AUGUSTA – The city of Gardiner was amont five communities that received Maine Department of Agriculture Conservation and Forestry Coastal Community Grants.
Community resilience projects located throughout coastal Maine shared $151,000 from the program. The grants are part of the Municipal Planning Assistance Program’s mission to foster innovative and effective land use management approaches by providing technical and financial assistance to Maine municipalities, said a DACF news release.
“Coastal Community Grants help fund needed adaptation planning,” said Amanda Beal, DACF Commissioner. “The five selected projects are tackling issues Maine communities are facing today and raising awareness of future potential risks.”
Coastal Community Grant funding is made possible by the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, through Maine’s federal coastal zone management award to the Maine Coastal Program at the Department of Marine Resources. Each project involves regional or local-level partnerships, and each grantee provides a minimum of 25% in matching funds or services.
Gardiner’s Downtown Master Plan, “Reinforcing the City’s Connection to Nature,” was awarded a grant to expand on an earlier multi-agency collaborative effort to provide detailed planning and recommendations for flood and storm mitigation. The city’s downtown is on the banks of the Kennebec River at its confluence with Cobbosseecontee Stream, where chronic flooding and erosion damage to property and roads are becoming more frequent.
Other winners were the town of Phippsburg, “Collaboration to Increase Social Resilience in Midcoast Maine”; the town of Waldoboro, “Septic System Vulnerability Assessment Guidance Document Development and Case Study”; Southern Maine Planning and Development Commission, “Developing A Model Coastal Resilience Ordinance to Protect Maine’s Coastal Cities, Towns and Residents” and also the commission’s development of a checklist and technical standards for erosion and sediment control plans for municipal separate storm sewer system communities.
