Letters to the Editor

Election letters

To the editor,

I am writing to support Kennebunkport ballot Question 3 to build a new town hall and public meeting space. The need for a new town hall is largely undisputed — the limitations of the 63-year-old building for our growing town were apparent 20 years ago. Unfortunately, the ongoing debate around location and cost has resulted in the spread of some misleading or inaccurate information.

Dan King photo

Opponents point to the fact that Arundel built a new town hall several years ago for far less money, claiming the town of under 4,000 is similar to ours. The comparison is deceptive on many fronts.

Our town not only swells in size to over 12,000 many months of the year, but our part-time residents and visitors greatly impact the operations of our town hall. We have two working harbors, beaches, and a congested tourist town with hotels, restaurants, and businesses — all of which require town services and staff time for public safety, permitting, inspections, etc.

For these reasons, our current town staff is larger than Arundel’s, and our need for a larger building with more public meeting space is evident. And the inflation in building costs since pre-pandemic years is well documented.

None of us enjoys paying taxes, but I am grateful that Kennebunkport has the second lowest property tax rate in Maine — $6.25 per thousand – compared to $16.05 in Kennebunk and $17 in Arundel. The proposed town hall will serve our community well into the future for a tax rate impact of $0.12. I think we’re worth it.

Penelope Gruen

Kennebunkport

To the editor,

I am writing this letter to ask the voters of Kennebunkport to vote in favor of a new town hall. The current town hall was built 63 years ago when we had much fewer residents, employees, summer people and tourists. Back then there were no computers, email and social media. We didn’t broadcast board meetings on the local TV channel. We had no IT personnel, no human resources employees, no code enforcement and planning department.

Our employees are crammed into that building. I was one of those employees for 17 years. We have two people sharing a cubicle that was designed for one. No one should be working in those conditions. We should be treating our employees better than this. It is very hard to hire good help these days, especially ones that are as well trained as our employees. There is not enough parking for employees and customers. There is no security for the staff. Documents are being stored in less than ideal situations. The vault is not rated for two hours of fire penetration and has a water pipe running through it. The building is just beyond its usable life.

I was on the building committee. We spent almost a year trying to get the best building for the town’s needs at the most affordable cost. We looked at almost a dozen floor plans and sizes before we all agreed on the current design. It will meet all our needs today and take the town into the future. We looked at half a dozen sites and felt the town owned land on North Street was the best location. Trust me, we put a lot of time and effort into coming up with this plan for the town.

Also don’t forget that a vote against the town hall is a vote against the fire department. One day in the near future we will need per diem firefighters. They will need the current meeting room to add bunks and offices however they can’t have the space without the town building the new town hall and a new meeting room.

Kennebunkport has the lowest tax rate of any full service town in the state of Maine. The town leaders have done a very good job of running the town as economically as possible over the years. As chairperson of the budget board I can tell you that all of the board was in favor of building a new town hall. We are estimating that it will add about 12 cents to the mil rate which means it will increase taxes on a $500,000 house about $60 per year or $5 per month. I think this is well worth it.

We also plan to fundraise as much money as possible to reduce the cost even further. We already have an anonymous donation of $500,000 and we hope to raise much more. I will also tell you that during the next budget cycle I will do everything I can to keep the budget down so the impact of the town hall will be as palatable as possible.

Please don’t listen to the naysayers. They are spreading disinformation. They have no idea what it takes to run a town. They have no vision for the future of Kennebunkport. Even one of the opponents admitted at the last selectmen’s meeting that, after taking a tour of the current town hall, he agreed that we really need a new town hall. The longer we wait, the more it will cost. Now is the time to build a town building that we can be proud of and that will take us into the future. I am not just looking at today but for the future of Kennebunkport that will be a wonderful place for my daughter and my grandchildren to live.

I ask you to please vote to build a new town hall and meeting room and take Kennebunkport into the future.

April Dufoe

Kennebunkport

Not ‘the way life should be’

To the editor,

After the Oct. 25 shootings in Lewiston, someone on the radio said, “This isn’t Maine.”

I beg to differ. This is Maine.

“Efforts to reform the state’s gun laws, which are some of the weakest in the country, have repeatedly come up short, the Legislature this year once again failed to pass widely popular gun control measures … said Jackie Sartoris, district attorney, Cumberland County, in the Portland Press Herald, Sept. 3, 2023.

Here’s what Gov. Janet Mills had to say on Oct. 26: “This attack strikes at the very heart of who we are and the values we hold dear.”

Do we not hold dear the value of safety in our daily lives? Maine’s Legislature says, no.

Rep. Jared Golden, now that mass shooting has hit his home town, made the most courageous statement. He apologized for his opposition to gun safety laws saying, “The time has now come for me to take responsibility for this failure, which is why I now call on the United States Congress to ban assault rifles.”

The gunman is in and has earned medals from the Army Reserve. Who can we trust with AR weapons if not him? The U.S. Congress made a fatal mistake in 2004 when it allowed the assault rifle ban to expire.

Golden, Rep. Shelley Pingree and the vast majority of U.S citizens are right. We must ban assault rifles.

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