What’s needed from FairPoint Communications are fewer questions and more answers. If the company is not going to fulfill its promises to Maine regulators, it must be upfront about it. There have been enough unpleasant surprises following its takeover of Verizon so far without more to come.A smooth transition was unlikely. That FairPoint was acting […]

There’s nothing wrong with our gadgets, until we hurt ourselves or others. Two stories over the past few weeks in New England should give the technologically distracted among us pause.In Warwick, R.I., recently, a teenage girl walking toward her high school on a rainy morning was struck and killed by a passing school bus. She […]

The city of Lewiston did the right thing Friday by releasing a three-page legal opinion from its attorney, Martin Eisenstein, about Wednesday’s closed council meeting. It needed to be done.Councilors wouldn’t talk about the 3.5-hour session, though some spoke liberally about why it was convened: There is discontent among their ranks, a great deal of […]

There is some justifiable concern about LD 290, which would allow the interstate sale of health insurance policies in Maine. Opponents believe it is a disaster waiting to happen, because insurers beyond Maine would erode the state’s regulatory ability to protect the insured here.This is true. There is no guarantee that if Mainers buy policies […]

Cheers and jeers from around the news:• Cheers for historic preservation. Three buildings and one city block in Lewiston have been honored for their importance to the city’s heritage – the Dominican Block, the Franco-American Heritage Center, Bates Street Senior Housing and Frye Street adjacent to Bates College.It’s an odd mix – a finished project, […]

To recap: Lewiston City Councilor Denis Theriault says he’s dissatisfied with City Administrator Jim Bennett’s job performance and that he has secured the council votes to effect Bennett’s ouster. (A claim so far unproven.)Meanwhile, on Tuesday, the city held a remedial “City Councilor 101” session to review, for everyone, the responsibilities of a city councilor. […]

On its face, it looks like a simple policy matter. But at its core, how lifetime health benefits were conveyed to spouses of deceased Androscoggin County employees embodies everything wrong with how this county government operates. This week, the county commission decided to “re-interpret” this benefit. The commission had received legal advice the benefit was […]

One of the best things to come from Maine’s Department of Environmental Protection in recent years was a groundbreaking (or maybe bulb-breaking?) study of what happens when long-lasting compact fluorescent lightbulbs fracture and release their chemical innards.CFL bulbs contain hazardous mercury, a dangerous facet of the popular bulbs the DEP examined in its first-in-the-nation effort […]

It’s been more than a year since Lewiston City Councilor Denis Theriault promised the city would rebuild the playground at Kennedy Park.So much for promises.On April 21, 2008, the city shut down the playground at Kennedy Park after a complaint was made about a loose board on one of the play decks.At the time, Theriault […]

For the past decade, Major League Baseball has been in a drug-induced coma from which it stubbornly refuses to emerge, despite repeated 10,000-volt electric shocks of its superstars testing positive for performance-enhancing drugs.The latest is the manchild, Manny Ramirez, who during his time in Boston was hailed as King of the Idiots but has been […]