A Sneak Peek at Studies

In this brief episode of 'Potholes and Politics,' hosts Rebecca Lambert and Amanda Campbell dive into key legislative updates and study bills of municipal interest in Maine. They discuss the recent legislative adjournment, the upcoming issue of the Maine Town and City magazine, and various significant study bills, including those on property taxation, unfunded mandates, unregulated stormwater pollution, and school funding. The episode also touches on their upcoming trip to the NLC Staff League Summer Conference in Minneapolis and the importance of networking with municipal colleagues nationwide. Tune in for a comprehensive overview of current legislative efforts and future plans to address critical municipal issues.

Transcript

Welcome everyone to this episode of Potholes and Politics, Local Maine Issues from A to Z. I am your co-host, Rebecca Lambert. And with me as always is my amazing colleague, Amanda Campbell. Say hello, Amanda. Hello! Last week we talked about the budget and said goodbye to our friend and coworker, Rebecca Graham, also known as Grambo.

But the big news for now is that the legislature officially adjourned, until the second regular session, or if the governor is to call them back into a special session. And the second regular session is scheduled to reconvene on January 7th, 2026. Our team is hard at work pulling together information on bills of municipal interest.

So be on the lookout for our July issue of the Maine Town and City [00:01:00] magazine because that issue will be the legislative takeover issue and it will detail all things legislative from the first session. It will include the MMA platform update, carryover bills, legislative studies, or working groups.

You name it, that magazine issue will have it. So this week, Amanda and I want to talk about a sampling of the study bills that are in play. Some have been enacted, some have been carried over to the second session and also what potentially could be worked on in the coming months. So it won't be all of the studies, but a few that, uh, we thought we should draw your attention to.

So without further ado, Amanda, what's piqued your interest in the study bills? Well, I think of, of great interest to, certainly our team and the LPC and likely members, is the Senate President Bill, LD 1770, which is going to create the real estate property tax relief task force. This group is created by this bill and, is, [00:02:00] it's interesting because the creation of this bill language was happening in tandem with the LPC's own tax working group, which was happening, while we didn't know that this was happening with the Senate president. So it's kind of neat that, folks were of the same mind, to think about the property tax issues that are happening around the state. And so this, group will form any time now it was passed as an emergency.

So they have 30 days to create, to make appointments and figure out who will be, sitting on this task force. They're due to provide an interim report to the taxation committee in January of 2026, and then a final report in December of 2026, with the primary duty to be determining the source of the problem with property taxation, which is interesting.

I find the word “problem” interesting in that description, just because I'm not sure that property taxation is problem in total, so, we'll see what happens. But the group… The source of the problem, huh? Exactly. Because there's probably [00:03:00] just one source. Agreed. So the, the group is going to, contract with a research entity that will provide analytical support and look at data that drives property taxes like valuation.

What types of properties are being valued? How are they being valued? Is it a municipal assessor? Is it a contract assessor? Those types of, of data points, which will be easy for this entity to find because all of that information is published by Maine Revenue Services annually in their Municipal Valuation Return Statistical Summary.

That information anyone can find right on the Maine Revenue Services website. And look at, both town wide, countywide, statewide figures, for all of those types of things. But they're also gonna be looking at things like median income of homeowners to compare it with some of that, property tax specific information they're gonna look at.

Data for the property tax fairness credit, tax relief deferral programs, both statewide [00:04:00] and local, and how those are being utilized by property taxpayers and by municipalities. One thing that is also interesting is one of the duties is to help determine how municipalities are using their tax relief funds from the state, which would include revenue sharing.

And while the MVR, the municipal valuation return, which municipal officials have to complete on an annual basis after they commit their taxes, doesn't really allow for an explanation of how they used their state funds because I think it's assumed that those funds are being used to directly offset the property taxes. One would hope.

Right. But it doesn't allow for any sort of explanation. There's just a line where you plug that number in. And likewise, through my work of looking into our fiscal data across municipalities, those local audits and budget documents don't provide any explanation information either.

It's just a number in your revenue line saying this is what we're bringing in against what we're [00:05:00] sending out. So, it'll be interesting to see how this entity determines that data, who they're gonna ask, how many municipalities are they gonna ask and what the answer's gonna be when they are asked, how do you use your state money?

Because then, farther down in the, the duties, one is to develop methods to ensure municipalities use their property tax relief for its intended purpose, which is all well and good, but even if a municipality is using their, of course, they're using it to offset property taxes, but increased local spending, there's no talk about that. So, it'll be interesting to see what they find, across all of these, data points that they're looking for information at both county and municipal level. Recognizing the fact that county taxes do impact the local property taxpayers as well.

So there are several appointees that will come to the table. Two for sure who are municipal officials and one additional member of the public who has, assessing [00:06:00] and property valuation knowledge, which I assume, I guess suppose could or could not be a municipal official. So it'll be interesting to see what, what comes of this in their initial six months of work after they get going.

So, sounds like a lot of work. It, it is a lot of work. But the property tax, I mean the taxation committee was really excited about this bill. It went through, several revisions. They made a lot of collaborative, collective edits and amendments to this, to bring it to a place where they were able to pass it out with a unanimous vote, in support of the bill.

It'll be very interesting to see going forward, how the committee receives the interim report, and of course, what that interim report says. So mm-hmm. Very interesting indeed.

Cool. Yeah. So that one's, currently going on. Do you have one that's been approved and enacted? Well, kind of in that same vein, I picked out one that I feel was important, and it was a carryover study. It was LD 6 [00:07:00] 34, and that was a resolve to create a study group to examine the reduction of unfunded and outdated municipal and county mandates.

This group would be made up of a representative, like a member of MMA and also a member of the Clerks Association and six municipal officials from varying population categories. The bill indicates that an interim report would need to be submitted by December 2025 with a final report due in November 2026.

And further, they're authorized to submit legislation in 2026 or 2027. Being carried over, the first report, it doesn't seem like it would be feasible for them to do the work and have a report by December 2025. So, I'm thinking that would probably need to be amended in the second session to reflect that.

Or I guess it could probably die too. With all the unfunded mandates to municipalities and schools, I'm really hoping that this study grows legs because I think it has potential to bring [00:08:00] light to a very real problem of unfunded mandates. Certainly are a lot of them. Right. Um, with that said, though, I also overheard a conversation at the State House that when studies were done, oftentimes it was just to give the appearance that something was being done to address the issue, but that nothing typically gets done with the results.

So, I'm hopeful that these studies don't fall into that category because both of them, I think, would be a real eye-opener for everyone involved. I agree. What else have you got? So, my, the other bill that I chose to talk about is one that, was also carried over, on the study table and had a lot of discussion.

This is, LD 646, which, began as a resolve establishing the commission to study unregulated storm water pollution. And had a lot of discussion in committee. I worked with a ton of our colleagues and stormwater stakeholders, municipal stakeholders, to bring to the committee that a lot of the work that this commission is [00:09:00] calling for is already being done.

That this was duplicative, and that it wasn't necessarily going to be able to provide the data that the proponents are looking for. They were, they did change the word unregulated to unmanaged, which is better in one way but not in another, because that provides concern about the impact on rural areas where stormwater is currently unmanaged and whether or not any results, any resulting legislation from this study potentially would bring about new regulations for the unregulated communities that, currently we have, 30-ish, communities who are MS4, which is the Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System, permitees in the state. And so, they are under rigorous and very strict rules and regulations to manage their stormwater runoff in those communities.

And in communities that are [00:10:00] not under one of those permits, there is no regulation. And so, while this study would look to ways that that runoff could be managed in those communities, if that were to be directed, as a mandate, let's say, you know, those smaller communities just do not have the capacity either financially or personnel wise or knowledge wise to, to undertake that sort of task.

And really what, what's interesting is that currently DEP has been undergoing, for the last year and a half, the revision, complete overhaul and revision of the Chapter 500 stormwater rules. And you sort of get the feeling that people who didn't necessarily get what they wanted out of the chapter 500 rules are looking to sort of pave the way for those goals in this bill. So, we'll see what happens. I think that there's seriously, the most serious concern is that proponents [00:11:00] of this bill want further strengthening of the Chapter 500 rules, which are already laborious and, you know, over a hundred pages to, to get through with lots of reporting, as I've alluded to. 

But it doesn't call for regulation of anything over an acre of land. And proponents of this bill want runoff from parcels that are under an acre to be managed, which provides a whole, you know, starts a whole bunch of problems, not only for municipal officials, but for developers and, anyone involved in land use really, that.

Any development creates runoff. And so, making more regulations is just not always the best idea. So we'll see where that goes. It's, it is currently sitting on the study table. It was not funded, by, it was not moved off the study table, at the end of the session. So it's sitting there until, till we come back.

So we'll see what happens. So it was it carried over? Yes. Does that mean it was carried over? Okay. It was carried over on the study table. [00:12:00] Yep. Interesting. Indeed.

So, the, the last one that I want to mention is the study, which was LD 318. And it was a resolve directing the Maine Education Policy Research Institute, also known as MEPRI, to study and identify the cost model parameters used when simulating the impacts of school funding. The study must include special education, regional adjustments and per pupil amounts.

And this is in an effort to more adequately fund public education. MEPRI is also gonna look into, to see if more information is needed from individual school districts when determining per pupil cost for high cost out of district special education placements. There was a work session held for several bills before the education committee, and they chose to roll five of those bills on that docket for the day.

The MMA platform bill LD 933, the special education bill, was one of those bills and they rolled them [00:13:00] into a concept draft that created this resolve. So, this study will be a very comprehensive, deep dive into the essential programs and services model. Also commonly called the EPS formula. And it has the potential to change the way school funding is calculated, and hopefully in a good way.

As many listeners know, the formula is really complex and when one thread is pulled, it has the potential to create a ripple effect of consequences. I've had the opportunity to serve on the MEPRI Steering Committee, and they are some really intelligent and talented individuals, and I'm looking forward to see what comes out of this work.

It hasn't been studied, the formula hasn't been studied in detail, I think since the early two thousands, so it's definitely time for a look a, a deep dive into this. The past year, MEPRI did do a study on the EPS formula, which will be used to inform this next phase. And from my understanding, it will simulate [00:14:00] changes to the formula to maybe determine if alternative factors should be considered or altered to better and more equitably fund public education.

It's also important to mention that the EPS formula is not intended to cover the full cost of public education. But to cover the minimum necessary to achieve the learning results with local dollars, making up the difference. And it's also worth noting that municipalities have been called out for having runaway spending.

But with the study on unfunded mandates, if you couple together the impacts of unfunded mandates for schools as well as municipalities, you can really see that the impacts to the property taxpayers, it. It's just can increase in, layers over time to end up being really large increases and I think more eyes on that problem will help draw attention to that because I think you know it's death by a thousand cuts.

I think it's interesting that all at the same time, people are looking to study property tax and how it's done. School [00:15:00] funding, how it's calculated, the mandates, what they are, how they exist, and what the impacts are and, and that all of those studies are sort of coming on board at the same time. Yeah.

Which I think is indicative of the fact that hopefully people understand, are starting to understand that things need to be adjusted a little bit in order to make, to make things work as effectively as they can and should. Absolutely. 

So later this week, Amanda, you and I are headed to Minneapolis. Yes.

Looking forward to this trip. Yes, it is the NLC Staff League Summer conference. This year's theme is resiliency and there's a lot of advocacy and AI workshops I saw on the schedule to attend. It should be really interesting and informative. Yeah, I, I remember coming home from last year’s trip to Austin with pages full of great ideas and things from the other states, and it's fun to meet the folks who are us in other leagues and see how they do [00:16:00] things and,

steal ideas at will. So, yeah. Yeah. It is always a good time networking with our colleagues from municipal leagues across the country, and it's exciting to see those familiar faces from year to year that you remember. And it kind of puts into perspective that the issues that communities face across the country are similar to the ones that we face here in Maine, just on varying scales.

And that the, the frustrations and, feelings that we are feeling are being felt by those same folks in the leagues all across the country. So it's, you know, we've got each other here, but we've also got them everywhere, so. Right. It's, it's fun to be around them all for, for a few days. Yeah. And they're always just an email or a phone call away, so it's really, it's nice to make those connections.

It's fun too, just to be able to compare that to be having been a municipal official. If when I was a town clerk, if I needed help, I could email another town clerk just like that and get the help that I needed. And so it was, it's cool to see that that same sort of [00:17:00] help tree follows along into the, to the support systems for the municipal officials too.

So. Absolutely. It's a, it's a good time. Good bunch of people. Yep. Well, there we are then. There we are then. Another episode wrapped up. Short and sweet today, but jam packed full of good information. Absolutely. Well, I will, see you on an airplane. Yes, you will. Take care everyone. Thanks so much.