AUGUSTA (AP) — A home bomb shelter built in the 1950s to protect a Maine man and his family from a nuclear attack is being threatened by an Augusta sewer project. Eighty-six-year-old Donald Tuttle, who drove a concrete truck for 30 years, built the underground, concrete bomb shelter behind his Mount Vernon Avenue home. The […]
Maine
Posted inLocal & State, sj-web
Maine weeklies shut printing plant
ROCKLAND (AP) — A news company that publishes four weekly or semiweekly newspapers in Maine is outsourcing is printing operations and laying off 17 employees. Village NetMedia CEO Richard Anderson said the company closed its printing plant in Rockland effective Tuesday and will have its papers published at the Sun Journal Media Group printing facility […]
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Posted inLocal & State, sj-web
Maine gasoline prices dropping
PORTLAND (AP) — Maine gasoline prices continue to drop. Price-watching website MaineGasPrices.com says the average retail gasoline price in Maine fell 0.5 cent per gallon in the past week to $3.63 per gallon. Including that decrease, gas prices in Maine were 14.9 cents per gallon lower than a month ago, but 86.2 cents per gallon […]
Posted inOur View
Supreme Court tips the scales for wealthy politicians
It takes money to have a voice in elections. With its ruling on Arizona’s Clean Election public campaign finance system Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court guaranteed that the person with access to the most money will always have the loudest voice. Voting 5-4, the court sided with plaintiff — a PAC for Arizona Free Enterprise […]
Posted inRiver Valley
Two Maine bat species one step closer to federal protection
RUMFORD — Two Maine bat species could be protected later this year under the federal Endangered Species Act. Responding to a Jan. 21, 2010, petition from the Center for Biological Diversity, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on Tuesday decided that the eastern small-footed and northern long-eared bats may warrant federal protection as threatened or […]
Posted inLocal & State, sj-web
8 vetoes await Maine lawmakers as they return
AUGUSTA, Maine (AP) — When they return to Augusta to finish up work for the year after an 11-day rest, Maine lawmakers will have to decide whether to sustain or override eight bills Gov. Paul LePage has vetoed. Among them are proposals calling for a study by state health officials into the effects of wood […]
Posted inOur View
Census shows married couples declining in U.S.
Recent U.S. Census Bureau statistics confirm a troubling new crack in the bond that holds society together: Married couples now make up fewer than half of American households. Of even more concern, the number of households headed by a woman without a husband jumped 18 percent between 2000 and 2010. In 1950, 78 percent of […]
Posted inLocal Sports
Outdoors: LaRoche looks ahead
Matt LaRoche was named Superintendent of the Allagash Wilderness waterway in the spring of 2009. His appointment was a dream come true for him, and for the public he serves, a natural-flowing evolution. A Maine native and 1978 University of Maine graduate, LaRoche cut his Ranger teeth on the Allagash Waterway. In the early years, […]
Posted inLocal & State, sj-web
Obama troop plan scrutinized
AUGUSTA — Maine’s two U.S. senators say they want to have a closer look at President Barack Obama’s plan to pull home 33,000 troops from Afghanistan by next summer. Sen. Olympia Snowe, a senior member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, says she’ll evaluate every aspect of the administration’s plan. The Republican says the […]
Posted inOur View
New research no reason for a potato panic
First, the nutritional pyramid turns into a platter. Now the humble potato is responsible for a health-care epidemic. It’s enough to cause a severe case of nutritional whiplash. Researchers at Harvard University reported Wednesday that an extra serving of potatoes is more likely to cause weight gain than an extra can of soda pop. Over […]