Replacement of the town’s aging town police boat had, along with other projects, been put on hold earlier this year due to uncertainty about whether Westbrook would sustain more state aid cuts. To keep a financial cushion that could be used to offset any new cuts in the final state budget deal, the Board of Selectmen (BOS) in May decided not to spend $200,000 in capital funds in the approved 2017-’18 budget. Now, with the terms of the state budget deal now known, town aid appears to be preserved and the selectmen voted on May 16 to allocate the funds to the highest priority capital project: the police boat.

Marine Patrol Officer Dave Russell said a recent inspection of the marine patrol’s 1987 22-foot Boston Whaler found it was at the end of its useful life.

“The evaluation found that it was time to replace the boat,” said Russell.

With the BOS allocation of $200,000 in already-approved capital funds towards a new boat, the request goes to a Town Meeting on Monday, June 18 for voter approval or denial.

Russell said that the new boat the town plans to purchase, like the current one, will be a commercial police boat design made by Boston Whaler. The proposed new marine patrol Whaler would be 27 feet long instead of the current boat’s 22 foot length and be equipped with a cuddy cabin enclosure to include a full windshield and sides; this feature will keep the crew and/or a rescued person protected from foul weather. A diver door feature will support swimmer rescues.

The boat’s shallow draft will allow it to patrol some of the town’s river areas. Russell plans to re-use most of the electronics equipment currently on the old boat.

“Over the past two years, the town has upgraded the electronics on the old boat. Most of this equipment—GPS, radio communications (four different ones), radar, and the AIS [automatic identification] system—can be transferred to the new boat,” said Russell.

Russell said that the marine patrol boat, usually crewed by two officers, is out on the water during the season about three or four days a week from about 11 a.m. until 5 p.m. The exact patrol period and days does vary based on holidays, tides, and weather.

“We work the tides, we work the weather,” explained Russell. “And we’re on standby for emergency boat rescues. We work closely with surrounding towns.”

Westbrook has more than 1,500 boat slips and on weekends, summer boaters make the town’s waters a destination, adding new boats to the mix.

“At the Duck Island anchorage, we could have as many as 100 boats on a weekend,” said Russell. “Last season we had over 1,000 contacts ranging from a slow-down or overloaded-boat warning, a check of boat registration, to a rescue. One of the things that is so valuable about this services is that when we see a potential issue such as a Sunfish or paddleboard being taken out by the tide, we can respond and tell them to come in to shore. We try to help them, to get them to come in to shore to keep them safe.”

Delivering that warning in a timely fashion also could mean avoiding what would otherwise become an emergency rescue.

Even if the town approves the $200,000 appropriation for the new boat, it will not likely be ready for service in this boating season. These boats, though already screened and listed on the state’s bid list, are built as a custom product to each town’s specifications. Once funding is approved, the boat must be ordered and then built.

“We will make do with using the current boat for this season,” said Russell.