thinking of Ellsworth, are people xenophobic?

[RANGER.101ST]

Originally Posted by Northern Maine Land Man

"I still remember the battle that was fought about the horrors of a "new" Rite Aid pharmacy when Rite Aid wanted to move out of an antiquated building in the center of town. WOW. Can you say: armageddon?"

You misinterpret the word "progressive". A progressive is anti development, anti business and anti about anything that benefits working families.

my brother built the riteaid in blue hill.he subed for HT winters.he told me people were down right piS@# off and looked at him like he was the devel.pritty closed minded up their.

[peachie_in_maine]

Originally Posted by heznc

Hi,
I have an exciting job prospect in Ellsworth and am contemplating a move. I have no qualms about winter, or the lack of nightlife. We are a family of 4 and very oriented towards quiet, space and outdoor activities. I am eagerly leaving a small town in the South...and hoping that the culture might be less exclusive than the one we've been living in for a couple of years. The hatred here towards.....Yankees, blacks, gays, non-Baptists....is really such a turn off that I'm not sticking around to be vested in my retirement. I don't want to be around this kind of attitude and don't want my children exposed to it any longer. Is it possible to fuse rural with some progressive thought? Or at least with live-and-let-live? Is this a possibility in this part of Maine? Any communities around Ellsworth that might be better than others in these terms...(openness...tolerance to "outsiders")? Thank you for any input.

I think with this negitivity in which you are living in right now with your family and you...
............you should be almost done packing and off the phone with the boss saying...
"Thank you sir or ma'm I'm looking forward to it.

Most of Maine and New England pride themselves on the fact that we are an open minded bunch of folks.
But, any where you go... there are people that are grrr.. but they are a bit far and few between.
Always "RESPECT THY NEIGHBOR...and as always they should return the favor.

[Acadianlion]

Originally Posted by RANGER.101ST

my brother built the riteaid in blue hill.he subed for HT winters.he told me people were down right piS@# off and looked at him like he was the devel.pritty closed minded up their.

Blue Hill and the greater Blue Hill area pretty much all the way to Stonington is pretty unique. The Blue Hill peninsula is sort of the bottom of a bowl, the sides of which rise to the west as Blue Hill Mountain. That is kind of the attitude in the area: they are guarded by the mountain and don't particularly want much to change. That isn't necessarily bad. Things are pretty quiet there, although traffic control is a problem particularly in the summer season, since there is no law enforcement.

The Rite Aide development was a traumatic experience for the town. There were many cries about how they didn't want the architectural "flavor" of the town to change, yet there are many different architectural flavors and periods evidenced along Main Street to make that protest foolish and ignorant of historical fact.

The plain fact was that the town NEEDED a new Rite Aid, and the old days of having a small drug store on Main Street were rendered obsolete because the town had never planned for the future, with the tremendous increase in traffic that occurs all year round, and expecially in the summer.

The town has no zoning ordinances or building codes. They were all repealed some years ago because after a furor of excitement about installing them, some "good ole boy" discovered that he couldn't build his new shed where he wanted to on his own property. In the next election, the codes were repealed. Makes planning board sessions interesting, to say the least. (caveat: some of this may have changed in the past five years, as it is that long since I owned property in Blue Hill. HOpefully, some of this has changed).

In the end, the large old frame grocery store burned flat to the ground one day. Now THAT was tramautic because it meant that the little super convenience store on Union Street...Merrill and Hinckley Market which has been there since the time of Christ...had to service the entire area, or people would have to go to Ellsworth or Bucksport for groceries.

The new grocery store is attractive, and with the a new bank building, and the new Rite Aid, Blue Hill has the beginnings of a charming commercial district right where it should be: the confluence of South Street and Main Street. It's coming together pretty well, I think, because it seems that the people who are doing the developing commercially, have the "flavor" of the town's heritage and history in their mouths. I don't think the town itself has done much to protect itself from the bad aspects of "development".

During my time in Blue Hill I met all sorts of people who live there, have lived there for a long time (generations), as well as who have come from elsewhere to live there. What my experience told me that there. Like towns everywhere there are many different sorts of people. There are the religiously conservative, the socially progressive, the politically conservative and the politically liberal in all variations and extremes.

But if I were to characterize the general town in one way, I would say that they like where they are, they like their hodgepodge of humanity, and want to be left alone, and to leave others alone also. Town government seems more intent on "administration" than governing, and I have found this to be the way things are in many of Maine's smaller towns.

[Peter Creedon]

What I meant by the new bedford thing, was this:

Say you live in Bristol County,MA and you need supplies or something, you go into new bedford. I was equating Ellsworth to it, because its a small city, like New Bedford.