Mary Mayhew, commissioner of the Maine Department of Health and Human Services, needs to get a grip on that department’s finances or Gov. Paul LePage needs to find someone who can. Mayhew told the Legislature’s Appropriations Committee last week that her department’s funding deficit had jumped by $50 million over the course of two weeks. […]
Our View
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A look back at the week’s news
Early this week, political powerhouse AARP named Lewiston among its list of “10 Great Small Cities for Retirement.” The listing was based on the elder advocacy group’s evaluation of cities that combine “the energy and excitement of cosmopolitan life with the charm and neighborliness of a small town.” Also on the list is picturesque Athens, […]
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Maine thankful to be located in happy middle
It is, of course, a well-documented fact that the epicenter of unhappiness is the Maine Mall on the day after Thanksgiving. Just ask any husband who has been there. The anxiety is written on the faces of shoppers desperately competing for parking spaces in the mall’s crowded lot. The aching feet, knees and backs can […]
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For one veteran and his family, help came too late
We realize hindsight is painful, but local officials need to ask whether every legal tool was used to help Justin Crowley-Smilek, a war veteran who died Saturday in a burst of gunfire in a police station parking lot. The goal would be to better help families who clearly see trouble coming but find themselves unable […]
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Auburn needs a major facelift to its gateway
We have new wall murals in New Auburn and they are even lighted. We have cleaned up the tattoo parlor, radiator shop and abandoned bar that once greeted visitors entering Lewiston via the Longley Bridge. Now there’s a water fountain at that intersection. The Lisbon Street entrance to Lewiston was remarkably transformed several years ago […]
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Land O’Lakes must be held to higher standard
Dateline Minneapolis/St. Paul. October 2011. “Another lawsuit has been filed alleging that Land O’Lakes Inc. and other major dairy producers illegally conspired to drive the price of milk up by slaughtering a half-million dairy cows since 2003,” according to the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal. It’s scary when Big Agriculture starts to sound more like Big […]
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A look back at the week’s news
On Wednesday, the first of three public meetings on development of a master plan for Lewiston’s so-called Riverfront Island was held at the Franco-American Heritage Center. The area of the city under scrutiny includes the Bates Mill Enterprise Complex and Bates Mill No. 5, Simard-Payne Memorial Park, upper Lincoln Street and the neighborhood around the […]
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Auburn extends the reach of its iPad innovation
They say you should either go big or go home. So we’re excited to see that the Auburn School Department has chosen to go big, not only with its iPad program for kindergarten students, but in becoming a training center for other educators interested in using the new technology. More than 100 educators, some from […]
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Training tough for families in debt or jobless
It sounds strange to say it, but Maine has both a shortage of workers and a shortage of jobs. The problem, according to a story in Sunday’s Sun Journal, is a mismatch between the skills of existing workers and those required for success in our new high-tech economy. It’s a national problem, but it is […]
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Choking off the village’s water
By Rex Rhoades Executive editor A clear stream runs through a mountain village, according to an old fable, and the villagers pay an old man a stipend to care for it. Each day the old man takes a few tools and hikes into the mountains where he clears leaves, branches and logs from the stream […]