Town planner Maureen O'Mara leads Cape Elizabeth primer on website tools
June 21, 2026 | Cape Elizabeth, Cumberland County, Maine
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Maureen O'Mara, the town planner for Cape Elizabeth, led a public "town basic information access primer session" to show residents how to use the town website to find agendas, minutes, videos, ordinances and property records.
The session aimed to help residents use three main tools on the site: the meetings calendar (for agendas and supporting documents), the meetings dashboard (to follow specific committees), and MapGeo (the town's GIS mapping tool). "This is the town basic information access primer session," O'Mara said as she described the session’s purpose.
O'Mara demonstrated how to use the meetings calendar to find a council agenda for a particular date and noted that council agendas are typically hyperlinked to supporting documents. She explained that some meetings are videotaped and posted about two days after the meeting so residents can watch recordings and review minutes if they could not attend in person. Using the planning board as an example, O'Mara showed where memos, staff materials and the meeting video are posted.
On the Government tab, O'Mara pointed residents to the town's ordinances and called out the Zoning Ordinance (Chapter 19), noting it is more than 200 pages long, includes a table of amendments since 2000, and shows the ordinance effective date on the front page. She cautioned that MapGeo is updated only annually and therefore some layers may be dated; MapGeo does, however, allow searches for property record cards, assessor maps and deeds. Demonstrating the tool, O'Mara opened the Winnick Woods parcel and showed that many town-owned conservation parcels include deed restrictions and that deeds are available for review on the site.
Webmaster Susanna Mizzell Hubbs took over the demonstration to show the Granicus subscription service the town implemented in August. Hubbs walked through the homepage pop-up that invites visitors to enter an email and subscribe to alerts by topic — for example, "latest news," community events, meeting agendas or building permits — and noted that prior Mailchimp subscribers were migrated into the new system. "Once you are subscribed, if at any point you want to cancel, in the email there's an option to unsubscribe," Hubbs said.
Hubbs also explained how to use the boards-and-committees pages to contact committees. A single "email the committee" link routes messages to the staff contact and committee members; for the planning board the staff contact shown is Maureen O'Mara. O'Mara reminded attendees that municipal communications are public records and advised residents to assume messages could be publicly available: "Anytime you email a committee member, before you hit send, imagine you're sending it to your grandmother," she said.
The session included a brief question period but no formal votes or motions. Presenters encouraged residents to explore the site, use the subscription service to receive timely updates, and review posted documents and videos to track local government business. The session concluded with thanks from O'Mara and Hubbs and no formal action taken.
The session aimed to help residents use three main tools on the site: the meetings calendar (for agendas and supporting documents), the meetings dashboard (to follow specific committees), and MapGeo (the town's GIS mapping tool). "This is the town basic information access primer session," O'Mara said as she described the session’s purpose.
O'Mara demonstrated how to use the meetings calendar to find a council agenda for a particular date and noted that council agendas are typically hyperlinked to supporting documents. She explained that some meetings are videotaped and posted about two days after the meeting so residents can watch recordings and review minutes if they could not attend in person. Using the planning board as an example, O'Mara showed where memos, staff materials and the meeting video are posted.
On the Government tab, O'Mara pointed residents to the town's ordinances and called out the Zoning Ordinance (Chapter 19), noting it is more than 200 pages long, includes a table of amendments since 2000, and shows the ordinance effective date on the front page. She cautioned that MapGeo is updated only annually and therefore some layers may be dated; MapGeo does, however, allow searches for property record cards, assessor maps and deeds. Demonstrating the tool, O'Mara opened the Winnick Woods parcel and showed that many town-owned conservation parcels include deed restrictions and that deeds are available for review on the site.
Webmaster Susanna Mizzell Hubbs took over the demonstration to show the Granicus subscription service the town implemented in August. Hubbs walked through the homepage pop-up that invites visitors to enter an email and subscribe to alerts by topic — for example, "latest news," community events, meeting agendas or building permits — and noted that prior Mailchimp subscribers were migrated into the new system. "Once you are subscribed, if at any point you want to cancel, in the email there's an option to unsubscribe," Hubbs said.
Hubbs also explained how to use the boards-and-committees pages to contact committees. A single "email the committee" link routes messages to the staff contact and committee members; for the planning board the staff contact shown is Maureen O'Mara. O'Mara reminded attendees that municipal communications are public records and advised residents to assume messages could be publicly available: "Anytime you email a committee member, before you hit send, imagine you're sending it to your grandmother," she said.
The session included a brief question period but no formal votes or motions. Presenters encouraged residents to explore the site, use the subscription service to receive timely updates, and review posted documents and videos to track local government business. The session concluded with thanks from O'Mara and Hubbs and no formal action taken.
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