The Scarborough Town Council recently adopted a new open space master plan, which catalogs all open space in the town and identifies areas to target for conservation.

The plan, passed unanimously by the council last month, is Scarborough’s first open space master plan since the 1990s. It will aid the town’s effort to achieve its goal to have 30% of land in town under conservation by 2030.

When the council set the goal in June 2023, the town had 5,391 acres, or roughly 17%, of its land either under conservation or reserved for open space and public recreation. That number now stands at over 23%.

Work began on the plan last year with an open space ad-hoc committee that included representatives of a number of town committees, the council, the Scarborough Land Trust and Scarborough Fish and Game.

Town Councilor Karin Shupe was the council’s representative on the Open Space Committee and has been acknowledged as a “champion” of conservation and the environment by her fellow councilors. She credited the work of the committee over the past year.

“It’s great to work with residents who are just really passionate about this, who gave a lot of their free time to this process,” Shupe said in an interview Tuesday. “Not just meetings and emails but volunteering, going out into the community to get feedback.”

At the April 16 meeting, Councilor Jon Anderson thanked Shupe for her efforts as well.

“You’ve been a champion for a lot of the work related to conservation and open space, so thank you for your leadership and being part of this,” he said. “I’m looking forward to seeing (the plan) come to life.”

Then, Anderson asked, “When do we get to the fun part?”

Town Manager Tom Hall said staff have wanted to find a way to track the goal since it was adopted nearly two years ago.

“Tonight seemed like a very good time to unveil the barometer of what we’re using to measure our success,” Hall said.

Designed by Jill Deering of the Community Services Department and constructed by Tom Bernier of the Public Works Department, the new barometer resembles a fish tank. Sand will be filled whenever Scarborough conserves more land and will reach the top when the goal is completed.

“What I love about staff is that they are also very passionate about this cause. They got together and created that whole thing,” Shupe said. “It was just a great thing to see, and it was really rewarding, I think, for everyone to see how far we really already are in that 30-by-30 goal.”

More sand was added just after the display was revealed – earlier that evening, the council authorized $260,000 of the town’s Land Acquisition Reserve Fund to be used to conserve 60 acres of land off Grant Road.

Shupe did the honor.

“I’m just really excited that this was received so well and it was passed by the council unanimously,” Shupe said. “I’m really looking forward to seeing what we take out of it.”