Two brothers, Lionel and Norm Guay, served at the same time as mayors of the Twin Cities. They were visionaries and saw the possibility of making Lewiston-Auburn one family. They created the L-A Joint Services Commission, on which I served with nine others from both cities. We worked tirelessly for two years and our report showed that, by consolidating city services, significant savings could be gained.
That was followed by the Citizens Commission on L-A Cooperation. Its work determined that $2.7 million could be saved over five years. I was serving as mayor of Lewiston when elected naysayers successfully sabotaged the effort behind the scenes. There went the savings.
Robert Reed and Ron Potvin, who now serve on the Coalition Opposed to L-A Consolidation, disputed the numbers then, claiming Reed’s calculations showed savings of $1.7 million. A meeting with them showed that, in fact, $2.7 million could be saved. Reed was quoted in the Sun Journal on Oct. 25, 2008, saying, “I was a high skeptic. I said that the group was able to identify $1.7 million in savings at best. But today, I feel like it’s more in the $2.5 to $3 million range.”
Reed and Potvin were skeptics then and they are skeptics now. They always seem to come up with “fuzzy math” to kill progress by scaring the electorate.
Robert Kennedy once said “Some men see things as they are and say why; but I dream things that never were and say why not.”
I dream about One L-A.
Larry Gilbert Sr., Lewiston
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