January, 1981
“Warren Joins Forest Street on Hit List,” says the headline, meaning that the Westbrook School Department now wants to close the Warren Kindergarten Center as well as the Forest Street (elementary) School. In a meeting with parents who resist closing Forest Street, Superintendent Carl Knowlton was asked about closing some of the new Congin School (which has the highest operating cost) instead of Forest Street (it has the lowest operating cost). Congin Principal David Bois responded that the gym, band room, and other advantages of Congin cost more to heat. The closings would mean larger class sizes, Knowlton acknowledged.
The Westbrook City Council voted to rezone from residential to business a 10-foot-wide strip of Westbrook Housing Authority land on lower Main Street where a city ordinance requires a 100-foot buffer between business and residential uses. City lawyers assured Mr. and Mrs. Lester Rogers that they still can develop their business use right to their property line.
A new bridge of steel and concrete crosses the Presumpscot River in Westbrook, but it’s not public; it’s within the S. D. Warren paper mill and is used by trucks carrying pulpwood, coal and other supplies. It’s part of the mill’s $75 million biomass boiler project.
Property taxes pay 49 percent of Gorham’s town costs and Gorham should be looking for other money. Town Manager Donald Gerrish told a forum called by the Republican Committee.
Chevron, Mobil and Getty are installing equipment at their tank farms in South Portland to recover gasoline vapors that have been polluting the air. A state and federal program requires the installation of the new equipment by July 1. Though the equipment recovers 95 percent of the gasoline, the cash value of the recovered gasoline is “negligible.”
The Million-Dollar Bridge (South Portland-Portland) reopened six weeks ago after major repairs, but Cianbro still is working on it.
Because of heavy holiday traffic, traffic lights were put on flashing at six of Westbrook’s busiest intersections.
Marcel Fredette and others of Westbrook’s Jaycees are in a membership are in a membership drive.
Philip F. Hill will retire as Gorham’s assessor in June. He was elected to the board of selectmen and assessors in 1963. When the town moved to Town Council government in 1968, he became the first staff assessor, part-time. He moved to full-time assessor in 1974. He is 63.
Gorham expected two federal revenue-sharing payments this year but is getting four. The extra payments total $92,910.
Windham’s Town Council has reauthorized the 36 video games of the Red Balloon Arcade.
Scarborough River’s channel to the ocean at Pine Point needs dredging, reports Harbormaster Joseph Anderson.
Among several family members who were Christmas guests in the home of Mr. and Mrs. Clark Neily, North Street, Gorham, were Mr. and Mrs. Richard Boyce of Ames, Alaska.
In high school basketball, Westbrook beat South Portland 60-58. It was the Riots’ first regular-season loss in two years. Tom Jackson and Jamie Burns led Westbrook scoring. Then Westbrook beat Portland, 68-60.
Michelle Buzzell, Pine Street, Standish, was 12 on Christmas Day.
January, 1991
Westbrook Mayor Fred Wescott welcomes the news that Idexx is moving from Portland to Westbrook, investing $4 to $5 million in a plant where it will be making animal disease test kits and other high-technology biological products. It will occupy a large part of the former Data General plant. David Shaw, the Idexx chief executive, expects the present staff of 200 persons to grow, perhaps to 1,000.
Westbrook’s City Council voted 6-0 (Don Richards absent) to pay the Portland Water District’s bill for a year’s operation of Westbrook sewers and sewage treatment for a total of $1,850,000. The bill is nearly double last year’s. The money will come from the city’s water users in their monthly bills.
About 60 people attended a Standish meeting in which several speakers were critical of Standish Town Manager Suzanne Kennedy.
The City of Westbrook has paid the Portland Water District’s latest sewer bill for the Hamlet mobile home park, $84,450. How to collect is under discussion. The park’s owners stopped paying about the time residents began asking the city for rent controls.
The Gorham Woman’s Club is taking part in a campaign of the General Federation of Women’s Clubs in which members write to Iraq president Saddam Hussein urging him to abide by “the U.N. resolution to end the conflict in the Middle East.”
The government took over Maine National Bank Monday. One of the messages that sends is that there’ll be no early action on the bank’s plans for a $16 million office complex on the County Road, Westbrook.
At least seven projects are underway to celebrate Westbrook’s 100th birthday this year. The city’s first City Council meeting was Feb. 24, 1891.
Garup Properties, South Portland, has sold land in the Airport Industrial Park, Foden Road, South Portland, for $295,000 to UPS Thrift Plan Corporation, Greenwich, Conn.
Ten physicians and two educators sign a full-page ad urging no war in the Persian Gulf. Tell our leaders, they ask, that “we must maintain sanctions for as long as it takes to reach a peaceful solution; war is not the way.”
Gorham has laid off four workers of its Public Works Department to reduce payroll costs.
The Portland Water District is trying again to get an access road to its new 2 million gallon reservoir on Freeman Hill, Windham from the Windemere subdivision. Windemere roads are private, and Windemere owners oppose the Water District’s request.
Town Taxi, Portland, has opened a Windham office, the town’s first taxi service.
Westbrook High School’s Marching Band, under director George Bookataub, won Maine and New England Class A championships, in 1990. It also won the New Englands in 1989 and the Maine championship in 1985, 1986 and 1987.
Judith Roy is new chairman of the Scarborough Town Council, succeeding Dr. George Roy.
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