SABATTUS – For years, Sabattus patrolman Gil Turcotte has been dreaming up ways to make the lives of senior citizens a little easier.
He initiated the Eye on the Elderly Program in Sabattus, in which patrolmen have a roster of seniors they check in with weekly. This program involves home visits, neighborhood barbecues, home maintenance repair and something Turcotte calls TRIAD.
It stands for The Right Information And Direction, he said. “We simply try to get the right information out to the people who need it most.”
He recalled a Canadian lottery scandal that recently hit the mailbox of a senior citizen. “She called me up and asked me if it was legitimate,” he said. “It wasn’t, and I sent the letter to the FBI to be looked into. There are so many people out there trying to take advantage of these people, we just try to lend a helping hand.”
Recently, his dream has spread across a large portion of the county. “We have formed a Rural Androscoggin County TRIAD that encompasses Sabattus, Wales, Leeds, Greene, Turner and Livermore,” he said. Unlike Sabattus, each of the towns lack their own police department. “The Rural Community Action Ministries, the Androscoggin Sheriff’s Office, and SeniorsPlus are all involved this time,” he said.
With expansion comes growing pains, and that is something TRIAD is trying to prevent. “We want to get volunteers to do the same thing we do for our elders in Sabattus,” he said. “We have a great board and I think a lot of potential, however everything is being done by trial and error.”
Having met just a few times, the group has already scheduled a lawn sale from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. July 30 at St. Francis Church off Route 202 in Greene. “This is not a church-sponsored function,” he said. “They offered up the space and we took them up on it.”
To assist seniors without raising taxes, TRIAD plans on holding such functions as lawn sales and donation buckets to help fund their projects. “All proceeds will go back to the TRIAD,” Turcotte said. “If anyone wants to donate items that will go towards helping out their town, they can give me a call.”
He said he hopes one day that this program will be duplicated throughout the country. “I may be a bit of a dreamer and some may think I’m off my rocker, but I really have big plans. I want to see them happen for this program. One plan he was willing to disclose was TRIAD working with a cellular phone company to use outdated or recycled cell phones as a simple 911 device.
“You could only dial 911 on it in the chance of an emergency when someone could not get to the phone,” he said.
Will this ever happen? He doesn’t know but that doesn’t stop him from pushing the cause.
“You may be out-of-sight sometimes,” he said. “But seniors, you are never out of our minds.”
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