News Briefs

Gray Town Manager's Report
Tuesday, May 5, 2005

Direct Deposit Program:

The Town will put into place a direct deposit program for its employees. Around June 1 the program will expand the ability of employees to have a portion or all of their pay checks directly deposited in their accounts in any of the financial institutions in Cumberland County.

Tax Collections and Revenues:

Donna Hill has reported that as of this date, the Town has collected 84% of the taxes due. As is typical for this time of year, expected tax refunds will likely fuel the additional payments of taxes so that we will again attain a 92-94% tax collection rate by June 30, 2005. This is the historical trend.
Revenues overall are at an 88.27% received rate. However, as mentioned during the FY 2005 budget development process, the Revenue sharing is now lagging behind by some 2%. Gray has received $444,148 or 81.5% when it should be at 83.33%.

Vacation Report:

As part of the personnel Policy, the Manager reports to the Council at his anniversary date the status of his vacation accruals. Effective May 1, fifteen accrued days were added to the 36 days being carried. Over the next year some of those will be used.

Respectfully Submitted,
Mitchell A. Berkowitz
Town Manager

Who's running?
Local races roundup
By Elizabeth Prata

Gray Council:
Seats available: two three year terms, one one-year term.
Incumbents: Occupying the three year terms were Pam Wilkinson and Lynn Olson. Neither are running again.
Richard Hall, who was appointed several months ago, is running for a three-year term, as are
Marchain ("Skip") Crane and Andy Upham.
Audrey Burns and Denise Duda are candidates for the only one-year seat on the Council.

Gray Water District:
Seats available: One five-year term.
Incumbents; Joseph Murray. Mr. Murray is running for the 5-year seat.
There will be a second vacancy for the Gray Water District. It is for a one-year term (the remainder of a 5-year term)--Dale Mosher will be resigning, effective June 1, 2005. No one has taken out papers. Write-ins welcome.

School Board seats, Gray:
Seats available: two three year terms.
Incumbents: Occupying the SAD Board of Directors seats are Tod Bennett and Peter Pinkerton, who are running again. Dan Maguire is also running.

School Board seats, New Gloucester:
Seats available: one three-year term.
Incumbents: Carmel Morin has taken out papers for another term.
Ron Brann has also taken out papers.

Board of Selectmen:
Seats available: one three-year term.
Incumbents: Stephanie Bryan occupied the seat, and is not running again.
William Maschino and A. Wayne Cobb are candidates.

Church to Dedicate Sanctuary Piano

This Sunday, members and friends of New Gloucester's First Congregational-Christian Church will gather in worship at 9:30 to dedicate their fine Baldwin grand piano to the service of God. The congregation purchased the five foot two inch 1950 Queen Anne style mahogany grand at auction this past winter and had it completely refurbished by George Family Piano Company of South Paris.

The entire service will be devoted to worship through music and will include selections from several pianists from the congregation as well as anthems from both the Sanctuary Choir and God's Little Voices, the church's children's choir.

The church, well-known for its active music ministry, had to replace its existing piano in October when the owners reclaimed it after allowing the church to use it temporarily nine years ago. A fundraising campaign ensued and the search began for just the right piano. In January, Pastor Linda Gard, a frequent customer at Cyr Auction in Gray, noticed a particularly handsome small grand coming up on the docket. After consultations with church members and assessments by professionals, she placed the successful bid and the refurbishment began.

Beth Barefoot-Jones of Harrison is Minister of Music All are welcome to the service of dedication which will also include recognition of mothers in attendance. The church is located at 19 Gloucester Hill Road, in the historic Lower Village. For more information, call 926-3260.

How Citizen Corps Works

Have you wondered what the Citizen Corps does locally, and how it can help in your neighborhood? On Friday, May 13th the Gray Region Citizen Corps will hold its monthly public educational seminar and meeting at the Gray Public Safety Building, 125 Shaker Road, beginning at 6:30 p.m. The general public is encouraged to attend and participate.

At this month's meeting, local fire-rescue personnel will give a guided tour and discussion of the fire, rescue and support apparatus in the central fire station. They will answer questions about their operations and where volunteers can help. Further, there will be discussions of such Citizen Corps programs as CERT (Community Emergency Response Teams) and Neighborhood Watch (now called America On Watch).

The Gray Region Citizen Corps encourages local residents to answer a skills survey available in the lobby of the Gray Public Safety Building.
This allows the information to be entered into its database so that during a regional disaster such as the Ice Storm of 1998 citizens can be contacted to help their neighbors. Volunteer skills are needed for tasks from delivering groceries to taking care of pets.

The non-profit Gray Region Citizen Corps (GRCC) volunteers provide monthly safety and emergency preparedness seminars on the second Friday of the month to residents from Yarmouth to Casco. Past monthly seminar topics have included chainsaw safety, home fire extinguisher practice, pet first aid, and cooking without electricity.

Future seminars are scheduled on family preparedness and helping in a Red Cross shelter. More information about the federal Citizen Corps program may be found at www.citizencorps.gov .

Their motto is "Uniting Communities -- Preparing the Nation". The local group publishes a periodic electronic newsletter. Messages for the GRCC may be left with Gray Public Safety at 657-3931. The Gray Region Citizen Corps is an IRS 501(c)3 tax-exempt charitable corporation. Donations are tax-deductible.