Linda Labrie has lived on Main Street in Sabattus for 40 years. When she was looking for a place to settle down she wanted somewhere more rural than Lewiston, where she grew up, and a place with a slower pace. She found that in Sabattus.

There was a nice brook that roared through town, attracting wildlife. And town services were centrally located on the street, which was well maintained back then.

But Main Street today is far from the community hub it was when Labrie first moved to town. She feels disappointed when she thinks about the state of the village now. The town hall and police department were moved to a different area of town, the credit union also moved, and many properties on the street are overgrown, vacant or cluttered with items.

And now that the town is about to sell the former Sabattus Primary School on No Name Pond Road, Labrie is among the residents worried that it could become another vacant property in the village

“It doesn’t look the same, it doesn’t feel the same. I don’t walk down there anymore because I have no reason to,” she said.

Now at least some residents are trying to help reinvigorate the area. The group wants to buy the former school property and turn it into a community center where people of all ages can gather and host clubs, play sports or hold events.

The group, according to Megan Peacock, one of its members, is working toward a nonprofit designation and hopes to make a bid for the building using loans and fundraising.

They’re hoping to get a public campaign launched soon, but Peacock plans to update the public after the holiday weekend, she said.

Sabattus doesn’t have a community center, aside from some space at the town hall. Labrie likes the idea of having a recreation hub for the community — a place where people want to gather in the village.

“There could be community dinners, fundraisers, the potential is astronomical,” she said. “If I had the money I’d buy it myself for a rec center,” she said.

POPULATION BOOM

Michael Deslauriers Sr. has lived all his life in Sabattus. He’s seen it go from a sparsely populated but tight-knit community to a bedroom community after its last mill closed down and industry dried up.

He wouldn’t say things are better or worse now, just different. Change is a reality he has accepted, but he still enjoys preserving the town’s history as a Sabattus Historical Society member.

“Everything changes and that’s life, it doesn’t stop moving,” Deslauriers said.

In the mid-20th century, when the town was known as Webster, the population was little more than 1,000, so there was a much stronger sense of community during those decades, he said.

Back then, the town hall was located on Main Street and it was the community hub where the police station operated from, the town did business, Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts held meetings, the high school basketball team played its games and school children put on community plays.

But in the 1970s and ’80s local farmers started selling off their land and a lot of people from Lewiston and Auburn started buying small tracts for mobile homes, a cheaper alternative to rents in the Twin Cities, he said.

The population nearly doubled in the ’70s, going from 1,681 in 1970 to 3,081 in 1980, according to  historic U.S. Census data from the University of Maine’s Fogler Library. In 1971, the town changed its name to Sabattus.

This is when the town started transitioning to a bedroom community, Deslauriers said. 

The ’80s saw more population growth, rising to 3,696 by 1990. Since then the population has steadily increased to an estimated 5,035, according to the 2020 Census.

Along with the population growth came more building and code regulations, and eventually the longtime town hall on Main Street was no longer suitable. Town leaders made the decision to move town operations, along with the police department, to a spot on the Middle Road outside the village.

Deslauriers thinks it’s not possible to recapture the sense of closeness that residents once felt because the town is so much more populated and the town has experienced so much change.

He’s heard about the plans for a community center at the former school but he thinks there are cost barriers to bringing the building up to code that could derail the project.

Labrie is optimistic. She thinks there’s a lot of potential to bring the community closer. She sees the plans for a center as an opportunity to have a community kitchen, host community clubs and maybe even have a town library.

She hasn’t made many new connections with residents in town since her daughter, now an adult, was in school, and she sees this as an opportunity for neighbors to get to know each other.

She would like to see town officials get on board with the community center plan and sell the property to the group heading it up, even if it’s just for a minuscule amount of money.

A SPLIT SELECT BOARD

At the last Select Board meeting, June 16, officials debated what information they should request from bidders looking to buy the former school, while residents shared their thoughts about what should be done with the property.

The town is accepting bids for the property until July 30. Included in that bid application is an area where bidders are asked about how they plan to repurpose the former school.

Board members appeared split on how much information they should request from bidders, including their plans for the property, and whether they should impose a timeline for those plans.

Selectman George Merrill thought it wasn’t necessary to ask bidders what they plan to use the property for when they are not bound to those plans and can change them after they buy the property. Any redevelopment plans for the property would need to go through the Planning Board anyway.

Board member Noel Hinkley had some mixed feelings on the issue, she said. She grew up at that school and it holds sentimental value to her, but she also thinks the town can’t tell a potential owner what they can and can’t do with a property they buy.

Looking at it from a buyer’s perspective, Hinkley said, she believe it’s not the town’s place to ask bidders for a timeline for completing their plans as long as the property taxes are paid.

“I get we all want to see something good with it, I understand that. I want the best interest of the town, but it’s also the best interest of the person buying it too,” she said. “They’re buying it for a reason. They’re not just buying to sit on it.”

Select Board Chair Laura Clifford said she wanted to know what bidders plan to do with the property after they buy it, even if they eventually change their minds. She thinks it’s even more important to know what a bidder’s plans are than the actual dollar amount they could get for the property.

“That’s fine if they change their mind, but I think their intent and what they plan to use the building for or what they plan to do with the property, I think that’s important information,” she said.

Board member Nancy Provost agreed and also wanted to see proof of financial viability from bidders, she said. She doesn’t want to see the building sit empty for several years after it is bought.

One resident who lives near the former school spoke at the meeting and said she feels it is important that the Select Board be mindful about what they may be bringing into the community when they sell it. She appeared emotional at times talking about some of the negative changes she has seen in town, particularly the way Main Street has changed.

Another resident talked about how lively the village used to be when she owned a business there years ago, and how it has since lost its vibrancy.

Labrie, who was not at the meeting, said even if the plans for a community center at the old school fall through, she wants to make sure the building is sold to someone who is going to do something with it instead of letting it sit vacant.

“It would be a shame to have it sitting empty when there are people that wanted it, that would put it to use,” she said.