DOT gets earful from Calais bridge panel

CALAIS – A citizen panel created by the state Department of Transportation to offer advice on a proposed third bridge at Calais just won’t go away.

After a round of meetings by the panel, DOT told the committee, in effect, “Thanks for your time.”

But some of its members decided to offer their views on the location they prefer.

A majority voted for a new St. Croix River bridge to be built near the Calais Industrial Park, not farther north near Route 9 in Baileyville.

DOT hasn’t said where it wants the bridge, and it apparently didn’t want the panel, known as a public advisory committee, to offer an opinion, either.

In a letter to DOT, eight of the 14 members of the committee signed a resolution in support of the Calais Industrial Park site for the new crossing. Three other members said they would consider signing the resolution once the state releases its environmental assessment.

Federal law requires the state to create an advisory group to help plan federally funded transportation projects. For more than a year, the state has been working with the committee, made up of representatives from Calais to Bangor. And for a year, the committee members believed that the state would ask them to vote on where to locate the new bridge.

But at a meeting in July, the panel members were told that the public advisory portion of the process was complete. A few days later, they received what some characterized as a “dismissal letter” telling them that their services were no longer required.

Carl Croce of DOT’s Bureau of Planning did not return a telephone call to his office.

In the July 25 letter, Kevin Rousseau of DOT’s Freight Transportation Office said he wanted to thank the committee members for their service and “clarify” their role.

Rousseau did not mention the issue of a vote, but said the committee’s comments and recommendations helped DOT “focus on the critical issues” as the department moved forward with the process. That letter set off a firestorm among some of the panel members

The panel members who favor the Calais Industrial Park site include not only representatives from Calais, but also state Rep. John Morrison of Baileyville, Jack Fortier, Baring selectman, and Urban Dyer, sales manager for Dysart’s Transport Inc. in Bangor.

Two members of the panel who did not sign the resolution were Baileyville Town Manager Jack Clukey and Lawrence “Gus” Gillis, the Baileyville fire chief.

Dick Mahan and Charlie McAlpin of Calais and Alan Brooks of Trescott said they would consider signing the resolution after the environmental assessment.

“We felt that our input meant something. That’s what they told us all along until the last meeting when they told us we were only advisory,” said former Calais Mayor Judy Alexander, a panel member.

Member Michael Johnson agreed. “All along they were telling us how important our decision would be. But at the end, they didn’t care very much about what we thought,” he said.

Some in Calais argue that the economic future of the city is tied to where a third bridge will be.

For the past few months, state and federal officials have considered two locations for the proposed bridge: near the Calais Industrial Park, two miles north of downtown; or in Baileyville, near the intersection of Routes 1 and 9, more than eight miles from downtown Calais. Both sites would cross the St. Croix River.

Calais officials fear that the state is placing too much weight on the cost of the two alternatives as a decision nears. If the state ever has to build a four-lane highway in the area of the Calais Industrial Park, it ultimately would drive the overall cost of the bridge there to more than $20 million. But a similar four-lane facility in Baileyville would cost less than $10 million.

Last month, Washington County’s largest employer, Domtar Industries Inc., which earlier this year acquired the pulp and paper mill in Baileyville from Georgia-Pacific Corp., announced its support for the Calais Industrial Park as the “preferred location” for the third bridge.

Calais resident Edmund DelMonaco, who is a member of a business group also lobbying for an industrial park location, said he believes it is up to state Transportation Commissioner John Melrose and Gov. Angus King to sell the New Brunswick government on building the bridge in Calais.

“We are depending upon him and the governor,” he said. The Canadian and New Brunswick governments already have begun building a bypass around St. Stephen, across from Calais, and some believe the New Brunswick government favors the Route 9 site. But New Brunswick has said it also is in the siting stage.

Rousseau said that once the draft environmental assessment is complete, copies will be made available to the advisory committee. The state then will schedule a meeting to receive the committee members’ comments and recommendations, and after that, with the public.

“After all the comments from the [panel], the general public and other governmental agencies are taken into consideration, a final [environmental assessment] will be released along with a decision document by the Federal Highway Administration,” Rousseau wrote.

But Johnson said the panel members want their vote made public.

“It is the voice of the people of this area,” Alexander said.