LIVERMORE FALLS — Voters will be asked June 10 if they want the town to restore the original name of the Geneva Hodgkins Memorial Park to Union Park.
Selectmen changed the name in 2008 in remembrance of Geneva Hodgkins, who restored the park prior to her death in 2008.
A petition with 117 valid signatures was turned in Tuesday asking for the question to be put on the ballot. The petition needed 110 valid signatures, Town Clerk Sue Sapiel said.
Selectmen Chairman Bill Demaray said Tuesday night that the petition did not have the wording of the article on the front page and a box was not checked off. The law requires a box to be checked off in front of Sapiel to indicate how the petitioners wanted the article to be voted on, either at a town meeting or at a referendum at the polls, Sapiel said Wednesday.
Demaray said the wording of the article was on other pages of the petition. Since it is a citizen initiative, he said, it was the consensus of town officials that the park name article be put on the town meeting referendum ballot for June.
Veterans approached the board in August 2013 asking that park’s name be restored to Union Park.
The Grand Army of the Republic initially donated the park to the town in the early 1900s in memory of Union soldiers who fought in the Civil War, according to the veterans.
Hodgkins adopted the park, cleaned it, restored it, sought donations for it and took care of it for five years prior to her death. Her family still takes care of the park in her memory.
dperry@sunjournal.com
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- Residents of Livermore Falls will be asked in June whether they want to restore the name of the Geneva Hodgkins Memorial Park back to its original one of Union Park. The park’s name was changed in 2008 after Hodgkins died. The change was to honor her work cleaning and restoring the park.
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