Wiscasset has its next town planner.

Jamel Martin Torres will start work Dec. 8, according to a press release Monday from Town Manager Marian Anderson.

“I’m really excited to join the Wiscasset community. I’ve always been very fond of the Midcoast, and am excited to make my footprint on it,” Torres, of Waterville, said in a telephone interview Monday. Among Wiscasset’s strengths are its location, its natural resources and its village, he said.

“I feel that it’s a really beautiful town.”

Torres, 27, comes to Wiscasset from a job in the same city Wiscasset lost its last planner Misty Parker to, Lewiston.

As a health promotion coordinator for Healthy Androscoggin in Lewiston, Torres has assisted schools and communities in policy and environmental changes for healthy living, according to Torres and the release from Anderson.

Torres said one of his efforts, a “Complete Streets” policy he assisted the Lewiston-Auburn Pedestrian Committee with, was ranked fourth best in the nation. “Complete Streets” policies call for roadwork projects to take into consideration all uses of the road, Torres said.

Torres grew up in Denmark, Maine. He has a bachelor’s degree in environmental studies from the University of Vermont and a master's degree in community planning and development from the Edmund S. Muskie School of Public Service in Portland.

For the undergraduate degree, he minored in geospatial technologies, which involves mapping; that could be helpful to his work in Wiscasset, he said.

“Thanks for joining me in welcoming Jamel to the town of Wiscasset,” Anderson writes.

Wiscasset has been without a planner since Parker finished her service Oct. 3. Parker left to take a job as an economic development specialist for the city of Lewiston.