MADAWASKA – Roger Pelletier’s office is full of souvenirs from his years of doing business in Madawaska, but that will all end sometime soon when the doors at Acadia Motors are shut by creditors.

As a result, the Aroostook County town with the highest per capita income will become a town without an automobile dealer.

Pelletier, 74, the town’s Ford and Mercury dealer from 1961 to 2001, is seeing his business career, which started when he bought a gasoline station in 1954, coming to an end. He has been selling vehicles in Madawaska since 1958 and bought Acadia Motors in 1961.

The sign out front says “closing sale.”

The business will be the second in Madawaska to close its doors in 2004. Fashion Bug closed around the holidays, and there are reports of other business closings in town. Some of those, however, are just rumors.

Ryan Pelletier, owner of Rumours Pub, said the reports of his business closing are rumors. It’s much the same with the purported closing of Radio Shack. Jacques Pelletier, owner of the electronics outlet, said his store is open and will continue to be open.

Coed Fitness, a Main Street gym, may close. Judy Pelletier, owner of the gym, said she is looking for someone to buy the gym and keep it open. If not, she will sell the equipment out of town.

There are 13 vacant storefronts on Main Street, and the former Ames Shopping Center still is empty.

There have been several new businesses opening in town recently, including Dollar Deals and More, Trenz Shirts, a T-shirt and clothing store, Frozen in Time, a scrapbooking store, and One Call, a cleaning business, which just opened.

“The biggest problem of doing business in Madawaska is people shopping out of town,” Roger Pelletier repeated several times Wednesday afternoon while sitting in his office. “It’s been getting worse since Fraser [Nexfor Fraser Papers Inc.] went to 12-hour shifts.

“People working there have more time to go out of town for two or three days at a time, and it hurts local business,” he said. “Every time someone shops out of town, it hurts the town. Once a dollar leaves town, it does not come back.”

He went on to say that “people don’t shop in town anymore saying there’s nothing here, and that’s because they’ve been shopping out of town. I stopped selling snowmobiles years ago because people would buy them in Presque Isle to save $50.”

Judy Pelletier’s reasoning is a bit different, but it also involves the town’s largest employer.

“It’s all a trickle-down effect,” she said. “When Fraser makes cuts, it affects everyone.”

Last spring, Fraser cut nearly 300 jobs at its Madawaska and Edmundston, New Brunswick, operations.

“This is the fourth time people of this town have me [supposedly] shutting down,” Ryan Pelletier said of Rumours, his restaurant and nightclub. “If people put as much effort in supporting us as they do talking about us, business in this town would be great.

“The rumors about Rumours have happened many times,” he said. “We are not closing.”

The businessman even put up a sign stating that fact in the front window of his Main Street business.

Roger Pelletier remembers when Madawaska had four automobile dealerships.

In 2000, Acadia Motors had 20 employees, plus its owner. The businessman recalled selling 40 cars a month. Now he has a hard time selling 10 cars a month.

Those jobs, which included office clerks, mechanics, salespeople, and body shop personnel, have dwindled, and soon the rest will be gone.

The four local dealerships have all closed. The nearest automobile dealer now will be in neighboring Frenchville, which has two.