There are seven candidates running for the two a-large seats on the South Portland City Council this fall. 

They include Maxine Beecher and former councilors Louis Maietta Jr. and Michael Pock. The others are Richard Carter and James Gilboy, who have both served on the city’s Board of Education, along with community activist Susan Henderson and fundraising specialist Katherine Lewis.

Many of the candidates cited their frustration with the current membership of the council as being a key reason for why they’re running. In particular, several candidates have complained publicly about the behavior of councilors Eben Rose and Brad Fox, who they say push their own agendas, rather than acting in the best interests of the community.

While several other candidates didn’t point fingers, they did agree that there is ample room for better communication and unification on the City Council, saying that the city is currently at a crossroads.

Issues raised by the candidates as needing attention moving forward include continuing to work for more environmentally conscious solutions, building a more diverse tax base and coming up with creative solutions to complicated issues, like the increasingly high cost of living.

Beecher

Beecher is passionate about the city continuing in a sustainable direction and as a beekeeper, she supported the ban on certain pesticides that the council passed this past summer. She’s also in favor of taking a closer look at preservation of open space.

Beecher has given preliminary support to energy benchmarking proposals brought before the council recently, which would track energy use in some of the largest buildings in the city and use the data to help mitigate the carbon emissions.

Beecher also wants to reach out to the city’s under-represented and under-served senior citizens, who she said often have “too much pride to ask for help. We’ve got to set up (a way) to actually go to them.”

If re-elected, she would like to continue as the council liaison to the Comprehensive Plan Implementation Committee, to which she has devoted several years of service.

“I have worked hard, I have been committed to the city, (and) I don’t sit on my hands,” she said.

Carter

Carter has been a member of the school board for more than a decade and has also served as the chairman. He previously ran for the council during a special election in 2013, when he lost the seat by two votes.

Carter believes his experience in serving the city will help bring balance and a middle-of-the-road perspective to the council.

“I have a great concern that we could be facing a City Council that wouldn’t truly represent the majority of South Portland,” he said.

He works as a retail operations manager and is the father of two adult sons. He said that if elected he would operate without an agenda and give everyone equal attention.

“There will always be people who won’t agree with something I vote for, but I’ve always been a person, whether it’s a coach or a school board member, who will sit and listen to everybody,” he said.

Carter is running because “for the first time, the tone and direction of the council itself is detrimental to the city and needs to be corrected.”

Gilboy

Gilboy, another veteran school board member, is running for a seat on the council for the first time. He wants to be “that go-to person for voters or people who live in the city who have concerns.”

For him the biggest obstacle facing the city is the ongoing litigation with the Portland Pipe Line Corp., which has challenged the validity of South Portland’s so-called Clear Skies Ordinance banning the importation of tar sands oil. That ban was passed in 2014 and the pipeline filed suit in federal court a year later.

Gilboy said with the “corporation suing the city, it’s the taxpayer that’s going to be on the hook,” both for the legal costs associated with the lawsuit and for the potential commercial damage caused.

Gilboy believes he would be an asset on the council because he would work hard to represent everyone, which includes “listening to everyone’s concerns and just asking questions. I think I can represent the city well and set the tone where things get done.”

Henderson

Henderson is a retired nurse and professor who has lived in the city for almost 40 years.

She’s been involved in the comprehensive plan implementation process and is a member of the citizen advocacy group Protect South Portland, which is largely credited with passage of the tar sands ban.

Henderson said the three biggest issues in South Portland are the economy, the environment and affordable housing.

“I would hate to see our town be only a town for rich people,” she said, adding that part of what makes South Portland special is that “moderate- and lower-income people can live here.”

In addition to affordable housing, Henderson said it’s imperative that the city continue to develop and diversify its tax base “so that as things change the city will be able to absorb that shift.”

But as the tax base is expanding, she said, it’s also necessary to balance other needs, like preserving open space.

In addition, while she did not want to criticize sitting councilors, she believes that “there’s a lot of social change (happening), and it’s not easy to sort out, (but) valuing all people,” is necessary. “Everybody has equal value,” she added.

Lewis

Lewis is the director of development for Greater Portland Landmarks and has lived in South Portland for a decade. Even so, she represents a constituency that has an underrepresented voice in city government, she said, and that’s working parents with children in the school system.

For those groups, she hopes to be a” communication bridge and conduit of information,” particularly as the council takes a role in scrutinizing whether to combine Mahoney and Memorial middle schools or keep them separate.

Lewis has no particular agenda other than to serve the community.

“One of my strengths is working with different types of people to get large goals accomplished,” she said. “You have to build consensus, and I can bring that to this council.”

Lewis supports what she called a “forward-looking economy” that grows the tax base by providing incentives for business owners without sacrificing the goals of open space, sustainable living and the health of residents.

Lewis, who is also the vice president of the South Portland Land Trust, wants to make sure that the city continues to recognize the value in preserving open, usable green space.

Overall, she said, “We really need to consider the importance of the spaces that give our neighborhoods character, that encourage development (and) make this a great place to live and work.”

Maietta

Maietta served one prior term on the council and also represented South Portland in the Maine House of Representatives. Known mostly for his family’s construction and real estate development company, Maietta, who is also a landlord, said his goal is to bring balance back to the council.

He disagrees with the Clear Skies Ordinance and the pesticide ban and said he knows a lot of residents who are upset about those ordinances. He argued that the policies and rules passed by the council should better reflect the desires of all constituents.

Maietta also doesn’t believe the city is doing enough to encourage the establishment of new businesses, noting the proposal to build a new Martin’s Point Health Center at the corner of Sawyer and Ocean streets last year, which ultimately failed.

“The doors need to be open,” he said. “I don’t think we’re doing enough. We’ve got to be (more) open-minded” about new business opportunities. “It’s a rippling effect. (If) people think South Portland is too hard to deal with, they’re going to go somewhere else.”

Pock

Pock also has prior service on the City Council, serving one year, after being elected in the 2013 special election. He, too, wants to bring more balance to the council and help “calm the rhetoric.”

Pock criticized the pesticide ban, which he called “Orwellian,” while also arguing that it “has no teeth at all.” He’s also against instituting any rent stabilization or rent control measures, which has been discussed by the city’s Affordable Housing Committee.

“Supply and demand will control the market,” he said, adding that the best solution to the housing crisis is for the “city to make more land available for housing.”

Another issue that Pock wants to address is the school budget, which he said is inflated, arguing there “should be pretty much no increase” in school spending, year to year.

In addition, if elected, Pock said he would encourage the city to pay more attention to its elderly.

Maxine Beecher

Richard Carter

James Gilboy

Susan Henderson

Katherine Lewis

Louis Maietta Jr.

Michael Pock

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