Lincoln County Sheriff's Department started the new year by renewing two animal control contracts and hiring a new deputy. On Jan. 6, commissioners approved contract renewals with Damariscotta and Wiscasset for animal control. Commissioners also approved hiring Zach Smith of Boothbay. He will likely begin training at Maine Criminal Justice Academy in Vassalboro this February depending up availability, according to Sheriff Todd Brackett.

Commissioners also approved several purchase authorizations for the department, including a $3,240 maintenance and support agreement with IDEMMIA for finger print and digital scanning software; and payment to Coastal Electronics in Wiscasset for equipping two police vehicles. One payment was for $9,692.90; the other, $8,654.71.

Commissioners approved four Motorola Solutions in car and body camera subscriptions. One subscription is for $2,700. The other three totalled $8,100. Commissioners approved a $41,473.89 subscription renewal with Central Square RMS for a complete records system. "It's how we do our arrest, incident, and case reports. It's how we track our data," Brackett said. "Evidence, photographs are in there. Essentially, everything we do is recorded in the system."

Commissioners renewed Lexipol Training online's $3,357.90 fee. The program provides digitized Maine Criminal Justice Academy mandatory trainings.