Cheer, cheer, the gang’s all …

So fearful was southern Maine last year that Gov. John Baldacci was going to ride into Augusta with his “Bangor gang,” scaring the locals and breaking the china, that the Portland Press Herald published a Page One article in which it simultaneously questioned whether the governor was guilty of cronyism and admitted he wasn’t.

The article was a series of quotations from various experts who were amazed at how little cronyism overall there seemed to be in the administration, but that wasn’t important: the mere idea that there was a Bangor gang boosted Bangor as much as it appalled Portland. After eight years, a little affection from Augusta was coming this way that we wouldn’t have to beg for.

Gov. Baldacci may have his heart in Bangor, but his mind is on state policy. I’ll spare the horse puns, but if racino is an example of the Bangor gang in action, this region has reason to worry. The governor assembled his replacement bill of the racino referendum passed by voters without consulting the one city directly affected by it. The city he grew up in. The city where he can’t walk down the street without meeting a dozen people he knows. The city that nurtured his political ambitions and now elects him nearly as a reflex. His hometown.

The governor’s attorney says it would have been improper for him to meet with the city because it had a pending harness-racing license, but governors regularly talk to groups that will be affected by the outcome of legislation, and such a meeting could have been public and free of charges of favoritism. Anyway, his spokesman, Lee Umphrey, says the governor and city council Chairman Dan Tremble had coffee together and discussed the bill, so the pending-license theory doesn’t explain much. Still – the biggest development in Bangor in years and it’s worth a coffee?

This led Bangor to a curious place. It recently hired a lobbyist to give it advice on the governor’s bill, which has the prospect of diminishing Bangor’s share of the slot machine profits. That Bangor feels it must hire a lobbyist, at $150 an hour, to get access to John Baldacci, who knows every member of the city council and whose spokesman is a former lobbyist for the city, is a shame, not for the least reason that it tells every other community in Maine that Bangor currently has no influence on the Baldacci administration.

The city, of course, has the most incentive to stay in touch. It might not have so amiable a governor again for decades. With school funding being reformed, social services agencies overhauled and the state budget deep in the red, it’s good to have a friend in the Blaine House, but you have to make the call.

A similar situation to racino occurred this week. The governor has proposed cutting General Assistance to cities as a means to close the budget gap, an especially harmful decision to communities that provide services to a broad region – communities such as Bangor. But there was no communication beforehand, and the city circulated a letter Thursday that says the cut would cost it $300,000 (and Portland nearly twice that), while the governor’s office believes the impact would be a fraction of that. This level of confusion on critical programs is not how a cozy relationship is supposed to work.

Bangor doesn’t need special favors; the value of having a governor from Bangor is that city officials get to remind him of how his decisions affect them and trust that he will know exactly what they are talking about. But, for instance, the governor still doesn’t understand why Bangor let the potential new racino owner, Penn National, get ahead of it in the line for harness racing at the Bangor Raceway, though the answer from the city is straightforward. It’s obliged contractually to support the application of Bangor Historic Track, likely soon to be owned by Penn National, unless it has a good reason not to. The wiggle room in that final clause is likely where the governor’s concern begins.

The favored political position in large parts of Maine is duck-and-cover, then hope for help. There have been good reasons for this defensive posture in the past but there aren’t now, and the opportunity for getting this region out of its downward spiral is brief. Bangor is in the process of transforming itself, working mightily against the tide of demographics. The more help it gets the better, and the more help it asks for, the more it is likely to get.

Gov. Baldacci can have a highly successful time in office without helping Bangor. He shouldn’t, but he could because the state has so many problems that require his attention. Polite and patient Bangor can either wait for its turn or it can call the governor’s office and make itself understood (it’s 287-3531). The governor, for his part, might also call back to the old gang more regularly (945-4400). As a matter of form, the one who gets called should supply the coffee.

Todd Benoit is the BDN editorial page editor.