Letters to the editor, Oct. 1

Re-elect Lor Gramlich

To the editor,

We are writing to voice our support of Lori K. Gramlich for her re-election for House District 13, Old Orchard Beach to the Maine State House of Representatives. Lori has both the aptitude and expertise that have enabled her to be a strong and effective voice for our community.

Lori has spent her entire professional career as a social worker, working for the Maine State Department of Health and Human Services, Municipal Government, and for various nonprofits throughout the state of Maine. While much of her work included her advocacy on behalf of children and seniors, it is what she was able to accomplish in her first term representing our community, that we find particularly impressive.

Lori’s accomplishments in her first term include working with legislative colleagues to assure our town gets more of our share of state funds, protecting our children from toxic chemicals, assuring that our residents have safe clean drinking water, and proposing legislation to impact the opioid epidemic.

Additionally, Lori was able to garner bi-partisan support for her bill to protect our precious beach and shoreline. Again, in a bi-partisan manner, she was also able to pass legislation that provides additional funds for children’s oral health care. And she was able to reap the fruits of her hard work by assuring that children in our town had dental kits, which she handed out to families at the end of the school year parade at Jamison School.

Finally, her deep commitment to assuring that our veterans get the benefits they deserve is an issue we are both so proud of. Lori Gramlich is the real deal. She has our support. Please join us in re-electing Lori Gramlich.

Jayne and Peter Flaherty
Old Orchard Beach

Vote yes for Question 1 in OOB

To the editor,

For 78 years, Old Orchard Beach has been a piece of my identity. I met my husband on the beach in Ocean Park in 1961 and we have spent every single summer here since then. Our kids learned the value of hard work, with their first job at the Soda Fountain. Like most kids, they left, only to have our oldest child return home to raise his children here. To say that I love our town and care deeply about its future is an understatement.

Well, now our town needs us — the wastewater system is failing. It cannot keep up; systems are not up to code and anyone who lives in Ocean Park knows this problem stinks!

After decades of debate, millions spent in band-aid fixes, and two DEP violations later we now have the opportunity to successfully fix the problem. Question 1 asks voters to approve a $23.5M bond to fund important, long-term and overdue improvements to upgrade and expand our wastewater treatment facility. This is an important investment in our town, and in our future.

If we delay, the system could fail. If it fails, our beaches and water quality will be put in danger; our economy would suffer, and future generations won’t want to come back. These are things I’m not willing to risk.

If you love Old Orchard Beach and Ocean Park and care about its future success, please vote YES on Question 1.

Helene Whittaker
Ocean Park

To the editor,

For 20 years, our town’s aging wastewater system has needed critical upgrades, repairs and expansion. The system is prone to failure, 70 percent of the equipment has exceeded its useful life, and other areas are not up to code and are at max capacity. With no action, we teeter on the verge of catastrophe for full operational failure – leaving our watershed, shoreline and economy in extremely vulnerable positions. For the last two years, 2018 and 2019, we’ver received violations from the Department of Environmental Protection for operational deficiencies of our wastewater plant. Continued fines are inevitable.

Now is the time to take deliberate steps to fix our aging wastewater system and vote yes on Question 1. The $23.5 million bond will create a long term solution for the infrastructure needs within the wastewater treatment facility. Interest rates are at historic lows, and the impact to the average houshold will be less than $15 a month.

This bond will finally apply a planned approach toward a much needed solution to our consistently deficient wastewater facility. I hope you join me and vote yes on Question 1.

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