PATTEN, Maine — Patten Town Manager Gail Albert resigned in December because the Select Board asked her “to engage in illegal activities,” she said.
As of Friday, the Patten Select Board had not yet accepted Albert’s Dec. 23 written resignation. And despite her offer to remain in the role for several months to ensure a smooth transition for the town, officials abruptly cut off her access to email and town files without notice earlier this month.
“The position of Town Manager requires mutual trust, respect, and adherence to sound governance principles,” Albert stated in her resignation, which she shared with the Bangor Daily News. “Regrettably, those conditions no longer exist. Under the current circumstances, I do not believe that my continued service would be productive or appropriate.”
During a Jan. 6 Select Board executive session with town attorney Matt Raynes, Albert was asked to leave the meeting and told that the board would be in touch with her, she said.
“On Wednesday, I got up at 5 a.m., as I normally do, and went to check my email. I didn’t have access to my email or any of my files. I was cut off,” Albert said. “I guess that’s when I learned I no longer worked for the town.”
That same morning, Town Clerk Billie Doody sent an email to notify town leaders of Albert’s departure, and asked that any correspondence be sent to her or Deputy Town Clerk Willow Brooks until an official decision was made about the town manager position.
Brooks told the Bangor Daily News at the time that Albert had resigned, and the Select Board had not shared any details.
Repeated attempts to reach Select Board Chairman Gregg Smallwood last week and again on Friday were unsuccessful.
Vice Chairwoman Rae Bates said Friday that she had no comment on the matter.
Albert said during her tenure the board asked her to perform illegal activities related to town funds or actions that violated federal and state employment law.
“I was often in a moral and ethical dilemma because I was asked to engage in these behaviors from my supervisor, the Select Board, and I had to keep pushing back,” she said. “I’m a whistleblower and I was retaliated against.”
Albert first submitted her resignation in 2023, after the Select Board challenged her regarding the board’s requested monetary actions that would violate state law, she said.
“I was asked to transfer $12,000 of town funds to a nonprofit organization,” Albert said. “When I informed the board this action requires a vote by the town legislative body, I was met with combativeness and disregard for the law.”
The board told her she would have to meet with Select Board member Rae Bates and the town auditor regarding the matter, she said.
The board’s requested action would have been illegal according to state statute, she said.
Because there is pending litigation regarding several board actions, Albert said she could not share specific details.
“What I can share is that federal contract laws were broken by a Select Board member and there were a number of employment laws, age discrimination and sex discrimination, that the board also wanted me to engage in,” Albert said.
She decided not to resign at that time after she met with the board about her concerns. The group asked Albert to reconsider her decision and expressed a willingness to form a more constructive and cooperative working relationship, she said.
“At that time, I believed that such collaboration was attainable,” Albert said. “I remained steadfast in my commitment to serving the residents of Patten and was optimistic that our professional relationship could be strengthened.”
But things escalated again in 2025, she said pointing to the demolition of an asbestos-filled building.
On April 17, 2025, passersby saw two excavators dig into the town’s 1941 recreation center at 12 Founders St., collapsing the roof and creating piles of debris.
Smallwood, the Select Board chair, demolished the historic building despite Albert sharing a detailed 226-page Environmental Protection Agency 2024 report on the contamination, she said.
The assessment found asbestos in several parts of the recreation center, including 1,800 square feet of white siding, the rim around the boiler room door and two additional boxes of asbestos tiles in a second-floor room.
That April 17 demolition ultimately was found to have violated strict state environmental protection regulations, in part because it should have been carried out by a state-licensed asbestos removal expert, according to the Maine Department of Environmental Protection.
Smallwood did not have that licensing and his company, Smallwood Inc., demolished the building without taking proper precautions, state investigators said.
When Albert was hired, she ended a near four-year stretch when the town did not have a permanent leader at the helm.
During her nearly three years in the post, she implemented accounting practices that were not in place and started providing financial reports to the Select Board that had not previously been received, she said.
She also launched an employee performance review and development program and created policies and ordinances to make sure the town was in compliance with state law, she said.
But what’s really unfortunate to her is that the town just suffered a devastating fire and she was currently in the process of updating the emergency preparedness plan that dates back to the 1980s.
Her decision to resign was not made lightly, Albert said.
“Throughout my tenure, I have remained committed to the Town of Patten and its citizens and have consistently acted with integrity, professionalism, and in the best interest of the municipality,” she said. “It’s unfortunate for the town that it wasn’t allowed to continue.”
