Westbrook Assistant City Administrator Bill Baker apologized Tuesday for a profanity-laced email he wrote in February, mocking a number of residents, business owners and community volunteers.

In his email to Mayor Colleen Hilton, made public Monday at the Westbrook City Council meeting, Baker said he was writing what he “wanted to say” in response to an inquiry from Michael Shaughnessy, the president of the Friends of the Presumpscot organization, about a recently installed sculpture project along the riverwalk.

“This is the dumbest (expletive) idea I’ve ever heard,” he said. “I know they say art is in the eye of the beholder, but really, you want to clog up the riverwalk with (expletive) bird houses that some little (expletive) will vandalize in the first ten minutes.”

The email was read publicly Monday by Westbrook resident and business owner Deb Shangraw. She said she obtained a series of city emails from a recent Freedom of Information Act request pertaining to budgetary issues, which included the email from Baker.

Baker sent an apology letter Tuesday to those he named in the email, writing he was “deeply sorry and embarrassed.” He characterized the email as a “self-inflicted wound made possible by my reckless written words.”

Among those named in his email are Westbrook artist Caren Michel, who is president of the city’s Arts & Culture Committee; James Tranchemontagne, the owner of the Frog & Turtle restaurant; Shangraw, who owns Emerald Property Management; City Councilor Mike Sanphy, and My Place Teen Center Executive Director Donna Dwyer.

In the email, he says, “collaboration is not possible,” because Michel will “be blaming the city for not maintaining those pieces of (expletive) five minutes after she says she supports them being there,” and that Tranchemontagne and Shangraw will “be asking what public money paid for them.”

The February email that prompted Baker’s response was from Shaughnessy, who asked city officials for their assistance in supporting the art project for his class at the University of Southern Maine.

Baker also mocked Dwyer in the email, in which he says she “will argue that (the sculptures) need to be bigger and must have kitchens to feed the 137 kids a day she feeds – by they way you will need to build her stipend in to the cost of construction – she is due 15 percent on the cost of material and labor for anything built within three blocks of the teen center.”

In his apology, Baker called his email a “highly inappropriate, but satirical parody.”

“The improper purpose was to lighten the mood or vent some frustration in the wake of constant taunting from a small group of mean spirited people with a harmful political agenda led by James Tranchemontagne,” he said in his apology.

Baker said Tuesday that he regrets sending the email. He said he has lived by the words, “If you don’t think stupid, you won’t say stupid,” for 40 years. He said that since the email was read on Monday, he has received a number of emails of support.

In his apology letter, he also said, “I live and breathe my commitment to showcase this city in a positive light.”

“Those words are not a reflection of how I think, how I speak, or how I treat people publicly or privately,” he said about the email.

Referencing Tranchemontagne and Shangraw, he wrote in his apology that he “handed the people who publicly denigrate the City, the Administration and hardworking public employees the opportunity to do more damage.”

Shangraw said Tuesday morning that Baker’s comments are “despicable” given the fact that this email is “viciously attacking and in some cases inferring wrongdoing, the very citizens that pay his salary and/or he is supposed to serve.”

Hilton said Tuesday that following the email, she called Baker, stating she was “worried” about him. She called the email “atypical” for Baker.

“It was a private email addressed to me expressing a satirical commentary on some very frustrating situations,” she said, adding that she asked Baker if he needed time off. “I told him that it’s not okay.”

Hilton said she has “absolutely no” intentions of asking for Baker’s resignation.

At last week’s City Council meeting, Hilton publicly thanked Baker and the other involved parties for their work on the art project. Baker said he never received an email response from Hilton.

Tranchemontagne, who is also the vice president of the Westbrook-Gorham Community Chamber, is also calling for Baker to be removed from his position on the Downtown Westbrook Coalition.

In an email to the coalition Tuesday morning, Tranchemontagne said he hopes the coalition will remove Baker from its leadership, and replace him with a representative from the chamber. While Baker is responsible for spearheading the group, he is not a member of its executive committee.

“As a small business owner, in the downtown, we cannot have this type of leadership and I believe it damages your group reputation,” he said, adding that he plans to mail Baker’s email to every downtown business.

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