LUBEC — The Board of Selectmen accepted the resignation Wednesday of Shellfish Warden Russell Wright, who said he is willing to help train his successor.
The board voted 4-1, with Selectman Mark Kelley opposed, after which he said he thought Wright would appreciate his dissent.
A Lubec native, Wright has served as the town’s shellfish warden for 2½ years. He assumed the role after 25 years with the Maine Marine Patrol, part of the Department of Marine Resources.
In a telephone interview this week, Wright said he doubts a warden without law enforcement experience could handle the job.
“Clam diggers are not the easiest people to work with,” he said. “I spent a lot of years doing this job, not just for the town, but for the state. There’s a lot more to it than people know.”
If someone is caught harvesting without a license, Wright said the warden must be able to make arrests when necessary and write a summons that will hold up in court.
If district attorneys believe a summons is poorly executed, they will likely decline to prosecute.
Lubec has nearly 100 miles of coastline for a warden to patrol, and some clam flats are accessible only by boat.
“As big and important an industry as clamming is for Lubec, the town needs someone working 40 hours a week,” Wright said.
He said effective shellfish conservation requires closing flats for at least a year — ideally two or three — to allow depleted stocks to recover.
He added that maintaining those closures is impossible without consistent enforcement.
Wright said his interest in conservation led him to the job, and he has concerns about the future. He warned that if clamming disappears and fishing continues to suffer, some small coastal communities could be left with almost nothing.
Wright, who recently urged residents to report illegal clam harvesting, has been active in the town’s efforts to seed clam flats in partnership with the Downeast Institute. He said those efforts will need continued enforcement to succeed.
At Wednesday’s board meeting, Chairwoman Carol Dennison proposed hiring an hourly warden who would log which flats they visited each week.
She said the job would require 10 to 15 hours a week, starting at $20 an hour and increasing to $25 after the warden completes the three‑day, state‑mandated training.
Dennison also suggested creating a deputy warden position to support enforcement.
Shellfish Committee Chair Jennifer Brody said a deputy would help cover the flats when the warden is away and noted that harvesters have reported several people digging without a license, a problem she said demands stronger enforcement.
In other matters, Playground Committee Chair Alex Henry told the Board of Selectmen that parents at Lubec Elementary School have formed a parent‑teacher association and a second group called Friends of LES.
He said both informal groups plan to raise money for maintenance and improvements to the school’s playground, which has fallen into disrepair after years of deferred upkeep.
The school last had a PTA before the COVID‑19 pandemic, according to board members at last month’s meeting.
Henry said he and School Board member Richard Huntley plan to tour the playground behind the school to assess how much work it needs.
Henry also said the Playground Committee is expected to receive an update early next month on efforts to reach an agreement with the school administration over managing the community playground on South Street.
This story appears as part of a collaboration to strengthen investigative journalism in Maine between the BDN and The Maine Monitor. Read more about the partnership: bangordailynews.com/the-maine-monitor