Category: Community

Local Journalism: A Vital Job that Needs to be Done

By Renée Morin Dear Sanford Springvale News Readers, We are currently seeking volunteers to help us cover Sanford City Council meetings. I began covering council meetings during my senior year of high school, as part of a school project. When I graduated high school this June, I opted to stick with the paper. I’ve continued to cover the meetings for multiple reasons, including my amazing fellow volunteers and the valuable real world experience this opportunity has given me. The key…

Large Committee Starts Work on City Guidance Document

Photo: Sebastiaan ter Berg via Creative Commons By Lee Burnett, submissions editor The Sanford City Council recently named 31 people to a Comprehensive Plan Steering Committee to update the city’s long-range planning document, last updated in 2005. The group includes city councilors, city staff, business owners and citizens. They met for the first time on May 22 to get acquainted and orient themselves to the task ahead. The process will be led by City Planner Erin Moriarty, a veteran of…

Pratt & Whitney Volunteers Transform Veterans Cemetery for Memorial Day

As Memorial Day approaches each year, a dedicated team of volunteers from Pratt & Whitney in North Berwick steps in to help prepare the grounds of the Southern Maine Veterans Cemetery in Springvale. This annual event has become essential for the cemetery, which faces staffing shortages and damage from harsh winter storms, leaving the grounds in need of significant cleanup. The cemetery's small staff focuses primarily on burials, headstone placements, and mowing, leaving them without the manpower to handle the…

Wanted: Shipyard Workers Willing to Drive

From a press release Portsmouth Naval Shipyard workers could become paid drivers under a pilot program aimed at increasing convenience and reducing the number of cars commuting to the shipyard in Kittery. York County Community Action Corp. (YCCAC) is advertising for drivers and hopes to introduce expanded bus service by the end of the summer. The agency received two years of funding through Maine Department of Transportation's Workforce Transportation Program to try out a worker-driver service that has been introduced…