RE: Orient 3-member Board

To the editor:
    A portion of the taxes East Grand Lake property owners pay support the Orient Pantry. The Pantry gives food and clothing to deserving poor people who live in Orient, and others less deserving.
    Over the years Orient residents who have no jobs and who are collecting unemployment, Social Security, Medicare, Food Stamps and other government subsidies are further supported by the Pantry. The word has spread. Other less deserving people with freeloading motivations are moving into Orient to take advantage of the Pantry Party. Ms. Alicia Silkey, the Town Clerk is a strong supporter of the Pantry.
    During a meeting last year Silkey offered a free “Pantry Food Basket” to all who attended. This offer included people who have a higher income than I, one whose husband is a millionaire (she refused) and others.
    Last November the Town voted for a 5-member Board of Selectmen rather than the 3-member board. Ms. Silkey, who is presently running the Town of Orient with her selectman husband, recognized a loss of power under a 5-member board. So in the time since the 5-member vote took place until the present Ms. Silkey worked to schedule a “special” Town Meeting to change it back to the 3-member board. With her husband’s help, the help of Selectman Victor Alexander and the absence of the third Selectman (who later voted against it) — she succeeded.
    She took it upon herself to check with the Maine Municipal Association to see how to do it. She then made certain the “Special” meeting was scheduled on an inconvenient date, one nearly all lakefront residents and other legal Orient residents were absent. Legal publication of the meeting required by the State she placed in the Houlton Pioneer Times just two days prior to the meeting.
    In the meantime Ms. Silkey met and spoke with people who presently receive benefits from the Pantry. She urged them to attend and vote for the three-member board inferring a loss of Pantry benefits under the watchful eyes of a larger (i.e.; more honest) board. The vote to return to a 3-member board was given mainly by those who needed no excuse to be absent from work to do so … because they weren’t working.
    Salary increases for Town Clerk, Treasurer and Tax Collector (Ms. Silkey is all three) will come up in this year’s town meeting. She presently is making around $30,000 yearly in Orient, a town in which the average yearly earnings is below the poverty level. It’s possible that under a 5-selectmen board earning $1,500 each her chances of getting a raise this year were not good. They’re much better now.
    Unfortunate people need help. Freeloaders do not. A 5-member board is much more likely to reflect the needs of the total population, and can be just as likely to retain the Orient Pantry as is a three-member board. But it’s not nearly as beneficial to the town administrators.
John Dombek
Santa Clara, Utah and Orient taxpayer