Bud Lewis of Auburn, a longtime engineer with Bates Manufacturing, has known Mill No. 5 for half its life. It’s arguable that nobody knows the building as intimately as he does.

Recently, Lewis recommended razing the 365,000-square-foot mill. It’s unique, he wrote to the Sun Journal, but its foundation is unsettled, its ceiling cracked, its infrastructure corroded. He shared these concerns with Lewiston’s mill task force, as well.

Lewis’ views were unexpected, and welcome. They injected some reality regarding Mill No. 5, which some time ago turned from an old mill into a potential convention center, or other lofty ideal. Lewis reminds us it is still just a mill, one worn down after a century of hard work.

This is the reality of Mill No. 5. It is not one universally shared, however, by dozens of other historic properties around Lewiston-Auburn with strong potential for re-use.

In April, lawmakers will address LD 262, which would create tax credits for historic renovations. Developers who qualify would, in broad strokes, have 25 percent of their investment returned as an incentive. In other states, proponents say, similar vigorous credits have worked wonders.

Nowhere are these credits needed more than Lewiston-Auburn, which has some 32 buildings that could qualify, the most of any Maine community. LD 262 could spark downtown projects, which together could have an economic impact equal, or perhaps greater, to one thing, anything, in the big mill.

And smaller projects are not only more probable, they are starting to occur with great frequency. Consider the recent work to Lyceum Hall, home to Fuel Restaurant, KeyBank Plaza, home of the Androscoggin County Chamber of Commerce, and the Dominican Block.

All occurred without these tax credits; strong tax incentives, then, could certainly inspire additional projects in Lewiston-Auburn’s overflowing roster of historic properties, as well as those in the downtowns of Norway, Rumford, Paris and elsewhere. This is why we endorse its passage.

For $100,000 in startup capital, the credits could deliver millions in subsequent development.

Yet we’re unsure these credits will bring Mill No. 5’s future into focus, because remaking the mill will require a unique plan, one not like Lyceum Hall, but more like those for the former Hathaway shirt factory in Waterville and the Kennebec Arsenal in Augusta, both from developer Tom Neimann.

These projects all point to Lewiston’s success with the other Bates Mill buildings as inspiration.

All of which makes Lewis’ opinion so salient. He has provided a sober case for a course of action, after a decade of immobility and debate. Proponents of keeping Mill No. 5, and its $400,000 annual cost to Lewiston taxpayers, now have this argument to dispute, and an important question to answer:

If the man who knows Mill No. 5 best says to tear it down, why shouldn’t we believe him?

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