LIMESTONE – Brian Hamel, president and CEO of the Loring Development Authority, rarely misses an opportunity to promote the Loring Commerce Centre and northern Maine.

The LCC, host to three Phish festivals – The Great Went, Lemonwheel and last August’s It – each brought upward of 60,000 people to the facility and northern Maine.

Thinking of the three festivals and the thousands of people involved, Hamel wrote an open thank-you letter and got it published on an Internet fan site, www.phish.net. While the site is not the official Phish site, millions of Phish fans go to it get news about the band and to chat.

Going a couple of steps further, Hamel invited the fans back during non-Phish festival jaunts and asked them to become ambassadors for the LCC and northern Maine.

“I had just been thinking about the three concerts and all the different people who came to The County, thousands of them,” he said Monday. “They were introduced to the state of Maine, and just maybe they have a business they want to relocate or expand.

“I want to use them as ambassadors because they are people who had pretty favorable experiences in northern Maine,” he said. “This allowed me to thank them for coming and to ask them to come back.”

Hamel’s letter, which included a photograph of himself during the festival, with a Groucho Marx mask that included a black mustache, was published on the front page of the site.

He originally ran into roadblocks with the letter because it looked like advertising. Undaunted, he pushed further until he came into contact with Ellis Goddard, president of the Mockingbird Foundation, a philanthropic foundation of Phish fans.

Hamel said the site operated by Goddard’s foundation is a host site, not the official Web site of the band, where fans go multiple times a day.

“That’s where they all go to converse with each other,” Hamel said. “Other Phish sites have links to this site. The site gets millions of hits a day.

“Time will tell how it will be received,” Hamel added. “I’ve received dozens of e-mails already from Phish fans, thanking me for the letter because they are not recognized often.”

He said he received positive feedback, including a professional couple from Massachusetts who may move to Maine. He said they may not have come had they not been asked.

Hamel’s letter to Phish fans thanked them for “adding value” to northern Maine, and he wrote that the area appreciated them and the way they conducted themselves. He wrote that northern Maine wonders if Phish will return in 2004.

Then Hamel’s kicker came into play.

“While I have your attention,” he wrote.

He told them of his professional move to Aroostook County in 1994 to redevelop the former Loring Air Force Base, now the LCC and the host site of the three concerts.

“From a professional perspective I have certainly been fulfilled, but more importantly, my family and I have fallen in love with the region and its people,” he wrote. “As you have experienced during your ‘road trips’ to Loring, the beauty of our countryside is breathtaking and our citizens are warm, welcoming and genuine.”

Then he asked them to return out of the “Phish season” and experience all that northern Maine has to offer. He encouraged them to take a cyber visit and to make arrangements to come back by calling a toll-free number.

Hamel went on, relating his efforts on economic development. Knowing that many Phish fans are entrepreneurs, he offered them a look at starting up a small business at the Loring Commerce Centre in the Loring Applied Technology Center.

In addition, he wrote, “You or your friends and family members may be working for a company that might be considering an expansion or relocation, but the company may have never considered northern Maine.

“Who better to extol the virtues of northern Maine than a veteran of The Great Went, Lemonwheel or It Phish festivals?” he wrote. “Are you willing to be our economic development ambassadors?”

He offered an Internet site, www.loring.org, and his personal e-mail address bhamel@loring.org for fans’ creative thoughts.

To take the cyber visit, go to www.visitaroostook.com or call 1-888-216-2463 to make arrangements.