The group has been asked to review the best uses for the city’s historic fire station and its public works garage, which have been neglected for decades and are in serious need of rehabilitation.

The $5 million project — rebuilding a 2,000-foot stretch of Water Street in Hallowell — is scheduled to begin in April, and the project is being put out to bid at the end of this month.

Rebuilding Water Street downtown is due to begin in around 90 days, and the state Department of Transportation hopes the open house provides answers to residents’ or business owners’ final questions.

The council will review ordinance changes related to recreational, adult-use marijuana and will consider language that creates zoning, permitting and licensing standards for cannabis use.

Among state proposals was one in 1975 that called for widening Water Street, which Hallowell’s then-mayor lambasted as a ‘perfect scheme to murder the city.’

The proposals stipulate the cost of an adult-use cannabis license would be $250 and only three recreational marijuana retail sellers would be allowed simultaneously in Hallowell.

The move of the historic Dummer House in Hallowell would leave an empty property for the city to construct a new municipal parking lot ahead of April’s Water Street reconstruction project.

The reading of “A Christmas Carol” and donations received benefited the Hubbard Free Library in Hallowell.