Why the high bidder?

Much information has been publicized about the How’s Corner Superfund site in Plymouth over the years. Here is a tidbit that I’m sure won’t get written about: The How’s Corner site group recently solicited bids for the construction of a groundwater treatment system as remedial action at the site. Detailed plans and contract specifications were provided by an engineering firm. Bonding was required to ensure contractor performance.

The group received three bids, all from qualified, reputable and competent local contractors. All three bidding companies are general contractors whose primary expertise is earthwork. For no apparent reason, other than name recognition or lack thereof, the group has selected the highest bidder to perform the work.

The claim has been made that project funding is private; therefore, the group can choose whomever it wants to do the work, regardless of price. Many of the responsible parties who have paid for cleaning up the site are public entities, including cities, towns, state government agencies and schools. Doesn’t that fact alone make it publicly funded?

It is comforting to know that in these times of economic belt-tightening, all of the dozens of responsible parties for the cleanup have an extra $170,000 to spend on the project. Maybe they are doling out the extra cash as reparations for the environmental damage caused by the mishandling of waste oil. Rather than give the excess money to a contractor, they just could give it to the people of Plymouth.

Rick Whitmore

Eddington

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Stimulate, don’t stifle

We strongly agree with the BDN’s June 14 editorial, “Keep Recovery Going,” which called for extending funding for the Federal Medical Assistance Percentage, or FMAP, the federal funds states receive for Medicaid.

The increased assistance for FMAP was originally included in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which passed with the support of Maine’s congressional delegation in 2009. Unfortunately, this essential funding is scheduled to expire unless the Senate votes to extend it. They failed to do so twice last week, with both Sens. Collins and Snowe voting against the extension.

Maine is one of 30 states counting on the extension having planned budgets around it, and stands to lose $85 million. Without this extension, Maine will again be forced to cut essential public services further, meaning working families will continue to struggle. Failure to extend enhanced federal Medicaid assistance will create a gaping hole in Maine’s budget, after being slashed by $300 million earlier this year, putting vital health care services and jobs in jeopardy.

Given that the program was designed to create and save jobs in a volatile economy, we call on our senators to represent their constituents who are struggling to make ends meet and vote for the FMAP extension. We appreciate their past support and ask that they continue to support this funding. They should be voting to stimulate the economy, not stifle it. The bottom line is a loss of jobs and services to lower-income families and increased financial burden on an already strapped state government.

Joseph P. Ditre

executive director

Consumers for

Affordable Health Care

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What Ike said

Two of my favorite columnists, Paul Krugman, the New York Times and John Buell, the Bangor Daily News, have written strongly worded columns concerning the folly of cutting back on federal spending for job creation, promised aid to states for Medicaid and extended unemployment benefits. They warn that this “saving” would carry a very great risk of a double dip recession such as happened in 1937.

The BDN’s June 24 editorial, “Leaving Afghanistan,” makes the wise point that if it’s deficit spending that has the Senate, including Sens. Snowe and Collins, voting against legislation to extend unemployment benefits, for job creation and to deliver on promised enhancement of Medicaid payments to the states, they should instead vote to end our involvement in Afghanistan.

Is anyone else tired of being Dorothy in Oz, yearning to go home to Kansas? President Eisenhower warned us half a century ago against the military-industrial complex. Yet 50 years later President George W. Bush chided Nestor Kirchner, then President of Argentina, that it wasn’t a Marshall Plan that impoverished countries need, but war, as war creates wealth.

The majority of Maine people, as in the rest of the country, oppose the war in Afghanistan. Our allies continue to pull out. We Mainers do, however, want health care and jobs. It’s time to use taxpayer money at home. War destroys not only the enemy but also ourselves. I liked Ike, and I still do.

Karen Saum

Belfast

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Senators don’t care

Do you know how hard it is to pick yourself up by the bootstraps when someone is standing on your toes? I do. Our senators in Washington D.C., apparently do not. They not only kick us when we are down but they don’t care how we ended up on the floor and blame us for getting in the way when they helped toss us aside.

Sens. Collins and Snowe do not care about poor people or the planet. It seems our senators care more about their own reputations and what people think of them than they care about preserving the Clean Air Act or preventing a double dip recession.

I know the senators tried to explain why voting against a jobs bill and extending emergency unemployment benefits was the right thing to do. I don’t get it.

I know they tried to explain that they voted in favor of the Murkowski resolution and against Sen. Muskie’s Clean Air Act because they wanted to lead the charge, but I don’t get it.

I feel Sens. Snowe and Collins do not care about the state and myself personally. If they did they would be doing everything they can to pass legislation to help us. If they cared they would be talking about a comprehensive clean energy and climate plan and saying yes to jobs. If they cared we wouldn’t have to beg them to work with their colleagues to fix America’s big problems.

They don’t care, and I do.

Pat Cummings

Pittston

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Correction

Monday’s editorial “Can Girls Do Math?” misstated where Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson is from. She represents part of Texas.