Oct. 5, 1983

Westbrook Police Sgt. Timothy Farr believes the 17-year-old youth

who fired a shotgun at him (and missed) Saturday night was on his way to shoot a member of his own family. The youth had another shell in the gun’s chamber, but threw the gun to the ground as police pursued him at East Valentine and Brackett streets. They whisked him to the psychiatric ward at the Maine Medical Center for evaluation and then to County Jail, where he was being held on two charges of criminal threatening with the shotgun. The youth wouldn’t discuss where he got the 20-gauge shotgun and two shells. Farr said he is a former inmate

of the South Windham Correctional Center, which means he was treated as an adult for a criminal violation, and said the youth will be treated as an adult for this episode, as well.

Their comparative records on spending and taxation are the theme of statements issued this week by the Republican and Democratic candidates for mayor in Westbrook’s Nov. 8 elections.

Philip D. Spiller the Republican candidate, pledged two years of no

tax increases (“barring unforeseen emergencies”) if at least four

Republicans are elected with him to the City Council. Charles Malcolm Roma, the Democratic candidate, continued to attack

Spiller’s voting record in the City Council on spending questions.

Both men now are aldermen at large. Statement by Roma: “Now that I have stopped laughing at the Republican candidate’s statement in the newspaper last week (which was, to say the least, a feeble attempt to lump Mr. O’Gara, Roma, and overspending together), I would like to offer the

following comment: Baloney. First, I can hardly believe the candidate wrote the statement himself, and second, whoever wrote it was obviously not aware of the candidate’s voting record for the previous two years.”

The home of Paul Boivin, Longfellow Road, Gorham, sunk into a large hole created when hundreds of yards of unstable earth slid from beneath it. The word began going around in phone calls among neighbors and total strangers, soon after the landslide itself and before 7 a.m., Saturday, they began arriving, scores of people. They were excavators, well drillers, an experienced building mover, and many able-bodied hands, along with equipment. R.J. Grondin and Hans Hansen made a road across the gaping cracks Thursday and got out Stanley Hillock’s well-

drilling rigs. Then Friday the two vans, the family car and small

dump truck that were buried in the raked earth were hauled out of their graves. It was 9:30 or 10 p.m. before the house was skidded out onto firm field and the weary workers went home.

Oct. 6, 1993

Westbrook hired Boothbay Harbor’s town manager, Jeffery Grossman, Monday as new administrative assistant to the mayor. Grossman will start work Nov. 8 and be paid $1,000 a week plus benefits. The benefit package is estimated at $23,100 for a total of $75,100 a year. Grossman succeeds Peter Carmine Russo, Don Doane and Peter Murray, all widely known in the community, who have been hired by the Westbrook School Department in new careers.

To the tax assessors, Scarborough is now worth more than Westbrook, bumping Westbrook out of third place in the county. Both are in the billion-dollar league, but Scarborough leads Westbrook by $1,150,000 in 1994 figures. For 1993, Westbrook led Scarborough by $52 million.

Home gardeners with more squash, potato, onions, or any other

Thanksgiving table-type vegetables than they can use might like to donate them to the Westbrook American Legion Post 197. They will be used in a Thanksgiving dinner that the post auxiliary is preparing for the homeless and area veterans who are alone with no place to go on the holiday.

Superintendent Edward Connolly has told the Westbrook School Committee that it may need more money from the city to cover costs of a new heating system in Congin School and three new teachers required by federal rules. “I am not trying to use this as a public pillory” he wrote to the School Committee. “However, the Council needs to be apprised of our problems and our possible need to either severely cut programs or request additional dollars.”

Scott Paper Co. is paying “just under $3 million” and its insurance

carrier is paying $5 million to a class of stockholders who claimed in court that Scott withheld “certain material facts” about the company’s 1990 earnings.

Gorham’s proposed Narragansett Development District will get another hearing Oct. 18 before the Planning Committee makes any recommendation to the Town Council. Committee member Michael Phinney, whose father owns land in the propose shopping center area, removed himself from both the debate and the vote on the project. The Committee’s decision was prompted not so much by outright opposition as by thoughtful concern on the part of residents attending Monday night’s meeting in the Shaw School.