Food drive thanks

I would like to thank to everyone for the wonderful support we had for our 20th annual Hand-To-Hand Food Drive.

The Main Street of Freeport had a very long line of enthusiastic volunteers with bags of food to donate to the Freeport Community Services food bank.

A special thank you to the terrific “Flag Ladies” who were so kind and helpful; the Freeport High School JMG students, under the direction of Jay Harper; and the middle school students with Paige Fournier and the teachers and students from JMG Durham. Also, a big thank you to all the teachers, children and parents from Laugh and Learn Preschool, Durham and Freeport.

Thank you for making this event so very successful. We truly appreciate all of your donations and time and we hope to see you next year.

Wendy White Marstaller

Durham

What’s going on?

It appears as though town selectmen, as well as Budget Committee members, have thrown Fire Chief Bill St. Michel under the bus. A couple of selectmen told him one thing, then voted another way. Same with some of Budget Committee. Appears they needed to cut something from the budget, so one was the chief’s pay of 5 percent.

Makes no difference that the chief puts in long hours besides being responsible for the firefighters, equipment, buildings, training, mutual aid with neighboring towns’ rescue service, and town fire warden.

In the last 13 years he has written over $600,000 in grants. That alone is equal to $50,000 a year that did not have to be raised in local taxes. That is almost as much as his salary.

Also has a page full of merits that include past president of Maine Fire Chiefs, recipient of Maine Chief of the Year, current treasurer of Maine Fire Chiefs, founder Tri-County Training, MFT&E instructor, MFT&E safety officer, chair of Maine Fire Chiefs Certification Committee, represented Maine in Washington five times, current president of the New England Division of the IAFC.

I could go on, but hope people get the picture. And this is a town official that will be leaving us in a few short months. An official that couldn’t get a lousy additional $1,700 this year added to his salary. Well, I hope Durham voters are ready to pay thousands more for their RSU this year, and hope they hold them to the same pay scale as the town gave to their employees. Almost forgot, we can’t, as they are union.

So we have lost in the last year a great administrative assistant, road commissioner, code enforcement officer, and shortly, our town fire chief. I have to ask: What Is going on at our town office?

Ken Scribner

Durham