I subscribe to the City of Portland’s “City News Roundup.” Every Friday I receive an email that lists, among other things, volunteer opportunities on city boards and committees. As of last week, residents could apply for any of 21 seats on 11 civic bodies ranging from the Harbor Commission to the Rent Board. The city’s […]

Regarding Trevor Bickford’s trial in New York City (“Wells man who attacked NYPD officers with knife had untreated mental illness, attorneys say,” May 6), what a shame that four lives have been destroyed over the failure of the mental health care system in Southern Maine to adequately care for someone in dire need of resources, […]

I appreciate your comprehensive article about Portland Museum of Art’s proposed expansion, necessitating demolition of a designated, historic building. PMA, led by at least one elite earning an astronomical salary (despite a “voluntary” reduction), has lost its way. Museums exist to preserve primarily, in turn, to serve the populace. The proposed addition preserves nothing, serves […]

During the Portland City Council discussion about 142 Free St.’s precarious existence, viewers learned the majority of the council was likely to favor demolition, as the Portland Museum of Art wants. This final chapter mocks the building’s decades of pretension. Its columns echo temples at the origin of democracy (such as it was). Now the […]

The Washington Post article by Bogage and Weil, “Social security, Medicare finances looking grim,” does not fulfill the newspaper’s basic task of competently informing its readership. In the authors’ disingenuous effort to bolster the idea that we can’t afford Social Security, they leave out the most important detail – namely, the fact that we stop […]

Wouldn’t it be ironic if the Portland rail station relocated to its former site at the razed Union Station? The old station was an architectural splendor that should never have been demolished. The restoration movement began while the bulldozers were destroying the landmark. William Chanler Danvers, Mass.