Municipal Meetings

All meetings are at Lincolnville Central School unless otherwise noted. The Planning Board meets Wednesday the 31st at 7 p.m., meeting televised.

Town Office

I’ve been asked to clarify the interest payment on the $220,000 loan for the proposed town office project: the annual interest on the loan has been estimated to be $15,998 during a 20-year period. As explained in the handout prepared by selectmen, building and budget committees, the average taxpayer now pays $14.50 toward the $30,000 Capital Investment Reserve Account. That amount will no longer be raised each year if the town office project is approved on Election Day. In its place taxpayers will be paying annually $15,998 in interest. This is estimated to cost the average taxpayer $7.73, a savings of $6.77 over the $14.50 they were paying for the Capital Investment Reserve Account.

School

A meeting for parents of kindergarten through second-grade students will take place Thursday, Oct. 25, at 6 p.m. in Walsh Common to report on the steps the school is taking to meet the state mandate for proficiency-based education. Dinner will be served, and eighth-graders will provide childcare as part of their class trip fundraising efforts.

Eighth-graders are selling pumpkins ($5 for large, $3 for medium and $2 for small); contact the office if you’re interested.

Musicians of the Month for September are Nick Watts, Choral Musician and Jay Osgood, Band Musician.

Halloween Events

This one’s in Belfast: Friday, Oct. 26, and Saturday, Oct. 27, — Belfast Class of 2016 will host the second Haunted Walk. Walks will start at 6 p.m. and continue until 9:30 p.m. Cost is $5 per person. Children younger than 13 should be accompanied by an adult as it’s going to be “very frightening.” Funds raised by the Haunted Walk event will benefit the high school classes’ future activities. Contact: Anne by calling 342-2170 or email theambrose5@yahoo.com. “We look forward to scaring you,” say the organizers!

L’ville Craft Sale

This Saturday the 27th annual L’ville Crafters sale will be held at the L’ville Improvement Association building, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. A delicious lunch of corn chowder, sandwiches and dessert will be served by the Women’s Club; baked goods, and all sorts of crafts will be on display. This is one craft show with no table charge for crafters, and as organizer Nancy Heald says, “This show is done in memory of my dad, Raymond Miller, who was a fine crafter and liked to see the ‘little man’ [or woman!] get a hand up.” Nice thought, and it’s a nice show. This will be the first one I’ve missed showing at since it began.

Move It! Day ….

….is Saturday the 27th, the day we finally pull the old Center School House across the road and onto its brand new foundation. And because we’re actually pulling it, we’re going to need many, many willing bodies – as many as 50, we estimate.

If you want to be a puller, please arrive by 8:30 to register, get instructions and an armband. You’ll also be asked to sign a waiver of risk form, one modeled after one the University of Maine uses for volunteers. There will be a separate rope for younger pullers, to keep youngsters apart from the bigger, stronger ones.

Parking will be at the school and at Breezemere. There’ll be seating for spectators and a special section for former students. If you or someone you know attended the Center School you’ll get a front row seat to the action, so just let a volunteer know that day.

Though this is the shortest parade in L’ville history, it may well be the longest in time; estimates put the actual move across the road at an hour or more. Once across the building has to be pivoted and then moved sideways onto the foundation, or at least that’s the plan as I write this.

Traffic through the Center will be stopped from 9 to 10:30 a.m. so please plan trips that day accordingly. However, once the building clears the Boat Club side of the road there should be a single lane of traffic, though large vehicles might have difficulty getting by. Signs at Drake’s Corner and at Heal Road will indicate the need to detour.

Salmon Spotting on the Ducktrap

Coastal Mountains Land Trust invites the public to join fisheries biologist Peter Ruksznis on a salmon ecology walk along the Ducktrap River on Tuesday, Oct. 30, from 2 to 4 p.m. The Ducktrap, as many of us know, is one of only eight rivers in the U.S. with a wild Atlantic salmon population. Peter will explain salmon ecology, and hopefully will find salmon redds, the depressions on the riverbed where the female lays her eggs. The group is limited to 15 so call 236-7091 to reserve a spot.

Free Fall Harvest Festival

Crossroads Community Church holds its annual Fall Harvest Festival on Wednesday, Oct. 31, at L’ville Central School from 5 to 7 p.m. Win prizes by bringing your best carved pumpkin, best decorated pumpkin and best tasting stew. There’ll be games, candy, food, and prize drawings, all for free. Call Pastor Dave Pouchot at 763-3551 for more information.

Busy Week in the Center

It was hard to miss all the activity out in the Center last week, much of it happening on one day. A slab was poured over the old D & E foundation, while the school house was pivoted on its rollers to face it across the road. The cement truck came back with another load and poured a slab on the dirt floor of the old shed left behind when the school moved. This building is part of the Boat Club’s complex and will have a whole new front before long.

Meanwhile, down the road, the Center General Store got a whole new look when both its porch roof and back addition were removed. Some and/or all of these elements will be restored in some other form. So now we can get a good look at the architectural details of the big windows on the front of the store, just the way it looked in old, turn-of-the century photos.

Planting Garlic

In the midst of all this activity last week came a couple of sunny hours and my favorite fall chore. Kneeling in the muddy soil – it had rained for days – with a box of the biggest cloves from this summer’s harvest I planted a long bed of garlic. And here’s what I liked best about those quiet hours. The dibble stick I use, not just any old stick from the wood pile, but an intentional planting stick, sharpened and well-used, belonged to Bill Brooks. Bill and his wife, Lena, built and ran the Ducktrap Motel in the 1960s; our oldest son worked for Bill, helping him out in the garden, putting in pea fence. Though our Bill was about 13 and Bill Brooks was in his 80s, it was the old man who pounded in the poles. While I worked in the rich soil, the very spot that was once our manure pile, I thought of Cocoa, the pony we had for many years and of the cows – Wandy, Daisy, Molly and more – whose contributions built this soil. Wally was, meanwhile, picking grapes from the vines that originally came from Hoppi Graham’s old garden. (Did you know Hoppi and Bob? They lived in the 1780s Cape that once stood on the site that is now the entrance to Point Lookout.) Just as I was finishing I uncovered a shard of pottery, most likely from a former gardener’s bean pot. I wonder who she was. (Wally says he’s pretty sure it was from one of those Portugese pottery wine bottles, the wine we all drank “back in the day”.)