LUBEC — The Board of Selectmen received a legal opinion Wednesday affirming that Chair Carol Dennison meets residency requirements, with board member Dan Wagner reading a letter from the town’s lawyer stating Dennison is eligible to hold office in Lubec.
“The evidence reviewed overwhelmingly suggests that Ms. Dennison is a qualified voter in the town of Lubec and maintains a place of principal residence in Lubec,” Wagner read from the letter prepared by John Hamer of Rudman Winchell in Bangor. “Ms. Dennison owns a year‑round dwelling in Lubec, and that address is used for federal, state and municipal purposes.
“The Select Board will make a final decision, but absent significant evidence suggesting otherwise, I recommend that the Select Board dismiss the complaint.”
Dennison, who was recently reelected as chair of the Board of Selectmen, said this was the second legal opinion supporting her eligibility.
She said Maine Municipal Association lawyers reached the same conclusion in 2016 and did not revise their opinion ahead of the Aug. 12 town elections.
Dan Daley, a former member of the Board of Selectmen, challenged Dennison’s eligibility at a board meeting last month, arguing she does not reside in Lubec and should not be permitted to hold office.
Dennison owns a house in town but lives with her husband, Ralph Dennison, who is Lubec’s harbormaster, at his home in Trescott.
Daley said this arrangement puts Dennison out of compliance with the town charter, which requires Board of Selectmen members to “maintain a place of principal residence in the town during their term of office.”
Hamer wrote that Dennison maintains her property on School Street in Lubec as a “voting residence,” which Maine law defines as a place where a person has established a fixed and principal home to which they intend to return when temporarily absent.
This explanation did not sit well with all members of the board or some in the audience.
“So you don’t have to live in the town of Lubec in order to run?” one audience member asked.
Wagner acknowledged that “the residency part is vague.”
“The ‘I intend to return’ is the problem,” board member Mark Kelley said.
Kelley argued that the standard could set a precedent for other property owners to claim Lubec residency even if their principal homes are elsewhere in Maine or out of state.
“Carol, you’re next door (in Trescott), but that doesn’t prohibit somebody from mirroring what you’re doing by living somewhere else,” Kelley said. “Maybe we need to define an actual limit in the charter.”
Board members Martha Howell, Wagner and Dennison and several audience members pushed back.
“I’m the only one that can come and go from that house,” Dennison said. “It’s not two months out of the year where I live in Portland. It’s every single day that I’m in Lubec.”
Wagner said he had seen enough evidence.
“Two law firms and the town (vote),” he said. “It’s just my opinion, but I consider it a done issue.”
