Overview
- The termination was announced at a Select Board meeting where Town Manager Michael Pardue read a letter from Police Chief Jo-Ann Putnam.
- Wells had signed onto ICE’s 287(g) program in April, which authorizes trained local officers to perform certain immigration-enforcement functions.
- The agreement had been on pause since May following sustained demonstrations and deep community division.
- Putnam wrote that she viewed the arrangement as a training opportunity but said the divide between politics and policing had become unclear.
- Wells was the only police department in Maine to participate in 287(g), a program that has grown nationally under the Trump administration.