MILLINOCKET, Maine — Millinocket needs to increase taxes, beautify itself, consolidate schools, aggressively seek grants and create a regional economic development strategy based on open public land and tourism if it is ever going to thrive in the 21st century, according to an open letter from a Virginia-based economic development firm released this week.
Alexandria-based CZB Associates sent the town a nine-page letter suggesting plenty of concrete steps to take, and some of the steps are already being taken, but its most bracing statements concern the negative attitude of residents toward themselves, people from elsewhere and their future.
“You have to improve your attitude towards the outside world. And when you do that, investments might follow,” CZB President Charles Buki said in the letter.
“Millinocket has not invested in itself in any meaningful way in more than five decades. It has relied on employers to do so,” he said. “It has assumed the town itself had no need to appeal to the wider market. Those days are over. A combination of new taxes, new regulations and new land management practices must be developed, and all in the context of any payoff being years if not decades away.”
Town leaders’ reaction to the letter, which was posted on the town’s website on Monday, was muted on Tuesday.
None of the seven Town Council members returned telephone messages seeking comment, but council Chairman Richard Angotti Jr. and Richard Theriault responded with short statements to an email sent to all seven seeking reaction.
“I am in the process of digesting the information which will take several days. I will not respond until I have thoroughly reviewed the document with my colleagues,” Angotti said.
“I have read CZB’s letter in its entirety a couple of times. We as a council have not had any opportunity to discuss the letter, nor have we had any discussions about future work with CZB,” Theriault said.
Town Manager Peggy Daigle, who said she hadn’t read the open letter, didn’t expect to hear more from CZB.
“They came up and said they would issue a report, and I am assuming that’s it,” Daigle said of the letter.
Workers from CZB visited Millinocket in late October and early November after contacting Daigle to offer the firm’s services as an economic analyst and planner, Daigle said. Reacting to a recent New York Times story on the town, Buki made the pro bono offer to help Millinocket reassemble itself to face its declining and aging population and the loss of its primary economic driver — papermaking.
Councilors were wary but not opposed.
Residents, Buki said in the letter, need to rid themselves of a dislike of outsiders and their love of their own history. They need to get better educated and start facing, together, the hard physical labor of community redevelopment and the intellectual challenges of facing hard choices if they are going to compete in a modern world that geography and their papermaking past have allowed them to avoid.
The mill operated by Great Northern Paper for decades was shut down in 2008 and has since been dismantled.
“Jobs that pay a wage sufficient to buy a home and raise a family are never again going to be available for anyone with only a high school diploma,” Buki said in the letter. “In fact, those with more education — a two-year college degree or additional apprenticeships after high schools — are not guaranteed a good job anywhere in America, either.
“The days of good jobs with little education are over. The days of guaranteed employment are over,” he added. “The norm at [the Town] Council for too long has been to cut, or to spend poorly. Neither will do any longer. The time has come for wise cuts and wise spending.
“What constitutes wisdom in this regard? Cuts and spending have to be aimed at two goals at all times: repositioning Millinocket to appeal to outsiders, and reducing the town’s physical footprint so it is appropriately sized,” he said. “The days of being unsightly and prosperous are over. As are the days of being a town of 3,000 families.”
Buki pointed out in the letter that Millinocket’s population of 4,500 residents is expected to shrink to 2,500.
“That means a new vacant home every two weeks for the next 15 years,” he said.
The analysis, for which Buki said he would normally charge about $23,000, marks the first time the 13-year-old consulting firm has worked for free.
A representative of one of CZB’s clients warned that the firm would be challenging to Millinocket when she was interviewed by a BDN reporter in September.
“CZB is not afraid to ask hard questions. The folks we have worked with would challenge people to think and defend and justify positions,” said Lori Tretter, assistant municipal administrator for Bowling Green, Ohio. “Their motivation is to think critically about why you have a belief or something is a certain way. They would say, ‘Tell me why. Go deeper.’”
CZB successfully helped Bowling Green and a neighboring university get past longstanding mutual distrust to fashion a long-term development plan for the Interstate 75 corridor, Tretter said.
CZB recommended a program councilors and Daigle are already implementing ― the reduction of the town’s housing stock to align with its smaller population.
That loss of people and housing means a further loss “of $11 million a year in locally driven retail spending and another 30,000 to 40,000 square feet of commercial real estate [that] is prone to become vacant,” Buki said.
CZB recommended school consolidation as a necessary step.
“Interests that oppose this are putting another nail in the town’s coffin; you cannot afford all the schools, real estate, and overhead you have at current tax levels, so either taxes increase or consolidation must occur,” Buki said.
Millinocket leaders have tried to consolidate schools with neighboring East Millinocket and Medway, but those efforts have failed. School officials are discussing possibly having Lee Academy officials administer the school system, but nothing has been agreed to.
CZB also recommended that town leaders push for more public ownership of lands to provide access to the region’s natural beauty for visitors as well as residents.
“It is not something the Millinocket community has been eagerly embracing. Indeed, Millinocket has been among the loudest voices in Maine to maintain the status quo, a business-as-usual, head-in-the-sand posture absolutely antithetical to a good economic future, and the time has come for this to cease,” Buki wrote. “If Millinocket is serious about recovery and growing its tax base, it must be serious about opening one of its greatest assets. Millinocket officials have instead opted to work cooperatively with private landowners on public-access issues.”
BDN Writer Nok-Noi Ricker contributed to this report.