WILTON – Gov. John Baldacci came to town Tuesday to recognize a new health care software company in the Wilson-Bass property as a state-certified Pine Tree Zone business.

The program provides tax incentives to spur economic development in targeted areas of Maine where unemployment is relatively high and wages are relatively low.

The five-month-old ScoreHealth Inc.’s designation will enable the company to grow and create new opportunities, Baldacci said during a press conference.

Baldacci said the state has received 80 applications for the tax incentives, which are intended to improve the state’s economy by providing jobs.

ScoreHealth’s customers include hospitals in Maine, Massachusetts and Vermont, the University of Maine System, the Vermont State Employees Health Program, the Macon County Health Department in Illinois, the company said.

ScoreHealth uses the Franklin ScoreKeeper management model for health promotion, disease prevention and chronic illness that was started in 1974 by Dr. Burgess Record and his wife, registered nurse Sandy Record. The couple started the Western Maine Center for Heart Health, affiliated with Franklin Memorial Hospital in Farmington.

Sandy Record, a founder and vice president of ScoreHealth, said the software operation has gone from nonprofit to for-profit because people are interested in buying the program.

“Our dream is to be able to take this model and go worldwide with it,” Record said.

Primary investors in ScoreHealth are Central Maine Healthcare of Lewiston and Franklin Community Health Network.

The company’s software helps businesses and health care providers improve people’s health while reducing health care costs, said ScoreHealth President Denny Brennan.

As a congressman, Baldacci had visited the Bass-Wilson property in 1998 – after the Bass shoe manufacturer had left the building. At that time, developer Randy Cousineau had taken over the building. Today the building is in a Pine Tree Zone and is occupied by the Franklin County Head Start and Child Care Program, the Boiler Room, Leap Inc., Synernet, a medical transcription service and ScoreHealth.

With the Pine Tree designation, ScoreHealth intends to hire aggressively as it grows, Brennan said.

The company, with seven employees and three contractors, hopes to double in the next year, he said.

dperry@sunjournal.com

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