Recent events costing the town of Windham more than likely hundreds of thousands of dollars is causing me to write this column. Make no mistake about it being an easy column to write because it’s high time for new management instead of the status quo that Windham has had for over the past decade. What’s even worse is that Windham has a divided council that undoubtedly will cause some serious problems in the future of Windham.

Starting in 1970, I was stationed at the U.S. Army Headquarters, Europe located in Heidelberg, West Germany in the Equal Opportunity and Modern Professional Army Division. I think that should be self-explanatory with the subjects we dealt with so my most important fact that was in the early seventies. Move ahead to around 2010 and one would like to think that a town like Windham wouldn’t have any problems like equal opportunity and sexual harassment. It’s sad for me to say it did although the very causes of that problem were brought forth by the 2004 Windham Police Department Study conducted by the Maine Chiefs of Police Association. And that’s only the tip of the iceberg as to what’s happened in Windham.

Another two examples are the expiration of a tax increment financing zone (about eight years ago) and the nearly $600,000 over budget of Windham’s General Assistance account a few years ago. Unfortunately, the state of Maine is just as dysfunctional for allowing this to happen without any penalties and I have to blame everyone in the Maine Legislature for that. What’s even more amazing is that I cannot find where the Windham Town Council voted to cover that $600,000 deficit. If the town manager did it on his own, he took money from other parts of the budget. As far as I am concerned, if that is what happened there was a large sum of money hidden in the budget that could have been used elsewhere. Maybe it’s time for a serious budget reduction in the coming fiscal year.

The 2004 study of the Windham Police Department clearly shows where the problems were in the department and nothing was done to successfully correct some of those problems. If the town manager had relieved the chief of police of his duties and replaced him with someone to correct the problems in the police department there is no doubt that the town of Windham would not have had two recent lawsuits against the town, especially one that could be filed for sexual harassment. What’s worse is that there has been other lawsuits as well.

I am also wondering if the North Windham sewer project will be similar to what happened to Windham taxpayers because of the South Windham sewer project that cost us $2 million plus interest by extending a pipe from the Westbrook sewer treatment plant through Gorham to South Windham. Keddy Mill was supposed to be torn down and replaced with 85 condos. All Windham received was a $2,000,000 bill from the Portland Water District and the developer fled town, more than likely never paying a dime toward the sewer. What bothers me is that there seemed to have been only one law firm involved so do you care to guess which one?

The Windham Town Council must place the highest priority on establishing an annual evaluation procedure for the town manager in writing instead of the good old boy pat on the back and either a pay raise or retirement boost. At this time I don’t think that the town council could rate a bag of potato chips without arguing and tempers flaring. I have no doubt Windham has had councils for years that rode on the back of the town manager instead of leading the town as they should have. The town manager annually engaging the auditors proves that.

Lane Hiltunen of Windham wonders how many high school students think that a slide ruler is the dictator of the playground.