As the funeral service and burial for U.S. Sen. Ted Kennedy is held Saturday, the following are comments he said about Lewiston during his visits.

Kennedy campaigned here twice in recent years. In 2008, he campaigned for Barack Obama, giving a speech at Bates College. In 2004 he campaign for John Kerry at Lewiston’s Franco-American Heritage Center.

During that visit he talked about how Lewiston was special. Kennedy said he was told by Kerry on the final day of the presidential campaign that Kennedy could campaign wherever he wanted.

“I said, ‘There’s one place I want to go: Lewiston, Maine. That’s why Vicki and I are here, to be with you. We love you in Lewiston,'” Kennedy said. “All of you understand the reason why, because of the extraordinary association between the people of Lewiston and the incredible reception you gave the president (John F. Kennedy) in his last stop of the 1960 campaign.”

The night before JFK was elected, it had been a long, hard day, Kennedy recalled. He was late for his scheduled stop in Lewiston. People here stood in the cold for hours. When Kennedy finally arrived just before midnight, “I don’t think he got a finer reception anyplace,” Ted Kennedy recalled.

The 1960 race was close. There was doubt Kennedy could win. Lewiston’s overwhelming reception was so uplifting to JFK, “it was the time he really believed he was going to win,” his brother said. “He said then, ‘Maine is a very independent state with independent judgment and independent-minded people.'” If he got that kind of response here, he believed the next day he would carry the election, Ted Kennedy recalled.

“That’s what Lewiston represented,” Kennedy said in 2004. “Every member of our family remembers that. The association between our family and the community is deep and continuing.”

 — Bonnie Washuk

Levesque forecasts school budget ‘tsunami’

On Monday night, Lewiston School Superintendent Leon Levesque was going over enrollment numbers showing that the early grades in Lewiston are full. “We have the largest kindergarten class ever.”

He saw it coming last year and reserved $200,000 in case more staff was needed.

While briefing committee members, Levesque warned that this year there will be budget problems.

Like last year, the state budget had a deficit, which meant less money for schools. Stimulus money from Washington helped out schools.

“It will not be there this year,” Levesque warned, adding there’s a big budget storm brewing. “A tsunami is coming,” Levesque said. “This will not be pretty.”

— Bonnie Washuk