This document is reprinted with permission from "The Manager Plan in Maine" published by the Margaret Chase Smith Center for Public Policy. Copies of the complete book may be obtained by calling the Center at (207) 581-1646.

The Maine manager plan might be described as the channeling of direction and control over municipal administration through a single administrator appointed by and responsible to a small municipal legislative and/or executive body elected on a non-partisan basis. Over the last 70 years the manager plan has been applied extensively in Maine cities, towns, plantations and villages. (A plantation is a unit of general municipal government unique to Maine. Under general law, plantations have annual meetings and a somewhat simpler governmental organization than towns, but plantations are not accorded the broad home rule and ordinance powers of towns and cities). Today, nearly half of Maine's 490 municipal units operate under the manager plan or some variation of the manager plan.

The Maine manager plan can be classified into five general categories. The distinction between the categories is based upon the type of power available to the elected body to which the manager is directly responsible. These categories are: the council-manager form, the town meeting-council-manager form, the town meeting-selectmen-manager form, the mayor-council-administrator form, and the town meeting-selectmen-administrative assistant form. While technically an administrative structure within the town meeting-selectmen form of government, the administrative assistant category typically has not been considered a part of the manager plan. However, it does represent the administrative structure of a growing segment of municipalities within the state. A brief description of each form of government is as follows.

1. Council-Manager: All municipal legislative and policy determining powers are unified in a small elected council. The council hires a professional manager to carry out its policy and to direct administration. The manager is vested with administrative authority to appoint and supervise personnel, to prepare and administer the budget and to make recommendations and reports to the council. Ultimate responsibility for policy and administration, however, resides with the council. This form parallels the national model which also has numerous hybrids.

2. Town Meeting-Council-Manager: General legislative powers and policy-making authority are vested in a small elected council. Other such powers are retained by the town meeting. The manager is responsible to the council for town administration, and is accorded some degree of supervisory, appointment and budgetary authority. Under this form the council has less legislative and policy-making flexibility than does the council-manager council form of government.

3. Town Meeting-Selectmen-Manager: The town meeting is vested with general legislative and policy determining powers, while the board of selectmen under law may enact certain ordinances regulating vehicles and public ways, and under the authorization of town meetings may amend certain zoning ordinances (M.R.S.A., Sections 2151 (3) C and 4953 (3)). The elected board of selectmen is the executive body of the town. It retains ultimate responsibility for administration but hires a manager to carry out and oversee day-to-day operations. The extent and scope of managerial administrative authority varies. Since the town meeting is constituted only occasionally, the board of selectmen may exercise some discretion in interpreting town meeting policy between town meetings.

4. Mayor-Council-Administrator: Typically, these are variations on the mayor-council form of government with an elected mayor acting as chief administrative officer of the municipality and a full-time administrator working directly under the mayor.

5. Town Meeting-Selectmen-Administrative Assistant: Under the administrative assistant form of government, the town meeting is vested with general legislative and policy determining powers and final administrative authority rests with the board of selectmen unless superseded by local charter. The administrative assistant works directly for the board, although in many cases performing the same duties as a town manager.

The table shows the number of Maine municipalities within each form of government category, by selected population groups. Manager plan municipalities are defined as the Council-Manager, Town Meeting-Council-Manager, and the Town Meeting-Selectmen-Manager forms described above. As shown in the table, just over one-third of all Maine municipalities operate under the manager plan. Taking into consideration towns employing administrative assistants, nearly one-half of all Maine municipalities operate with some form of the municipal administrator.

* As reported by local government officials, 1991.

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