The Bangor Daily News from Bangor, Maine • 19

I Bangor Doily News 'Sat Sun June 26- 27 1982 It ALL UJIgdB A 1 4 Jumper rescued Crank to be yanked at Pond MTA says petition OK over the company from a local family last year The central switchboard is located in the home of Elden Hathaway who owned the Bryant Pond Telephone Co for three decades before losses forced him to sell it By Wayne Reilly NEWS Education Writer By Beurmond Banville NEWS St John Valley Bureau MADAWASKA threw her sweater over The pro-crank forces who in April proposed the magneto system be preserved ks a were able to pay almost all their legal expenses through the sale of Yank the T-shirts said Mrs Johnson She said the group is considering selling a special edition T-shirt now to pay off the rest of its debts AUGUSTA (AP) A nine-month campaign to spare the last working hand-crank telephone system from obsolescence was unplugged Friday as utility regulators voted to allow new dial-type sets to be installed the western Maine village of Bryant Pond been a long said Robert Jamison manager of the Oxford County Telephone and Telegraph Co after the state Public Utilities Commission voted 2 to 1 in favor of the planned conversion A group of residents in Bryant Pond located in the town of Woodstock population formed the Yankfthe Crank Committee" last year and asked the PUC to block the conversion i None of the members attended PUC meeting in Augusta But its chairwoman Alice A Johnson said in a telephone interview she was not surprised by the decision knew we had one vote against she said adding that probably no court appeal would be filed The company argued that maintaining the magneto phones was too expensive mainly because of the difficulty in obtaining replacement parts The group argued the anti-'que system offers a personal touch that is both quaint and invaluable in emergencies On Friday PUC Chairman Ralph Gelder cast the only vote against the conversion saying he believed the fewer than 450 Bryant Pond customers were evenly divided on the issue He said both types of service should be offered with rates that reflect actual costs satisfy one group you've got to wipe out the other said Gelder require people to have dial service if they want But commissioners Lincoln Smith and Diantha A Carrigan both of whom are leaving the PUC by next month noted that the PUC hearing examiner in the case had concluded that option would be much more expensive They said the decision should be left up to the company always a matter of what the customers said Smith what the company can Oxford inherited the band-crank telephones when it took the railing and then went over said Aim Lucas who saw a wonfaiyump over the railing of the international bridge at Madawaska about 3:30 pm Friday A short time later Geraldine Martin a customs officer at Edmundston heard someone call for help Looking down over the bridge she saw a woman on the Canadian shore of the St John River The woman was identified as Rona Morin 35 of Edmundston originally from Caron Brook NB She was taken to Edmundston Regional Hospital Mrs Lucas said she was the only one who saw the woman jump was in a line of cars at the American side and saw her throw her sweater over put her foot onto the steel squares and go over It was done so quickly no one could have stopped her It Mrs Lucas reported the jumper to US Custom! Officer Clifford Madore who called police am glad I was able to help in some way to savq -the life It was awful to see it happen- There were no pedestrians and the other cars were too far ahead to see her If I had not seen her she wouldnot have been missed" said Mrs Lucas Police know how the woman made it to the Canadian shore was on the bridge when I heard said Mrs Martin After seemg the woman Mrs Martin asked other port employees to help her and they went down the embankment to the river Shortly ambulance attendants and police arrived A group of elected Maine Teachers Association leaders says it hasollected enough signatures on a petition to force the organizations 'executive committee to convene a special meeting of the Representative Assembly to consider the case of its embattled executive director John Marvin Charles Sanders a past MTA president said Friday the group of Representative Assembly delegates medal of honor winners and past presidents has collected the names of more than the necessary 40 percent to force a special meeting The executive committee was meeting in executive session Friday afternoon President Beth Su-pranovich one of the leaders in the move to oust Marvin was unavailable for comment Marvin has asked the group- which is meeting Friday and Saturday to consider his request for a meeting of the Representative Assembly to consider his case The group reportedly also was planning to complete drafting charges against Marvin -ana to schedule a hearing He has stated that a hearing before the executive committee would be unfair because it is also drawing up the charges Sanders said petitioners are asking for two things a chance to review the employment status of Marvin and a recent report by the National Education Association pointingout some weaknesses with- in the operation of the MTA of us in favor of convening the Representative Assembly feel an obvious connection between the two" said the principal of two elementary schools in Millinocket 1 The petitioners want to see if the weaknesses would be best addressed by firing Marvin said Sanders The report reportedly pinpoints weak Mrs Johnson said she has been contacted by people across the United States who have read or heard about the save-the-crank campaign and offered to help She said some people have offered to finance a privately run telephone museum in Bryant Pond Jamison declined to comment on a published report that a Virginia man has offered to buy the company to preserve the magneto system company for Jamison said flatly ashe left the PUC building after the vote Although not as vocal as the opponents many Bryant Pond residents are anxious to see the old system replaced In fact nearly half of the witnesses who testified before the PUC fell into that category complaining of poor connections unexpected disconnections and fears that their privacy is invaded by operators listening in according to Hearing Examiner JaneS Bradley It was Ms report which recommended that the company be allowed to proceeid with the conversion that the PUC accepted Friday The current case marked the second time in less than 10 years that a dispute involving Bryant Pond's telephones was decided by the PUC In 1973 the commission refused a request that the phones be replaced Gelder is the only member of the PUC who will remain after next month Ms Carrigan is resigning for personal reasons term is due to expire and he is not expected to be reappointed was conscious and asking for help when I first heard her and saw said Mrs Martin who had gone Onto the bridge after hearing someone had jumped Not seeing anything from tne bridge she was returning to the Canadian port when she heard nesses but urges against finding a scapegoat within has not seen a the MTA said Sanders who added he copy the woman below Commissioners' conference considers consumer issues By Susan Collins District Correspondent told commissioners that from the consumer viewpoint nitty-gritty of utilities issues is price price and price" Burak acknowledged that utility costs for consumers are high but the high prices reflect increased costs of power production Burak said the perception of utilities as necessary services affordable to everyone is being altered by the high cost of service service i ROCKPORT Attempts by the nuclear power Industry to control cost-overruns and plant malfunctions and to meet the ever-changing requirements of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission are enterprise in almost total the nitty-gritty of utility consumer issues is price and and consumer advocates for public utilities should a pro-active rather than a reactive stand on what participants at the New England Conference of Public Utilities Commissioners heard Friday morning at the Samoset Resort in Rockport where they were gathered to hear three consumer advocates for the utilities industry in New England Peter Bradford public advocate for the state of Maine Michael Burak director of public advocacy and consultant David Silverstone of Cousins Ritter Sil-verstone and Johnson agreed that public utilities are at a crossroads in consumer policy Public advocate Peter Bradford told commissioners poor administratiorTis not to blame for the woes of the nuclear power industry The primary problem is the' growth rate Bradford said Virtually all nuclear plants operating today generating more than 500 megawatts were built and commissioned without operating experience Emergency planning and quality control have been said Bradford by an too fast too The' Clinch River breeder reactor project encouraged by Reagan a similar mistake in said Bradford The project has nothing to do with real national energy needs he said and is nothing more than form of nuclear cheer-leading" If the Reagan push for fast nuclear plant proliferation continues the next few years be a re-run of for the nuclear power industry and a time of chaos and resistance from the outside according to Bradford Michael Burak director of public advocacy for Vermont Burak outlined three approaches to the problem of affordable utility service Mechanisms designed to assure continued service despite temporary inability to pay constitute a direct approach to universal service and include rates and winter disconnection rates mandatory rate controls seasonal rates and time-of-day-rates But Burak warned commissioners that provision of service based on the ability to pay may result in a kind of of subsidizing less-affluent consumers And the limited-service approach based on ability to pay also can be socially inequitable said Burak relegating poor consumers to limited utility servibe Consumer consultant David Silverstone urged his audience to stick with questions rather than substantive when debating consumer interests Silverstone said public utilities today are faced with new issues that threaten to override primary consumer issues that may remain unsettled: Advocates must separate the needs of consumers from new concerns like forecasting siting alternative power advertising and fuel and rate-adjustments Silverstone said advocates must keep the dialogue alive between consumers and utilities and suggested more dollars be directed to analysis and consumer groups A shift in emphasis from the hearing format to meetings and an increase in formal and informal channels of communication between consumers and utilities is needed he said Finally Silverstone said advocates must assume a rather than a stand on issues by anticipating problems and widening channels of communication i Sevin suspected in cemetery By Diana Bowley Of the NEWS Staff were big spots of the chemical everywhere He suggested it could have been accidental Ernest DeRaps an inspector for the Maine Department of Agriculture Food and Rural Resources investigated the complaint lodged by Pratt DeRaps collected a foliage sample from trees at the cemetery and scrapings of material from tombstones An analysis by the Public Heath Laboratory found the foliage sample contained 49 parts per million of Carbaryl After this approximately 32 home-owners in the immediate area received a two-page letter announcing the findings Residents were advised to rinse garden vegetables thoroughly before eating Robert Denny director of the control board said Friday the board is trying to piece together the evidence Denny said the board considers this a major misapplication of pesticides Denny said judging from the area officials have pinpointed and the samples taken from the area the river did not get the full disposition According to plans no spraying was to have occurred within 30 to 40 miles of Dover-Foxcroft Denny said DeRaps found large droplets of the pesticide on the tombstones and smaller droplets to the east in a line parallel to the Piscataquis River He said it was likely the aircraft or aircrafts had up to 20 gallons of the liquid left in the plane below the natural pumping level Carbaryl is a slightly toxic carbamate insecticide registered for general use on a wide range of fruit vegetable forest and lawn pests It is also used in flea powder Denny said Insects are fairly susceptible to the pesticide appears to affect lower forms of animals more so than be said Several laws have been violated be- cause of the spill Denny said including misapplication of a pesticide and violation of federal and state disposal laws There is evidence it was applied to the Piscataquis River He said the Maine Forest Service overseer of the spruce budworm program is DOVER-FOXCROFT The state Pesticide Control Board has ordered an investigation of illegal dumping of Carbaryl on a mile of land bordering the Piscataquis River The pesticide known to gardeners as Sevin and used in battling the spruce budworm was first discovered June 15 in an area from the cemetery on Vaughn Street extending easterly for approximately one mile Dover-Foxcroft Town Manager Owen Pratt notified the pesticide board after residents reported some cemetery stones were spotted with an oil-based chemical Pratt said several residents in the area told him they had seen two low-flying planes in the area on Tuesday afternoon After checking with several sources Pratt said he found two planes involved in the spraying had left the Mil-linocket area just before noon on Tuesday He said it was obvious the area was not sprayed because there (AP Photo) A relaxed fisherman drifts along the New Meadows River Contract ratified Downeast dialect Maine may be burial site for radioactive materials foils phone company The board of trustees of the Eastern Maine Medical Center Thursday unanimously ratified a contract with the Maine State Nurses Association bargaining agent for registered nurses at the hospital The vote by the trustees follows by one day a ratification vote by members of MSNA Unit 1 on the contract The two sides have struggled to negotiate a contract for nearly seven years Douglas Brown presidentof the hospital board of trustees said board expresses its pleasure over adoption of the contract It provides increased salary and fringe benefits for the members of the The contract preserves the right of nurses to choose whether to join the union Brown added yard in Kittery and Maine hospitals and college research laboratories according to the report Maine Yankee's spent radioactive fuel is considered high-level waste and is now stored at the plant awaiting a federal solution to disposing of the material Mrs Kany said the commission will present an to Gov Joseph Brennan and the Legislature sbmetime this fall concerning low-level waste PORTLAND (AP) Ma Bell wants to make sure that Downeast accents and other regional dialects upset her vision of a computerized future 1 Consider for example the number 1 To many Mainers particularly those in coastal sections of Hancock and Washington counties it comes out as posing potential problems for voice-activated computers special accent called a and characteristic of some Maine residents' speech can confuse a said Cindy Karhan a Bell Labs researcher studying speech Ms Karhan said a recent Bell Labs study at New England Telephone facilities in Portland showed the computer could easily recognize most numbers spoken by residential customers about half the time it had difficulty with misunderstanding it for The Maine study was conducted at random last April among 9000 customers dialing their own long-distance calls Following a tone selected callers were asked to speak your number Pause briefly after each Using the Maine samples scientists were able to change the voice patterns to reflect the widespread pronunciation of as These voice patterns or are electronic representations of basic sound elements Maine was picked for the initial study because has a very very distinct regional difference in said McCatherin AUGUSTA (AP) If Maine has to find its own site for storing low-level radioactive wastes it would probably be in the southern third of the state officials involved in the issue said Friday Representatives bf the Low-level Waste Siting Commission which is discussing possible dump site locations with officials from eight other Northeast states released their preliminary report at a State- house news conference Copies also are available to the public The next meeting of officials from the various states will be held at the Black Point Inn in Scarborough next Monday and Tuesday State Rep Judy Kany D-Waterville who heads the commission said Maine currently ships low-level wastes to federal facilities in South Carolina Washington or Nevada But the government has advised states they will have to have their own facilities by January 1986 After that Maine may have to store its wastes within its borders or ship to another state under a multi-state compact A proposed regional compact is expected to be prepared by the end of this year for consideration by state legislatures in 1983 Most of low-level radioactive waste comes from Maine Yankee in the form of contaminated equipment and clothing worn by plant workers Some comes from Portsmouth Naval Ship Palmer chosen If Maine were to bury the wastes within its borders the site would most likely be one of the many Sections of marine clay found in the southern one-third of the state according to senior geologist Marc Loiselle who also attended the news coiv ference He said the Maine Geological Survey is now taking an inventory of suitable sites Of the nine states now discussing the issue New York generated the heaviest volume of low-level-waste in 1979 the year cited in the report followed by Pennsylvania and Massachusetts New Hampshire Vermont and Maine respectively generated the smallest volume AUGUSTA (AF) Gov Joseph Brennan announced Friday he will nominate the Republican he defeated in 1978 to the state Board of Environmental Protection Linwood Palmer of Nobleboro ifto fill the BEP post vacated by Earl Wahl who has been named a district court judge Palmer is a Christmas tree farmer and retired steel company executive He served several terms in the Legislature including two terms as Hftuse minority leader Warren acknowledged picking a site for storing-such wastes is a town dump Everyone agrees that you need one but everyone wants it on the other side of Tf i.