The Colossus of Spring & McKeen

The Colossus of Rhodes, you likely recall, was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.  It towered over the Greek island of Rhodes, and was 107 feet tall.

                

One imagines it was constructed in the name of community pride, and to demonstrate to all who beheld it the wealth and glory of the governing body of the day.  It is now long gone.

As fate would have it, centuries later, here in Brunswick, a modern-day Colossus is rising up at the corner of Spring and McKeen (would that they were ‘roads,’ but they are simply ‘streets.’)  And it towers over us and its surroundings, in the name of community pride. It provides tangible testimony to the wealth, self-indulgence, and wondrous benevolence of our local and state governing bodies.

When you behold the rising Colossus, you’ll be unable to deny the glories of this awesome edifice “to the children.”  Destined to become one of the Seven Wonders of Modern Brunswick, the Stowe School is a consummate exemplar of modern, publicly sponsored architecture.

“Piloting” the train idea, and jump starting the transit run

There is much joy in Brunswick these days as $35 million in taxpayer money has been made available to upgrade the train tracks between Portland and Maine Street Station.  Work has already begun.

If I understand things correctly, the plan is to have an Amtrak train run between Portland and Brunswick twice a day, with a stop in Freeport.

Before that can happen, the $35 million will be sunk in the upgrade effort.  Then trains will have to be found and put in condition to be dedicated to the run, and crews will have to be hired to operate and maintain them.  The tracks will have to be maintained, inspected regularly, and plowed when necessary.  And presumably the crossing gates and lights will have to be maintained and inspected on a much more rigorous schedule then they are now.

This is all with no real way of knowing how much ridership the train will generate.

It’s a foregone conclusion the train will not be self supporting for its recurring operation, let alone recoup the non-recurring investment.  I’m not sure there’s an Amtrak run anywhere that can support itself.

I don’t know what kind of exposure the state has in this effort; there must be some, because bond issues have addressed rail transport, haven’t they?  And our local Senator, Stan Gerzofsky, has promoted “investment,” I hear.

While it’s a bit late for such an experiment, wouldn’t it have made sense to “pilot” the idea of twice daily “public mass transit” runs between Portland and Brunswick?  Wouldn’t this be a way to judge public demand and support for such services?

If this is such a good idea, a bus departing the Portland train station headed for Brunswick, with a stop in Freeport, and then returning, with two round trips per day, would provide a relatively low cost and immediate way to judge demand for this transit alternative.

No up front investment to speak of would be required; buses and drivers could be easily acquired; the transit times should be in the same ballpark as the train; and the fares could be far lower than the train will charge.  Or at the worst, for sake of realism, the same.

This could be up and running in a matter of weeks, providing a viable option for the fall tourist season and the holiday shopping period.  If this bus option couldn’t generate enough interest to make a go of it, what makes us think a train, likely at far greater expense and higher fares, will ‘fare’ better?

For that matter, why hasn’t some private concern established this exact route to up their profits?  I suppose the question answers itself.

The “romance of the rails” is one thing, but to think that alone will generate and sustain a critical mass of ridership for a 25 mile commuter run is a real stretch of the imagination.  Have you watched one of the Maine Eastern summer trains pass through town and counted heads in the windows?

But then that’s why we have government here to help us, I suppose.  And taxpayers in servitude to finance the help.

PS: while it might seem too late to try, it could still provide early benefits to Brunswick and Freeport economies if the demand is really there.  And if it isn’t, the losses could be cut before and if the train were to become an expensive failure and embarrassment.

Technorati Tags: Maine Street Station,trains,buses

Helping Scott Thomas qualify to run against Stan Gerzofsky in Senate District 10

Maine Senate District 10 includes Harpswell, Freeport, Brunswick, and Pownal. The office is currently held by Stan Gerzofsky of Brunswick, and he is up for re-election.

A few weeks back, the prior Republican candidate for the slot had to drop out of the race. A fine candidate, Scott Thomas of Freeport, stepped forward to replace him.

Scott is a motivated and competent business owner in Freeport, and he clearly understands the challenges faced by business owners in Maine. He is determined to turn things around.

He has a short window to collect the necessary qualifying checks for Clean Election funding. This is a call to registered voters in the district to contribute to the effort with $5 checks. If you would like to do so, please contact me at pemster4062@yahoo.com, and I will make arrangements to pick up your check and get you to sign the necessary form.

Alternately, you can contribute on line at MCEF donations.

If you choose the latter approach, please emial me to let me know you did so.

Once again, the candidate is Scott Thomas of Freeport, and the office is Senate District 10.

Thanks.

Technorati Tags: State government,senate

“I am not worthy……”

Borrowing a sentiment from the classic movie “Wayne’s World,” Side comes to you in a prostate position, humility and shame in full public display.

It has been too, too long for loyal readers, if there are any left, to go without the uplifting, amusing, and otherwise bizarre ramblings they have come to expect here, and this correspondent is appropriately ashamed for denying you your fix.

If we had thought about it, and applied any common sense, we might have decided to effectively shut the operation down for the summer, but we didn’t.  Failing that, we could have at least lowered expectations.  (Not that they could be much lower.)

So here we are.  The massive interior project we undertook is complete as of two weeks ago, other than the finishing touch of some border paper around the en suite bath.  And it took the starch out of this old codger, undertaken, as it was, in a series of the most sultry weeks this area has ever known.

Fresh on the heels of that milestone, female fruit of Side’s loins arrived with her two offspring, hoping to bask in the sunlight of our irreverence and hospitality for the month of August.

The end result is that we have talked much and produced little in the way of offerings to lift you from the doldrums.  And for that we apologize.  On the other hand, maybe you needed a break too.

In the midst of the recent power outage, we began this attempt at rebuilding your trust in us, and in getting back into the ‘groove’ of regular commentary.  Given that fruit is still on the premises, and summer is still in progress, we caution you that the publishing pace will ramp back up gradually, rather than instantly returning to the feverish pace you have become accustomed to, and for which we have garnered worldwide acclaim.

I have missed you dear readers, as I’m sure you have missed me.  I hope our bond is strong enough to survive a few mere weeks of our inattention.

And I look forward to a full return to our close and profound mutual support.  And the ‘dialogue’ these efforts inspire.

Sincerely,

P. C. Poppycock

Technorati Tags: Poppycock,Other Side

The LePage “Whistle Stop” Express

For a number of years, the Poppycock’s have bee meaning to ride the Maine Eastern train between Brunswick and Rockland, but there’s never been enough ‘push’ to get us to do it.

Well now there is.  Next Saturday, July 24th, there will be a special Maine Eastern round trip train from Rockland down to Brunswick, and back to Rockland.  It’s a chartered train, in the old “whistle stop” style, for Paul LePage’s campaign for Governor of Maine.

You can find the details here: details.  And more info here, including the itinerary: LePage train itinerary

For those of you in the greater Brunswick-Portland and points south region, the requirement to drive to Rockland for an 0830 boarding time, and then having to drive back home after returning to Rockland at about 1500 might look daunting enough to discourage your participation.  But there is another very attractive option that would make the day more manageable.

You could make the drive to Wiscasset and catch the train there at 1015, and then ride it down to Brunswick, make the turn, and get off the train at Wiscasset on the way back at roughly 1330.  This is a much more reasonable drive, and would still give you participation in all the "whistle stops" except for the Rockport origin.  And hours to enjoy all the enthusiasm aboard the train.

Please consider this option as another way to jump on board the "LePage train!"  Maine needs a major change in how it is ‘governed,’ and Paul is our best choice to do so!

Email or call me if you have any questions; but most of all, book a place on the train!

Technorati Tags: LePpage,train ride,Maine

A quickie…on the Constitution

You all know how much I love The Coastal Journal, and its all purpose persona Gina Hamilton, a liberal feel-gooder of epic dimension.

I’ve had her “opinion” piece of July 1st in my stack for two weeks now, and it’s time I make appropriate disposition.  She titled it “The Declaration…or the Constitution?”

If you ever wanted conclusive proof that our population is loaded with folks who can’t see any value or purpose or structural merit in founding principles or similar constraints upon our government, Gina is here to make the point.

To begin with, Gina asserts:

The Declaration of Independence was essentially a call to arms, and carries no force of law.  For instance, although the Declaration refers to a ‘Creator’, the Constitution makes no such reference, and indeed, establishes a strict wall of separation between church and state.

A call to arms?  Fine.  But ‘a strict wall of separation?’  Poppycock, balderdash, and folderol. 

The clear language of Amendment I says “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof….”  The words ‘strict,’ ‘wall,’ or ‘separation’ are nowhere to be found.  Except in the imaginations of those who find the constraints, well, too constraining.

Next, Gina lets us know that she finds our founding principles lacking in literary merit:

it was the dry, pendantic (her spelling) language of James Madison’s Constitution that we live with today and which truly forms the basis for our grand experiment.

But worry not. as Gina tells us:

the Constitution is a living document that should and does reflect the changing nature of America’s evolution and growth as a society.

In other words, no matter what you think the Constitution embodies, it is no more binding or permanent than is the makeup of your compost pile or tomorrow’s weather forecast.

As a matter of fact, Gina expects that:

The Court that will be seated in October will make many important decisions, just as former courts have done, and will share in the role of driving American society forward.

As you can tell, Gina is convinced that the role of the Supreme Court is to enact progressive social policy.

So what lesson do we learn here?  First, Gina should rename “The Coastal Journal” as “The Coastal Progressive,” since it is her purpose to use the weekly as her personal ideological manifesto.

Second, before she writes, Gina should learn to read, and more important, comprehend what she reads.  And teach her son and heir to do the same.

From all indications, she has not yet reached that milestone.  La Dolce this or that and other cutsie gimmicks notwithstanding.

Technorati Tags: Coastal Journal,Gina Hamilton

He’s back!!!! (Or maybe he never really left…..)

Things have been pretty quiet in Lake Basebegone since Barrister F. Lee Bailey penned his note of withdrawal to the MRRA.  Hence Side hasn’t reported on the subject since these two posts:

Re: Condolences-one last glimmer of hope?

A “Towering” Lake Basebegone Update, May 26, 2010

Imagine our delight, then, when in browsing through the Sunday Portland paper, we found that F. Lee is back in the news, and in more ways than one.

For the past two Sundays, this paper has carried major front page “special report” stories on the Dennis Dechaine case.  Astute followers of the case know that F. Lee took an interest in the case some months ago, and he’s mentioned in the article in that context.

Bailey gets his own related article in the paper, in which we find this interesting passage:

Bailey has business ties in Maine and he is moving to Yarmouth this month from Massachusetts. A longtime pilot, Bailey is a close friend and business partner with Jim Horowitz, the founder of Oxford Aviation.

So, maybe there is hope for a return of a Richardson-Bailey economic development “breakthrough” after all.  Bailey’s permanent presence in Maine should provide fodder of one sort or another for future musings on the subject.  And this is the first time we can recall seeing in print that Bailey is a business partner with Oxford Aviation’s Jim Horowitz.  That makes a trio of opportunists of “towering” stature, all here to surprise us with new and spectacular possibilities if we’ll just “invest” in them.

Let the speculation begin.  And we’re glad that Bailey seems to have recovered from his deep depression after Johnny Protocols pulled out of the race for governor.  Which makes us wonder whither goest JP?

Technorati Tags: F. Lee Bailey,John Richardson,Oxford Aviation

Uncle! Slacker alert!

I don’t need to tell you that our activity has been near zero in recent weeks, making your daily grind more monotonous than it otherwise has to be.

An alibi seems in order.  Starting about two weeks ago, I began a fairly major interior project at Chez PC, and as almost always happens, the little details add up to a bigger work load than imagined.  So I’m here to cry uncle and ask that you cut me some slack.

Couple that with high temperatures and grubby humidity over the last week or so, and continuing as we speak, and you have a work environment that slows ‘productivity’ by a goodly sum.  And when you quit for the day, you’re not really up for witty and pithy authoring.

I’ve got a few things in the hopper, but haven’t been able to get myself to finish them.  I’m hopeful that I’ll finish the project sometime next week, and get back to a more or less normal “summer” routine.  Notwithstanding that my daughter and family arrive in very early August.

So, for the time being, Side will be grateful for your indulgence and understanding, and we want you to know that the slower pace is only temporary.  We remain fully committed to offering the other side of things for the long term.

With occasional interruptions by real life.

Technorati Tags: Other Side,Poppycock,slowdown

Sub-prime, adjustable rate teachers’ contract

(Other Side note: what follows is an essay on the recently approved Brunswick teachers contract.  We hope you’ll bear with us as we set the stage for the heart of the issue.)

Much has been written and said about the great ‘housing crisis’ and/or the bursting of the ‘housing bubble’ in the last year and a half or so.  And it’s eminently arguable that this housing snafu, or more appropriately, the home financing snafu, was the underlying trigger and basis for the ‘great recession’ we now find ourselves in, and are having great trouble escaping from.

The story line in Washington and the mainstream media is that unscrupulous mortgage agents were pushing undesirable financing plans on home buyers who had no idea what they were getting into, and that the loans often involved skyrocketing interest rates and balloon payments.  Given the nature of home financing, where your property is your collateral, the deal is that you either pay up or you lose your house.

In most cases, the ‘loan paper’ was an adjustable rate mortgage, with a ‘teaser rate’ at the front end making for a seemingly painless entry into the glory of home ownership, which was seen as universally desirable.  By definition, the consequence of a very attractive front end with such loans is a far less attractive and predictable back end, with serious vulnerability to economic conditions.  This includes the possibility of rapidly increasing monthly payments, or even worse, the need to make balloon payments and refinance in the not too distant future.

The “firemen first” approach to public budgets

Technorati Tags: budgets,Brunswick,bookies

Anyone who’s watched local and state budgeting cycles over the years knows there’s a pretty standard protocol for scaring the taxpayers into coughing up the extra funds to do whatever it is the “public servants” in charge deem is most “vital” for their well-being.

Recently, The Weekly Standard ran a “Scrapbook” note on the subject, and it articulated the finer points of the strategy, and so I can’t resist passing it along to you.  You can find it here under the heading “Obama’s $50 billion wish list.”

It begins with this passage:

President Obama sent a letter to the House and Senate leaders of both parties last week asking for $50 billion to “address the devastating economic impact of budget cuts at the state and local levels that are leading to massive layoffs of teachers, police and firefighters.”

Here in Brunswick, recent years have shown a preference for using Coffin Pond summer swimming and Curtis Library funding as the strawmen for budget battles, and this year, freshman sports were added to the mix.  Suggesting Library cuts is a sure way to call out at least 50 opponents at a budget hearing.  The “bookies” are nothing if not organized.  And the “schoolies,” especially those engaged in sports, were almost as engaged.

Serious discussion aside, the referenced WS item simply caused this reporter to smirk in knowing agreement as the narrative unfolded.  Take this paragraph:

This is a classic instance of something Charlie Peters, the retired editor of the Washington Monthly, famously labeled the “Firemen First Principle.” As Peters explained, “The basic idea is that, when faced with a budget cut, the bureaucrat translates it into bad news. . . . In other words, he chops where it will hurt constituents the most, not the least. At the local government level, this is most often done by threatening reductions in fire and police protection.”

The article really hit home though, when it got to the discussion of specifics in the author’s Arlington County, Virginia domicile.  Local officials proposed cutting library operating hours.  Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?

Read it and laugh (edited for brevity):

….tax-receipts thanks to the housing bubble were increasing at double digit rates before the crash, and the county government therefore went on a bender. Now it whines about austerity. Our local version of “firemen first”  is a cut-back in public library hours, which the County Board has just announced in the name of fiscal discipline. This will, in fact, inconvenience and tick off a significant number of local taxpayers.

At the same time, believe it or not, the county is advertising a number of job vacancies, none of which inspire confidence in prudent fiscal management.

These include:

• Community Inspector II (Recycling)
• New Media Curator, Artisphere Cultural Center
• Affordable Housing Development Specialist/Trainee

These jobs offer salary ranges well beyond what the average taxpayer earns in the private sector, but I suppose that is to be expected. I’m only surprised that there isn’t a position to study the economy of Greece so that its finer points could be brought home to make Arlington County even more prosperous.

Whopper of the week (month? year?) award goes to….drum roll, please….. Bowdoin College!

Every now and then, you sit down with an adult beverage to casually leaf through the latest print media.  And on occasion, in doing so, you come across an item that puts your happy home at risk.

That’s because you run the risk of reflexively projecting an atomized mouthful of said high octane beverage into the immediate area.  If you’re unfortunate enough to have an open candle flame nearby, you could become a “fire-breathing” side-show star, a career move that is definitely not life-enhancing.

I came across just such an item this week in the Forecaster, and you can find it here under the title “Brunswick historic board questions Bowdoin house demo.”

The fun part of this story, for openers, is that it pits two of Brunswick’s elite forces of nature against each other – the Ivory Tower of Bowdoin College, and the preservationists of the Village Review Board.  The very soul of the community lies in the balance, so the stakes are immense.

The Seaward Inn….a Rockport gem

The Poppycocks spent their recent getaway at a truly unique and wonderful place in Rockport, Massachusetts, in the area known as Cape Ann.  It’s near Gloucester, the famous fishing town, and the broader region includes Beverly, Salem, and other fun places.

Our friends from New Jersey joined us at the Seaward Inn, a classic New England “shingle” bed and breakfast, directly on the water in Rockport.  It’s situated on a lovely road that provides wonderful peace and quiet with a view, and the perfect opportunity for morning and evening walks, in which you will take in superb properties and gardens, most with incredible ocean views.

You can find the info on the Seaward Inn here: http://www.seawardinn.com/.

The character, details, and appointments at the Inn are all first class.  And the breakfast is world class.  They have a great chef and an impressive professional kitchen from which to serve cooked to order morning meals.  We only wished they served dinner as well, but they do not at this point. 

The staff is most helpful, the “common areas” are homey and comfortable, and the amenities include fresh baked cookies each afternoon and complimentary tea and coffee available during the day.  Within a day or two we felt like old friends, even though we had not been there before.  But we plan to be there often in the future.

The Inn has been operating for more than 60 years, and the current owner is the daughter of the family that opened it as a tourist destination.

Rockport has a thriving waterfront village that is strong on art galleries, candy shops, and other classic New England offerings.  It took us a bit to scope out the dining options, but once we did, we had some most enjoyable meals.

The finest of these was at a place known as Duckworth’s Bistrot in East Gloucester.  The odd spelling of ‘bistro,’ we were told, is the original spelling in French.  No matter; this reporter rates the place in the top five places I’ve dined at in my lifetime.

Small, cozy, very well run, extremely appealing menu.  And most items available in either appetizer or entree sized portions, which we wish was more common in fine establishments.  The service was superb, and the desserts were beyond belief.  Check out a typical menu here.  And here’s what it looks like:

       

All in all, if you’re looking for a nearby getaway,  the Seaward Inn should fill the bill, and Duckworth’s will leave you wanting more, and more, and more.

And you can trust me on this; I’m not like all the others.

Technorati Tags: getaways,Rockport,Duckworth's