Veter Vigue, the Cianbro CEO seen by many in Maine as a knight in shining armor, ready to ride into the fray to save the day, recently restated his plan for restoring the state’s prosperity. His outline for a better Maine was submitted in the form of a bill to the last Legislature, but it went nowhere. The key components of his plan of action for Maine, Mr. Vigue said recently, focused on home heating as well as larger energy issues, improving the health of our population, attracting businesses and investment and improving transportation infrastructure.
Those challenges, if vigorously addressed, would indeed turn Maine in a new, more promising direction. Lowering health care costs — which may be implied in Mr. Vigue’s plan — and producing more college graduates would round out a worthy agenda for the new state government.
Mr. Vigue undoubtedly feels the new Republican-controlled state government is more receptive to his ideas. He made his comments at one of Gov. Paul LePage’s red-tape reduction forums, which raises yet another worthy goal — making government permitting more efficient.
Before declaring Mr. Vigue’s vision and the LePage administration a match made in free-market heaven, the businessman’s list should be scrutinized more deeply. At least two of the focus areas would require public investment. Maine’s transportation network, facing at least a $3 billion backlog in maintenance work, is not going to be paved with good intentions. And converting the state’s 71 percent of homes that rely on oil heat to another, perhaps locally grown fuel, also will require public incentives.
And if Mainers are going to start exercising more, eating more healthful foods and giving up cigarettes and illegal drugs, the dreaded nanny state intervention is likely to be part of the solution.
But this means Mr. Vigue’s vision for Maine is realistic as it balances government intervention with government restraint. It recognizes the vital role a healthy and unencumbered private sector plays in our well-being, and it underscores the importance of the public sector respecting that role.
The governor has said his focus is to handcuff government’s inclination to overregulate business and crank down the public assistance spigot. But if Mr. Vigue is right, achieving both will not be enough to restore Maine to economic health. Gov. LePage and Republican legislators would do well to consider what the state’s most highly regarded CEO is saying.
To employ a winter-inspired analogy: State government cannot only be a plow truck smashing back the drifts that lie in the way; it must also leave a path of sand behind for traction for those who would follow.