BRUNSWICK

Town councilors endured a trio of critics this week during the Tuesday meeting’s public comment period.

For nearly 20 minutes, three constituents told the council where, when and how they had gone wrong in political and environmental issues during the previous several weeks.

Two speakers called for increased scrutiny of Brunswick Landing as it is redeveloped by Midcoast Regional Redevelopment Authority, or MRRA; a third spoke of the irony in taking a stand on campaign finance.

Pembroke Schaeffer, of Crestview Lane, was the first to take the podium, and spent five minutes blasting the council for its Feb. 4 resolution in support of a constitutional amendment to reverse the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision known as Citizens United.

In its 2008 ruling, the Court removed limitations on the amount of money corporations can spend to influence elections.

Schaeffer’s rebuke largely was a rehash of what he had posted a day earlier on his blog, blasting the council for allegedly overstepping its local authority and taking a political position on a national issue.

He referred to a Jan. 22 council meeting, during which the board voted unanimously to support the town’s hiring of law firm Preti Flaherty to lobby Augusta on Brunswick Landing redevelopment and other issues.

“The corporation that is (the town of) Brunswick is spending money on political free speech as if it were a natural person,” Schaeffer said, “but I suppose the irony is lost on … most of the town.”

Subsequent speakers Jackie Sartoris, a former town councilor, and former marine resources committee member John Lemont, urged councilors to pay more attention to environmental standards as MRRA redevlops the former Brunswick Naval Air Station.

“The highest standards in Maine are at the local level,” said Sartoris, a frequent MRRA critic. “Just because state law may not entirely apply here … our rules apply to the base redevelopment.”

She favors fast-tracking local zoning to allow MRRA to market areas of Brunswick Landing that already have been built up, but also that undeveloped land be protected as much as possible.

Lemont echoed those concerns, saying base development “is overlooking our local rules.”

He argued that a new storm-water plan is needed to keep contaminated soils on the former base from leaching into shellfish harvesting areas on Harpswell Cove.

jtleonard@timesrecord.com