Just behind the Dunkin Donuts drive-thru, in a former mill with exposed beams and nice, natural light, Bob Parise makes machine parts in a half-empty shop.

Its good, steady work, better than his old job at the lumberyard in Andover.

Hes quick to smile, quick to say hed better hustle to get out this Thursday- morning order.

Parise is a precision metal worker the only one to go through an $800,000 training program and land a job at the new $3.2 million River Valley Technology Center, a bag-mill-turned-business incubator for precision metal work.

All around him, theres room enough for other businesses and vacant offices with crisp white walls.

The place is supposed to be teeming: New ideas. New companies. A new start.

Instead, years of investment and energy have netted nine new jobs. Two are professional housecleaners.

Not the sort of success the state hoped for when it launched the applied technology development system in 2001, an innovative idea to spread seven centers around Maine and grow clusters of industry.

The lure at each center? Below-market rent to attract young technology startups, get companies on their feet with mentoring, then gently escort them out the door once they turned successful, creating a base of new, well-paid jobs.

That hasnt happened in the rural outposts and, despite millions spent, in places like Rumford, the state has all but cut them off already.

River Valley cant afford staff. Neither can Limestone. In Fairfield and Greenville, theres money for one part-time director.

The centers are struggling to fill tenant spaces, stay on mission, even keep the lights on.

In a season of increased scrutiny on economic development efforts, state officials concede the original goal may have been too ambitious.

Facilities in Greenville and Rumford may not have been the best choice, said Peggy Schaffer, who was until recently policy and planning specialist at the Maine Department of Economic and Community Development. Our desire to be fair and our desire to make things geographically fair … that doesnt work.

Outgoing Commissioner Jack Cashman said that, in hindsight, seven centers is too many; maybe going forward funds ought to go to the few doing the best.

Scott Christiansen, the River Valley Technology Centers highest-profile tenant, argues it was set up to flop.

Are there politics here? he mused in his office at the Fractionation Development Center, listening to the boom and bang of Parises machine down the hall. Oh, yeah.

Haves and have nots

The initiative has its shining stars, according to Cashman and Schaffer, namely, centers in Orono, Portland and Down East in Franklin. They are, not coincidentally, tied tightly to the University of Maine System.

That link is a sore point. If they want to have a fancy brochure, they just go down and get a grad student to make one, said Ed Nickerson, executive director of the Loring Applied Technology Center in Limestone.

Oronos original focus: information. Portlands: the environment. Franklins: aquaculture.

At the Aquaculture Business Incubator, Director Nick Brown has four tenants whove done everything from build a demo seaworm farm (Seabait Inc. wants to grow worms for sports fishing and shrimp farmers) to explore ways to seed the bottom of the ocean to grow urchins.

To come: A UMaine aquaculture institute that will give the center students and researchers to tap.

Were so new and young we havent had anyone completely successful and walk out the door commercialized, but two companies are close, Brown said. I think its been better than anyone actually imagined it would be.

The center and its businesses have snagged $3.5 million in grants, not counting nearly $1 million from DECD.

He and six staffers manage buildings, assist with research, answer questions, recruit new startups and write grants.

Rosie Bradley does all that in Rumford.

Her dual role executive director of the tech center and the River Valley Growth Council has been paid for by the 10 towns that make up the growth council since July 2005. The council has one assistant who also does double duty.

She was thrilled the doors were still open this past summer.

After a big infusion to start, funding from the state turned competitive in 2005. This year Rumford got $29,800; $200 shy of its electric bill. Cashman said the intent was for centers to become self-sustaining (he isnt sure by when); thats the reason behind the plunge.

But its not a shock that hasnt happened.

In a North American survey, 23 percent of incubators said theyd close without subsidy, according to the National Business Incubation Association.

I think the concept is a great concept; it makes sense. They just need to learn to stand by their product. Economic development is not a 100-yard dash, its a marathon, Bradley said.

I think the state has the same mentality as some of the citizens; they want to see it tomorrow.

Chasing money

Frustrated, she still has big plans, big hopes and a big building that could prosper, under the right circumstances.

Only one floor of the looming River Valley Technology Center is finished and eight tenants take up half that. Northwest Precision is the only company that makes anything; the rest, like a cleaning service and Career Center, mostly use office space.

Though its clearly veered off focus, Bradley would like to see more precision metal companies so all that federal training money can pay off. Twenty-one of Parises classmates work in precision manufacturing now; they travel away to do it.

Bradley has talked to a firearm parts manufacturer who might move into space next to Northwest Precision and add three to five jobs. Theres also interest in the fourth floor for both an arts space and kitchen incubator for food-related startups; it has asbestos thats got to go first.

The plan for the third floor: finish the basics to make it attractive to a tenant.

We were thinking maybe a good call center, something that could create jobs, Bradley said.

Shell go after grant money to nudge all that along.

Unfortunately, everything revolves around the dollar, she said.

Christiansen, whos trying to site the worlds biggest tree-to-oil plant somewhere in Maine, bristles at Cashmans suggestion that Rumfords success or failure will be tied to his center. (I guess so far the jurys out, Cashman said.)

Success is more a policy test for the state, Christiansen countered: Is Maine interested in making life viable in rural Maine and make life better or not? Interest has to be backed up by investment.

To me, its on par with a woman giving birth, he added. Its a big deal. You send out announcements. You send out cards. But in this case, the woman never fed the baby.

This fall, in a report for the Brookings Institution, former state economist Laurie Lachance dogged Maine for choosing a strategy of investing in bricks and mortar rather than investing sufficiently in the ongoing operations to ensure survival and success.

Seven centers is twice as many as could be reasonably supported. Each needs the skills and efforts of three well-paid individuals to pull this off, she wrote.

Nickerson, whose position is funded by the Loring Development Authority since that tech center has no more money, said hes repeatedly spoken up.

If youre chasing money, you cant do your job, he said.

The ones that havent worked…

State funds make up just 20 percent of President John Ferlands budget at the Maine Center for Enterprise Development, the tech center that recently moved to the University of Southern Maine campus. The bulk of that centers money comes from service fees to clients, private sector sponsors and corporate giving.

Each of the centers exist in a different marketplace. Im sitting in the middle of the largest urban center in the state, Ferland said. Rumford, Loring, Fairfield and Greenville have less population to draw from, fewer startup opportunities, but they are very, very important for economic change.

Portland has seen $1.2 million from DECD. Its created 100 jobs and spun off seven companies.

The four rural tech centers have gotten $5.6 million and even more from outside grants and bonds created 48 new jobs and spun off one business. (With construction lag time, some centers have only been open and running as little as two years.)

The ones that have worked, yes, (its been) a very good investment. The ones that havent worked, not so much, said Cashman, now a senior economic advisor to the Baldacci Administration. Planning seven of them around the state for seven different technologies Im not sure was a good move.

The DECDs Office of Innovation, the parent of the center program, gets a new head this month. John Richardson is new as development commissioner.

Reached Thursday, he said he wasnt prepared to comment on the centers funding in the next two-year cycle and instead pointed to an $8 million budget request for Maine Technology Institute. That money, if approved, will be used for competitive, entrepreneurial grants.

Its about getting the proper tenant who can create jobs in the center. What were finding is a lack of capital, he said.

And will all seven stay open?

I think so. I cant speak for the Legislature…The answer is theyre open today. Its certainly up to the Legislature in the final analysis.

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