BATH

The city’s proposed $15.25 million 2014-15 budget drew only two comments during a public hearing Wednesday night in the City Hall auditorium.

The first was a representative of Spectrum Generations asking for a $1,000 contribution to help with services it offers Bath residents.

The second speaker was man who asked city officials how Bath’s property tax revenues are doing given the number of vacant homes and properties with for sale signs, and a drop in the city’s census.

City Assessor Paul Mateosian said the city has struggled with some residential property values, but it has also occasionally gained property tax revenue — which covers not only residential but also industrial equipment. The basic valuation basis “is fairly stable and it has been for several years. It’s not growing,” Mateosian said, and “we’ve been relatively flat.”

City Manager Bill Giroux said the city is seeing a slight increase in the vehicle excise tax revenue because the economy is improving and people are buying cars. While the Legislature saved municipalities from proposed significant cuts in revenue sharing funds, Bath still will see a decrease in 2014-15. This is a trend the city has seen for the last six or seven years as it now gets about half of the revenue sharing it used to get.

“We were able to find some cuts in almost every city department,” Giroux said. “The fire department gets some bumps this year with safety and training concerns that we had, and so we put a little money toward that, but most of the departments are flat or are actually (have) cuts or very minor increases.”

The city is also making some capital investments in equipment. The council Wednesday granted initial passage of a bond, not to exceed $675,000 that would allow the city to purchase several pieces of equipment. That bond and the budget are up for final adoption at the council’s June 4 meeting.

The bottom line is the proposed budget — the city budget and its share of the Sagadahoc County and Regional School Unit 1 budgets — will trigger an estimated 2.99 percent increase. This would cause the current tax rate of $19.64 per $1,000 of assessed property value to increase to an estimated

$20.25 per $1,000 of assessed value.

After the less than 10 minute budget hearing, the council conducted a special meeting during which it granted initial approval for a contract rezoning for a proposed long-term-stay hotel at 139 Richardson St. The council is expected to vote on final approval of the contract zoning at its June 4 meeting.

The current Bath Shipyard Inn hotel, formerly a Holiday Inn, would be demolished as part of the proposed project by Bathres LLC, which has an agreement with the current owner to redevelop the site. In it’s place, Bathres proposes to build a four-story, 103- room Residence Inn Marriott hotel. It would be constructed in two phases.

Michael Gotto f Stoneybrook Consultants represented Bathres Wednesday and told the council a market analysis made Bathres want to put in 103 rooms — mostly suites — which they need four stories to accommodate, but would initially build 87 rooms, “so we’re stepping into that market.”

The project requires site plan approval, which the Planning Board granted Tuesday night, as well as contract rezoning the council also must approve. The contract zone would allow the applicant to reduce the front setback from 50 to 27 feet, the minimum front yard area from 20 to 12 feet and increase the maximum building height from 40 to 55 feet. As conditions of approval, the applicant will restrict signage and is looking at having about 40 percent of the signage allowed; will construct a sidewalk and esplanade along the Route 1 property frontage and grant a public access easement to the city for it; and construct a sidewalk along Redlon Road and will contribute $65,000 in cash to the city for improvements to the Route 1 corridor of the city’s choice.

dmoore@timesrecord.com

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