This page is a snapshot, cut 13 September 2026, of a topic that moves. Below is the shape of the movement, read from the towns' own meeting records, and the way to get a view of it that stays current.
Overlay districts restricting what can be built near a drinking-water supply or a sensitive watershed: setbacks, impervious-surface limits, septic and stormwater conditions, and aquifer protection rules.Our definition of the class.
Snapshot taken 13 September 2026, based on 139 dated municipal records flagged as watershed protection overlay in Maine, spanning 58 municipalities. The topic moves; a later cut supersedes this page.
What this page is for one topic at state or national scope, told as a story: how it arrived, the shape of its movement, a dated snapshot of a moving record, and the door to a view of it that stays current. If it does not, write to us; that is what changes the next edition.
Source documents 3 of 19 on this page link straight to the town's own record. The rest are available on request. Ask for access.
The record starts in Presque Isle, 7 January 2013. Since then 58 Maine towns have put the topic on a meeting record, the newest of them Harpswell on 4 June 2026.
The last 90 days put 14 meetings on the record, down from 16 in the 90 days before.
It runs through the rooms where budgets and ordinances are made: Planning Board, Town Council and Select Board.
| Quarter | Meetings | Towns |
|---|---|---|
| Sep 2025 to Nov 2025 | 5 | 4 |
| Dec 2025 to Feb 2026 | 25 | 20 |
| Mar 2026 to May 2026 | 17 | 12 |
| Jun 2026 to Sep 2026 (current) | 14 | 8 |
a rolling 90-day total, so the right-hand point is that same 90-day count. The busiest stretch was Dec 2025 to Feb 2026, with 25 meetings.
And 43 more towns on the record, in an account view.
2 September 2026 · Brunswick
the agenda, on the town's own site Agenda — 2026-09-02
1 September 2026 · Falmouth Planning Board
the agenda, on the town's own site 2026.09.01 Planning Board — Agenda
3 August 2026 · Acton
the document, on the town's own site 20260521_PB
30 July 2026 · Auburn City Committees
the minutes, on the town's own site City Committees — Agenda 7 30 26
And 202 more companies.
The documents naming each, and the threads they sit in, are the account view. If one of these is you, those are your projects on the record. Ask and we will show you every one, and the towns around them, as they move.
Everything above is frozen at 13 September 2026; the topic is not. 88 more events on this topic carry no usable date and are counted, never dated. The counts follow where we read most: a town or a state absent here was not read at depth, and absence is not evidence the topic is absent there. A lighter-read state is not a ceiling; where you care about a region, pointing the system there is the first thing an account changes. How coverage is built, and its known limits: municipalalpha.com/methodology.
We track this topic continuously; this page is one cut of it, taken 13 September 2026. An account turns the snapshot into a working view: every town and every document behind these counts, the thread on each matter as it develops, word of new meetings as they land on the record, your own states and topics side by side, and the data itself when you want it in a table. The towns above are the taste; what each is actually deciding, funding or stalling is the read an account carries.
Also at this scope: Watershed protection overlay across the country. Counts and dates are computed from the documents on the record; the topic and its definition are ours. This page carries no subscriber content.
Towns on the record
58
Earliest
7 January 2013
Meetings, last 90 days
14 against 16 before
Snapshot cut
13 September 2026
A view that stays current