Three former Windham town councilors, including two who resigned, have applied to fill the seat left vacant by the death of Peter Busque.

The candidates include Kaile Warren, the controversial founder of Rent-A-Husband, and Carol Waig, one of three councilors who resigned in a controversy about consolidating emergency dispatching services.

Also applying is Peter Anania, who was appointed to fill a vacancy on the council last year. That term ended in November.

The Town Council will vote later this month to appoint one of the three candidates to fill Busque’s seat until the election in November. Busque died in an apparent suicide in September. He was 50.

Applications for the seat were due to the town manager’s office Wednesday afternoon.

On the advice of the town’s attorney, Executive Assistant Tammy Hodgman would not release the applications or the names of the applicants without their permission.

She said the attorney, Kenneth Cole, said the applications are not public records and are more like applications for town employee jobs than nomination papers for a council seat. Cole could not be reached Wednesday afternoon.

Hodgman said there were three applicants. Waig gave Hodgman permission to release her name. Warren and Anania confirmed to The Portland Press Herald that they also applied.

Warren said he has wanted to return to the council since he resigned in 2008 after suffering two heart attacks. He hasn’t pursued a seat since then because he has been addressing criminal charges that he deceived investors about the value and performance of his Rent-A-Husband handyman business.

Now that the charges have been dropped and his health has improved, Warren is ready to serve again and says he should be the council chairman.

During his 1½ years on the council, he was an aggressive member who wasn’t afraid of controversy, he said Wednesday.

“I voted the way I believe the citizens of Windham would best be served,” said Warren, who criticized the current councilors for voting strictly in blocs.

Anania said that wasn’t the case during his time on the council. “There was a lot of consensus,” he said.

Anania said the council would be best served by someone who has no interest in getting elected in November and, like him, just wants to do his civic duty.

Warren said he doesn’t know whether he would run in November, partially because he might have “bigger aspirations” for political office by then.

Waig did not return phone calls Wednesday seeking comment on her candidacy.

She was elected to her second term on the council in June 2008, and resigned in September 2010 after the town enacted a policy limiting communication between councilors and town employees.

The policy was adopted after police Sgt. Michael Denbow was fired for using police resources to look into a potential conflict of interest between then-Councilor Bill Tracy and the Cumberland County Regional Communications Center, where the town moved its emergency dispatching services in June 2010.

Denbow’s termination has since been overturned. 

Staff Writer Leslie Bridgers can be contacted at 791-6364 or at:

lbridgers@pressherald.com

 

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