A community comes together

To the Editor:

I am not sure who the person who wrote last week’s letter “Can a Balance be found?” is, but as someone who was born and brought up in Bethel and has lived in Bethel all my life, I have a little experience here. What I saw was a community coming together from within and from outside our community to help one of the largest businesses in the area try to get it back up and running.

Sour Grapes, not at all not by this writer. I am proud of all of those who contributed and did things no matter if they were big or small to help others.

I don’t know the half of what people did except what I saw on social media, like LeFerme making food and giving it away to those in need, only seeking donations; like Dara Behan, owner of the Pub to allow LeMu eats and the Gemini to do what they needed at The Hub’s place of business to keep their businesses going; Frank Delduca at Crossroads made food to feed truckers stuck on the road because they couldn’t get through; Poland Spring, a large corporation, donating a truckload of water and workers at Western Maine Supply unloading the pallets and taking them inside the Chamber; small contractors who normally don’t work during the winter because they are seasonal, breaking out their equipment to do emergency repairs for homeowners; all those who helped rescue items from the Sugar Shack; other residents making food or taking those in who had no power and couldn’t cook, and timely updates from the Town of Bethel and the Bethel Water District; the Chamber for leaving its doors open 24 hours a day for water pickup; Mainely Provisions extended their hours to accommodate folks once power was restored. There are so many others who did so many random acts of kindness that I do not know about.

This is what a small community does to help others. These and so many other unmentioned examples are the positive outcomes of a flood that hasn’t been seen like this in over 100 years.

There is no point blaming others for this storm (CMP is another matter I’ll address). If you live along the river or have a business along the river or know that this river floods and how high it can flood, all I can say is you need to make sure you have flood insurance because homeowners’ insurance will not cover flood disasters.

Is it expensive? It can be, but not half as expensive as the one time you may truly need it and don’t have it. This comes from my experience as a former banker of 30 years who always attended any and every FEMA flood seminar I could go to. I know a person who lives away from the Sunday River, and he sustained major, major damage.

Never ever been flooded out before. I mean major damage. Homeowners are not going to help him with this. Look at the dance studio and those who helped clean that this week. Look at Kowloon’s and the Butcher Burger. Floods are natural disasters just like tornadoes and hurricanes and blizzards. There is no sense blaming companies upstream of the river for what happened (which I have heard).

Back to Sunday River. Sunday River is a major major employer here, and many of the construction crews that came into action these past several days are not normally construction companies that consistently do work at the mountain.

Yes, there are a few, but out-of-town construction crews from the Oxford Hills and Lewiston area came in to help too. Construction companies jumped into action to get a major employer back up and running. A lot of money, work, time, labor, and business have been lost this week not only to this area but to the Sunday River.

There were a lot of refunds and tickets refunded this week. Sunday River didn’t have to do that, but they did. Many local businesses lost money this week, not because Sunday River wanted to get back to work but to Mother Nature.

They lost all their snow as did the whole area and then to further complicate things, it’s been crappy all week and not exactly winter weather for skiers, ice-climbing hikers, or snowmobiles. Many employees aren’t working this week because there aren’t enough people around to warrant them to come in.

Is that Sunday Rivers’ fault, no? Kudos to Sunday River and all the crews that have helped them, and other businesses get back to the business of doing business.

I will say I do hope the town will address the CMP issue of the location of the substation or the height of it. Year after year, floods happen. Sometimes they are really bad like this one and other years, the water doesn’t reach the substation. Since the town pays a lot of money for lights, as do the ratepayers, I think it is only fair that this issue be taken care of.

Either move the substation further away from the river or build it up with a cement pad about 8 to 10 feet. But something needs to be done. So many who needed electrical services at a time of the year when heat was needed didn’t have it, and by the grace of God, others stepped in to help.

Rest assured, all will get through this, and be thankful that nobody in this area lost their life during this storm like the not-so-fortunate mother and daughter in Rumford.

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