Dover-Foxcroft can’t afford dam repairs

To the Editor;

Let’s say you have a $33,000 auto or truck loan. Or a $33,000 loan for equipment for your work. Or an educational loan for your child. Would you then also mortgage your house and your family’s future for another $90,000 loan to build a swimming pool behind your house? Hopefully you’d have friends and family who would tell you that that second loan is a very, very bad idea, especially in uncertain economic times like these.

The lagoon formed by the Dover-Foxcroft dam is not a swimming pool, nor a private pond. But it does provide a familiar and picturesque setting which we are all comfortable with. For some few residents, it provides a recreation spot and seaplane landing. It would be nice to keep the lagoon … but not at a price tag of $9,000,000! That’s $9 million plus a projected $5 million in interest. Plus increased costs due to any construction delay or cost overrun (Dover-Foxcroft already has $3,300,000 in debt to pay off).

For comparison, the state estimates it will cost $8.8 million to repair an above-water structure, the Essex Street bridge near Ace Hardware. The state has 1.4 million people to pay off that $8.8 million.  Dover-Foxcroft has about 4,500 residents and roughly 2,900 taxpayers to pay off $9 million, plus interest, which will require a 10 percent tax increase. Do we want to mortgage our future and our children’s futures for the next 25 years? Because once this project is begun, there’s no turning back until completion. Unlike a financed truck, it can’t simply be repossessed by the dealer.  

Planning to repair a dam with only the very limited money available to our small town through its taxable citizens and businesses is insanity!  

Major work on a bridge or dam or sewer system or intersection is only done with massive assistance of state and federal funds. I attended some of the dam-related meetings and believe that our fellow citizens tried very hard to find some way to finance the repair, but they could not. Neither the state of Maine nor private or non-profit corporations have any interest in building dams or rebuilding them.

Already the select board has had to make budget adjustments in anticipation of this huge potential debt and dam-related costs: sidewalk improvements have been cut from the budget. What other expenditures will the town find it can’t afford because of the dam?

Road maintenance? Fire department equipment? School buildings? Recreation? Upkeep of the town beach and boat landings? And even a newly rebuilt dam will require upkeep of $30,000 per year.

Don’t we all consider buying something we’d really like to have, but then decide we can’t afford it or better to just hold our money for other necessary expenses? In my view, this is the situation with the Mayo Mill Dam.  I urge you to vote “No” on Question 4 on the June 10 ballot.  

David P. Frasz

Dover-Foxcroft