March 29, 2024
BANGOR DAILY NEWS (BANGOR, MAINE

City officials tout community improvements

Bangor officials showed off the fruits of the Jobs Bond projects on Monday by taking reporters on a tour of facilities built or upgraded by more than $4 million worth of matching grants.

The $2.3 million awarded by the state for the five projects was the most of any Maine community, and was paired with local matching funds that brought the total to about $4.2 million. Besides providing an estimated 4,196 worth of “person weeks” in construction employment, the project “also helped address some of the basic needs the city had,” said City Manager Edward Barrett.

About 65 construction and design contracts were involved in the work, with most of them coming from the Bangor area.

“So I think you’ll find some real success stories here today,” Barrett told members of the tour on a chartered city bus. Participants included reporters, City Hall officials, state Economic and Community Development Director Mike Aube, and four members of the state House of Representatives.

The first stop on the tour was the new fire station on the Hogan Road, a $700,000 building that was opened for business less than two weeks ago. The city saved an estimated $60,000 or so by acting as its own general contractor.

“We’ve only been in the building a couple weeks, but we anticipate it’s going to work out exceptionally well,” said Assistant Fire Chief Scott Bostock.

When the city removed the old Dow Air Force Base softball fields last year to make way for the new business park, the Bangor Recreation Department built new fields on Union Street near the Job Corps complex. As part of the department’s three-year, $6.5 million park rehabilitation project, three new softball fields, as well as soccer and football fields, were fashioned in the area. The project was paid for with money from the Jobs Bond and other grants.

Ever the salesman, Barrett told the Bond Tourists as they bounced along a torn up Union Street, “The bumps you now feel are part of our paving project.”

At Public Works, the city’s plow trucks will now be protected from the elements by shelters, and the large, cone-shaped building visible from Union Street is the city’s new shed that holds 4,500 cubic yards of salt. The department’s storage space also was doubled with bond money.

Perhaps the one face lift that will provide the most valuable first impression of Bangor is the renovated General Aviation terminal.

Before the $235,000 upgrade, little had been done to the terminal since it was inherited by the city from the Air Force more than a generation ago. The lobby has been expanded and brightened, rooms for pilots have been added, and the old glass-enclosed counter has been replaced with a more open and modern version. Nearby, the Federal Aviation Administration has moved into renovated quarters.

Across Maine Avenue, the Maine Business Enterprise Park is coming along, although it doesn’t appear as though the Department of Defense will be building its accounting center there. The Citgo gas station will be moved across the road to make way for more parking, and the site will soon be open to more light industrial business, according to Kenneth Gibb, director of community and economic development for the city.

“Last summer, they were playing ball over here … so things have come a long way,” Gibb said.

Another highly visible project is the Police Department, which now sports a pastel color scheme that probably wouldn’t have passed the muster of the old cops shown in the turn-of-the-century photographs that line the department’s walls.

With more than $500,000, the station received nearly a total overhaul that included new rooms and office space, access for handicapped people, cosmetic work and other improvements.

“It was really a challenge to everyone to work this thing through and get it done,” Barrett said at the end of the tour.


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