Talk
Rockport Select Board Chair Denise Munger is a great devotee of the Strongly Worded Letter. I should know, I’ve now been the target of two Strongly Worded Letters in just the past few months.
The first Strongly Worded Letter was read aloud by Ms. Munger at a Budget Committee meeting last fall. It was written in response to this essay, to which the Select Board, evidently, took great umbrage. My criticisms, Ms. Munger said, were unfair and made it “harder for us to work together.”
I was the subject of a second Strongly Worded Letter last week at the first of several joint meetings of the Budget
Watching last Wednesday’s Five Town CSD School Board budget discussion I was struck by the Board’s silence on a key educational issue.
Jen Munson, a respected English teacher, presented a compelling case regarding NWEA test scores that show students performing well below expected reading levels. She made a clear plea to retain the Literacy Intervention specialist in a full-time position providing remedial instruction to these struggling readers.
I found it both baffling and sad, that this plea was met with zero follow-up — no questions, no data requests, no discussion. Instead, the board’s
A few weeks ago we wrote about the bomb cyclone that tore through the northeast in late February and how it might impact seabirds that winter on the open ocean. We had pondered whether dovekies, those smallest of the alcids (the family of birds that includes puffins and guillemots), might be found along the Maine shores in higher numbers after the storm.
The survival of these seabirds on the winter seas brought to mind a story we’d heard ages ago about a legendary cod fisherman. His name was Howard Blackburn. While fishing from a dory during a storm on the Grand Banks in January of 1883
In your March 2 article about the Camden Police and the town budget, “Camden Town Manager recommends initiating search for new police chief”, the Camden Town Manager was quoted as follows: "As of FY26, Camden’s total assessment to Knox County is approximately $2.4 million, with roughly $1.8 million supporting the Sheriff’s Department. At present, many of the services funded through this assessment are not directly utilized by the town.”
I believe Town Manager is misstating what Camden currently pays the County for the Sheriff’s office for ‘law enforcement’. She is saying that Camden pays $1.8
Dear Reader, at the close of my essay, Rockport’s proposed budget is out. Did they hear us? Well, kind of…, I noted that there was "promising news" about the town's budget and the budget review process to come.
I was wrong about this.
Three minutes into the March 4 opening budget review hearing, Select Board Chair Denise Munger read a statement from the Select Board (she was acting in her role as Select Board chair at the time, so I assume she was speaking on behalf of the entire Select Board), which expressed "disappointment" that "a member of the Budget Committee" had "felt the need" to
In today’s Intrafish there is another article of a salmon company in dire straits. A regular monitoring of headlines should offer Belfast residents a sigh, that we escaped 18 football fields of empty rusty tanks scaring the banks of the Little River.
Maine & Co. does a disservice to the state’s brand by courting unreputable startups, promising them permitting and tax-breaks. Any reputable company would avoid the tarnish of eminent domain, exceptions to laws including the Clean Water Act, back-room politics, taking tax breaks meant for smaller local businesses, or attacking those defending
