Maine Association of Planners Announces 2024 Annual Awards for Planning Excellence

At their annual meeting on May 10th, 2024, at The Pub at Baxter Brewing, the Maine Association of Planners bestowed the following awards:

Plan of the Year – 2023 Bath Comprehensive Plan

North Star Planning and City of Bath for their plan entitled 2023 Bath Comprehensive Plan

This award goes to the highest merit of planning. The plan is original, transferable, of high quality, included public participation, and promotes actionable results. The awards committee was particularly impressed with the “Four Big Ideas” approach, which guides the plan and provides a framework for City staff to continue implementation work.

“Keep Bath welcoming, diverse, and livable; Support Downtown Bath as a destination; Reinvest in legacy assets; and Make Bath climate resilient”

These ideas resonate throughout the plan and a user-friendly implementation matrix. The Plan, adopted in October 2023, has already started to be implemented, and has proven to be a useful tool for the City. “The implementation plan is a straightforward, step-by-step section for City staff and volunteers to use. This section makes it easy to integrate the plan into City operations and budgets, and accountability is built in, with assignments to specific departments for oversight. This is not a plan that will just sit on a shelf.”

Project or Program of the Year – Rockland Downtown Waterfront Plan

The award goes to a project that is of unusually high merit and makes a difference in the lives of the people affected. The City of Rockland’s Downtown Waterfront Plan presents a vision for city-owned properties on the Downtown Waterfront of Rockland and an implementation roadmap for achieving that vision. The Plan was nominated not just for the product - a creative, timely, innovative, and elegant plan, but also for the carefully crafted and inclusive planning process that found consensus amongst a diverse set of community interests. This Plan already has served its purpose, by providing the project detail and community support important for advancing the project. Current efforts underway include being awarded two Community Action Grants to help fund preliminary engineering and the potential to be awarded $4 million of Congressionally-Directed Spending to help with Phase 1 implementation (one of the piers and the related landside facilities). Maine DOT Small Harbor Improvement Program has also committed to supporting the project with $500,000 in matching funds.

Professional Planner of the Year – Julie Dubovsky, Assistant Planner for Yarmouth

This award goes to a planner that has sustained a contribution to the field of planning through their distinguished practice. This includes increasing the public’s understanding of planning principles and the planning process as well as formulating and implementing plans and furthering the cause of planning.

Julie Dubovsky “Through her work to increase public engagement in the Yarmouth Comprehensive Plan Update, Julie has shown exceptional dedication, creativity, and excellence in planning. Thanks to Julie, knowledge of and participation in the comprehensive planning process greatly increased, resulting in a draft plan that better reflects perspectives and needs across the community, and wider understanding about the importance of planning across Yarmouth.” “When it comes to public engagement, Julie’s energy, ideas, execution, and smile are a model for planners on how to connect with your community.”

Citizen Planner of the Year – Richard Lyles of Ellsworth

The criteria for this award is that it is for a non-professional citizen who has made a distinguished contribution to planning. The nominee is dedicated to increasing the understanding of planning principles and the planning process, as well as the goals of the community. The award goes to a nominee that has promoted the cause and advanced the merits of planning.

Richard Lyles is recognized for his dedication to his community. He serves on the City of Ellsworth Planning Board, Ellsworth Comprehensive Plan Steering Committee, is the Vice Chair for the Ellsworth Housing Authority and a contributor to the citizen-initiated Ellsworth Green Plan. “Rick Lyles has professional experience as an educator, traffic engineer, and planner. He has been critical in providing technical assistance on Ellsworth’s current Comprehensive Plan update working diligently and engaging with both City staff and the consultants at BerryDunn.”

Lifetime Achievement Awards

Charles (Tex) Haeuser. Tex has been a professional planner in Maine since 1985. He is known for his thirty years of service with the City of South Portland. Tex became the Planning Director for the City of South Portland in 1990 and before that, he was an intern with South Portland Neighborhood Housing Services, a planner with the Southern Kennebec Planning & Development Council, and the first town planner in Cumberland. His work in South Portland included developing new traffic patterns and zoning for the Knightville neighborhood and the Mill Creek Shopping Area. He also played primary roles in developing the city’s Greenbelt Walkway system, funding public transportation through tax increment financing, promoting solar development and other energy-saving measures, and defending the city’s Clear Skies ordinance against a federal lawsuit. “Tex has been key to so many of the positive things that have happened here in South Portland over the past couple decades, most recently the solar array and LED street light projects come to mind,” City Manager Scott Morelli said. “We will certainly miss Tex and his expertise, but he’ll be able to retire knowing he has made South Portland a better place.”

Elizabeth Della Valle has over 40 years of distinguished professional planning experience in Maine. Her career in planning includes multiple roles with the Maine State Planning Office, serving as an adjunct professor of site planning and environmental planning at the University of Southern Maine, serving as a project manager and land use consultant for Market Decisions, Inc. and as planning assistant and then as Planning Director of South Portland. She also served as a past President of the Maine Association of Planners. She recently retired from the City of Sanford where she had been the Planning Director since 2015. “After 8 remarkable years of dedicated service to the City of Sanford, Beth Della Valle is embarking on a well-deserved retirement journey. Her dedication and passion for city planning have made a significant impact on the development of our beautiful city.”

Paul Schumacher has been an environmental and land use planner on Cape Cod and in southern Maine since 1982. He has served as Executive Director of the Southern Maine Planning and Development Commission since 1996 and recently announced his retirement. His focus has been on EPA Brownfields Assessment and clean-up programs, economic development planning and regional sustainability and resilience. Jan Williams, chairman of the SMPDC board, applauded Schumacher; “Paul is leaving a tremendous legacy. He, and his colleague Chuck Morgan, pioneered the use of government funds to clean up contaminated industrial sites in Maine all those years ago. It’s unlikely it would have happened without him. Since then he has been creative and relentless in developing new ways to encourage economic development in Southern Maine.”

MAP Lifetime Achievement Award Makes It Halfway Around the Globe

This past spring a new (and possibly unbeatable) record was set for giving out MAP Awards – one of our spring 2023 awards was finally delivered to Brian Kent just outside of Cape Town, South Africa!

While other plaques were sent in the mail, Brian now resides near family in Cape Town (where he grew up), in an area with no mail delivery. Fortunately, his decades of working and living in Maine meant that there he still has many connections with Maine friends and family, some who occasionally get to go visit him. We were lucky enough to have his friend Josh Royte (of TNC) take the award all the way to South Africa this past spring. Thanks, Josh, for making this happen!

Congratulations again on your MAP Lifetime Achievement Award, and best wishes from all your planning friends in Maine, Brian!

The Awards Committee included Joan A. Walton, AICP, Director Municipal Planning Assistance Program Bureau of Resource Information and Land Use Planning, Matthew Williams, City Planner for Ellsworth Maine, Keri Ouellette, AICP, Manager with BerryDunn and Scarborough Planning Director Autumn Speer.

These nominations were submitted to the Northern New England Chapter of the American Planning Association for consideration for a regional chapter award.