Sunday, April 1, 2007
Residents at Saturday's annual town meeting honored a former town manager who had held that post for more than 35 years before retiring last year, and who was a selectwoman before that.
Laura Toothaker, 86, faced two natural disasters in her first year as manager, in 1970. All but two of Phillips' downtown structures burned in a fire three months after she started, and a flood followed in December.
With only her Town Office and a grocery store left standing, she began the work required to get assistance to pull the town back together. Toothaker also worked to rebuild the town after major flooding in 1987, 20 years ago today, that also devastated other parts of the state.
"She taught me everything," Selectman Steven Charles said. "She knows the ins and outs of operating a town. When I first became selectman four years ago, I didn't know how a selectmen's meeting ran, or anything about town government."
Voters also learned that the cost of repairing 15 deteriorating roads in the town could exceed $2 million, and the town will have to find the money to fix at least five of the worst roads.
One of the top five roads, a section of the Reeds Mills Road, commonly known as the Davenport Flats, would cost $400,000 to repair and repave. The five roads on that priority list would cost $1.02 million to fix, explained Town Manager Karen Olivieri and selectmen Eric Kinney and Steven Charles.
About 75 voters attended the meeting at the Philips Elementary School to act on 53 articles.
Voters re-elected Town Clerk Evelyn Wilbur. Jonathan Wilbur outpolled Scott Croteau, 47-14, to win a selectman's seat.
The tax commitment of $149,564 was about a 3 percent increase from last year's and was within state-mandated limits for annual increases. The estimated school budget, according to Olivieri, is about the same as last year, but figures are not yet available.
Questions/Comments
Reader comments
Sort by: Oldest first | Newest First
Blow the candles out sweetie we got to get to voting
Steven you’re a warm body to fill the position just get up there and talk like you know what you doing
You’ll do until we find someone to replace you
OK everybody ready to pretend we can run a town
Just making fun of the way the story was written don’t get you knickers in a twist
report abuse
You must be a registered user of MaineToday.com to post a comment. Register or log in.