Questions about packages and ports

[Sean Murphy]

I like to use the pkg_add -r feature of FreeBSD, however I have run into
a problem where the ports have a more current version of the app then
the package of the same app.

It seems the ports collection is updated more then the package
collection is this true?

Is the maintainer of a package and a port the same person?  Are they
responsible for updating the package and the port?

Packages will download dependencys required by the app does the ports do
this as well?