March 9, 1988

The Westbrook City Council gave final approval Monday for sending six city officials at $939 each to a National League of Cities meeting in Washington this month. It wasn’t the unanimous, no-talk, quick vote of the council’s first approval Feb. 22, however. Questions came from audience members Llewellyn Randall, Warren Merrill and Bob Smith. The vote of approval was 6-1, with Alderman Malcolm Noyes opposed. By the same 6-1 margin, the council also approved sending Joan Reed, director of general assistance, to the same meeting, but paying only $350 of her costs.

In competition on their home turf, Westbrook High School’s Jazz Band and Jazz Choir were among 15 groups who earned the 28 or more excellence points needed to be eligible to compete in the Maine State Jazz championships later this month. Twenty jazz groups competed at Westbrook last week, including jazz combos, jazz choirs, jazz bands and show choirs.

Philip Spiller, the most active mayor Westbrook has had, at least in modern times, is fit to be tied. His left leg is in a cast that runs straight from thigh to ankle and makes it difficult, almost impossible, for him even to have a ride in an ordinary automobile. What’s worse, the cast is going to have to stay for six weeks. Spiller hurt his left knee when he fell at his home March 1. A handrail on stairs in a back shed at his Sawyer Road home pulled away from the wall as Spiller grabbed it for balance, and he fell onto his knee. He tore a ligament.

The Gorham Town Council has approved a 9.4 percent rate increase for users in the Little Falls Sewer Treatment System, barely six months after the system went online. The rate increase reflects increases in the operating budget by the Portland Water District for the system. Town Manager Donald Gerrish also said there is a serious problem with excess water coming into the system.

By the second or third week in April, Gorham will hire four new emergency critical care technicians. It is the first time that the town has ever paid its rescue workers. Several residents took issue with the plan at the March 1 Town Council meeting. “If Windham can run a volunteer rescue operation, I’ll be damned if the town of Gorham can’t. If the town lets this happen, they’re hurting older people,” said resident Don Hopkins. Fire and Rescue Chief Robert Lefebvre said the plan to hire four people does not lessen the importance of a volunteer rescue group. “I am in no way saying that the people we have now are not capable and dedicated. But it’s a case of the workload the rescue squad faces and the availability of people who are certified at the critical care level, which requires 800 hours of training.”

The towns of Gorham and Scarborough both have new, 105-foot ladder trucks, almost twins. They are 1988 Pierce Arrows. The company, once famous for its automobiles, makes one of the safest trucks, say fire officials. Gorham got a two-door cab, seating three up front and one at each side in open-air compartments in back.

March 11, 1998

A ladder truck from the Westbrook Fire Department and a police car escorted a motorcade from the Bradlees parking lot to Westbrook High School. Within the motorcade was a school bus with the Lady Blue Blazes, this year’s freshly crowned Western Maine Class A basketball champions. Dozens of fans, parents and students turned out for a victory celebration in the high school cafeteria. Westbrook beat Lewiston, 54-40, for the title.

General Electric Corp., one of the world’s biggest multinational conglomerates, plans to build a 520-megawatt, $200 million gas-fired electric generating plant on the Carmichael property off Saco Street in Westbrook. Representatives from GE and Genesis, formerly known as IPP and now proceeding in Westbrook under the name Westbrook Power, gave a preliminary presentation of their plans to a group of 16 Westbrook city officials and residents at the Masspower gas plant outside Springfield, Mass. A public hearing will be held in Westbrook March 26.

His long involvement in the effort to create a new east-west highway that will solve Gorham’s traffic glut is at an end, Bernard Rines announced at last week’s Town Council meeting. Asked to elaborate on his role in the project in the future, Rines offered three words, uttered slowly and clearly: “Interested private citizen.” Rines, 74,who was the unanimous choice as chairman of Gorham’s first Town Council 30 years ago, has been looked to as the voice of Gorham as committees and highway planners went through study after study. Rines, who has attended untold meetings for15 years or so on the proposal, has accumulated a mini-library full of plans and maps, regulations, studies and strategies. The give-and-take among individuals, towns involved, and federal and state transportation officials in determining the exact details of the route might take many more years, he said, adding that he’ll still be involved. “I’m not going to quit. I’m just going to quit being the chief negotiator. It may take 100 years, but it will eventually happen,” he said, saying that he doesn’t think he will have the opportunity to actually drive on the road in his lifetime.

The Gorham Planning Board has given preliminary approval to a 25-unit condominium subdivision off Route 25. The subdivision, known as Meadowland Condominiums, will have 12 two-family units and one single-family unit. Susan Duchaine, owner of the Design Dwellings development company, said if final approval comes as expected, construction could begin in late spring or early summer. For the fiscal year 1998, which ends July 1, 13 new house lots have been approved in Gorham. Some 49 new house lots from four different development proposals, including the 25 from Meadowland, are still under review. Only 68 new house lots were approved in 1997.

Gunnery Sgt. Joe Ledoux has retired from the U.S. Marine Corps after 20 years of service. He is the son of Harold Ledoux and Roberta Ledoux Lacroix, Westbrook, and is a 1977 graduate of Westbrook High School. Joe and his wife Carol have bought a home in Gorham.

David Sparks, Westbrook’s animal control officer, told the City Council this week that about 200 of Westbrook’s 1,000 or so dogs have not yet been licensed. The deadline was Jan. 31. Sparks has contacted some owners by phone, some in person and some by postcard. He can order them to court seven days after such a notice, but said he will not do so before April 15.