Archive for December 2013
St. Dom’s food drive nets 1000 pounds for food pantry
The fifth grade class at Saint Dominic Academy in Lewiston organized a food drive in recent months to benefit St. Mary’s Food Pantry.
The students challenged their peers to donate non-perishable food items from their own pantries and place them in designated receptacles at the school. They also organized a Halloween dance to help reach their goal of collecting 1,000 pounds of food.
At the end of the community service project, the students loaded a school bus with the collected food and delivered it to the pantry, where they were delighted to learn that they had eclipsed their goal by delivering a total of 1,037 pounds.
Lisbon students support Toys for Tots campaign
Students, staff and family members of Lisbon Community School, Philip W. Sugg Middle School, and Lisbon High School partnered this holiday season with the Town of Lisbon, the Giving Tree program, and the U.S. Marine Corp. to support the Maine Toys for Tots campaign.
“Student volunteers met to decide which projects they wanted to support this year,” said Lisbon Schools Community Resource Coordinator Monica Millhime. “Collecting toys during the holiday season was at the top of the list again this year.”
Troop 121 expands Christmas tree collection service
Boy Scout Troop 121 of Auburn will again collect discarded Christmas trees for delivery to a local recycling center this year. Last January, in the first year of the service, the Troop collected over 80 trees from residents of Auburn; this year, the troop will expand the service to include residents of Lewiston. While the cities of Auburn and Lewiston provide locations for free tree disposal, they no longer collect the trees at curbside.
Enough is Enough: City councilors, your lives are about to change
By Robert E. Macdonald
Mayor of Lewiston
In a few weeks a new city council will take the helm of Lewiston government. Councilors John Butler (Ward 1), Craig Saddlemire (Ward 5) and Richard Desjardins (Ward 7) will be replaced by Councilors-elect Leslie Dubois, Kristen Cloutier and Michael Lachance.
Our new councilors will find that their best day as a member of the Lewiston City Council will be Monday, January 6, 2014, Inauguration Day at the Franco-American Heritage Center. The inauguration gives them one day to bask in the sun, enjoying what they were able to achieve with family and friends.
The following day, reality will hit. City councilors, you are no longer part of the complaining public. Your days of complaining and criticizing policy makers have now gone the way of the dinosaurs. You are now part of the policy-making team. Your decisions will be applauded by some and loathed by others.
Mechanics Savings Bank supports Auburn Fire Department
Mechanics Savings Bank is a long time supporter of its local fire departments and the charities they support. On December 8, a team of Mechanics Savings Bank employees donned red and green tutus and candy cane-striped socks to participate in the Auburn Fire Department’s “Local 797 Truckload of Christmas 5K.”
“This was a great way to meet my personal fitness goals, give back to the community, and have a lot of fun with my co-workers,” said Terri Cook, Performance Improvement Project Manager at Mechanics Savings Bank. “This is what Christmas is all about… spreading cheer and embracing the opportunity to make the season a little brighter for others.”
CMMC WHA Gallery features Duplessis, Ness
The works of two painters are on display at the Central Maine Medical Center Woman’s Hospital Association (WHA) Rotating Art Gallery through January 9.
Paintings by Irene Duplissis and Melanie Ness are on display in the main lobby hallway near CMMC’s 60 High Street entrance.
Duplissis has been painting professionally for many years. She has devoted much time to teaching art locally, participating in workshops and developing her own talent. Her work, which frequently depicts the character of New England, can be seen at her gallery in Auburn, as well as in private collections throughout the United States and abroad.
Veterans restore dignity to Auburn Plains Cemetery
Officers of the American Legion William J. Rogers Post 153 and Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 1603, including Tibby Dupuis, Carl Douglass, Hugh Brown, Don Beaulieu, Frank W. Hulett and Paul R. Bernard, recently placed “Wreaths of Enduring Memory” on all veterans’ graves in Auburn Plains Cemetery on Route 4.
The project was the latest step in an ongoing effort by local veterans’ organizations, led by American Legion Post 153 of Auburn, to restore dignity to the humble resting place, also known as North Plains Burying Ground, Pleasant Plains Cemetery, Plains Cemetery and Poverty Corner Cemetery.
Enough is Enough: A love affair with technology has invaded our schools
By Robert E. Macdonald
Mayor of Lewiston
Every week several hours are put into writing this column. A lot of trees are sacrificed. Money is freely spent at Staples buying packages of 8×11 yellow-lined legal pads. The ink from a multitude of pens, courtesy of a local bank, is used in order to produce this column.
Once written, it is dictated to my wife who types the long hand on the pages into a word processor. It is then visually checked for grammar, punctuation and spelling. It is then reread several times over several hours, portions occasionally being changed or deleted until satisfaction with the final product is attained. It is then sent to the editor of the TCT.
My wife and I, like many others in this community, would never submit or sign our names to a document full of spelling, punctuation and grammatical errors. In school it was drilled into us that your writing went a long way in defining who you were to the public.
Phase II of new Industrial Park breaks ground
Federal officials, city representatives, and members of the public recently helped celebrate the official groundbreaking of Phase II of the Auburn Industrial Park.
A joint venture between the City of Auburn and the Auburn Business Development Corporation (ABDC), the new eight-lot subdivision will consist of approximately 100 acres of land adjacent to the Auburn-Lewiston Airport. Officials estimate the park could produce nearly $1.2 million annually in new property taxes, capture up to $80 million in private investment, and create over 200 jobs over the next 10 to 15 years for the City of Auburn.
Phase II of the project involves the construction of approximately 3,100 linear feet of industrial roadway to coincide with public water and sewer line instillation, natural gas line extension, and the addition of three-phase electrical power. Once completed, the subdivision will be large enough to accommodate approximately 1.3 million square feet of new construction.
“A Christmas Carol” returns to Public Theatre
For one weekend only, on December 13, 14, and 15, The Public Theatre will present its acclaimed original adaptation of “A Christmas Carol,” followed by a holiday sing–a-long featuring Christmas Carol fiddler Jennifer Armstrong.
The Public Theatre’s own version of Dickens’ classic tale has become a holiday favorite in Lewiston-Auburn. Performed by six actors and a fiddler, this inventive adaptation was developed and written for The Public Theatre by Artistic Director Christopher Schario in 1993. It has since been published by Dramatists Play Service and is now regularly performed by theatres around the world.