Economic Activity Report
January 2008
I continue to monitor and participate in the economic activities of the North Country daily through the internet and by telephone. As I reported last year, although I definitely miss the personal and contributing aspects of my duties by not attending meetings etc, the fact that I experience the conditions of a very different region than I normally do, gives me a different perspective about our hometown issues. For example, many of the communities in South Florida are experiencing rapid growth and this growth presents challenges for these communities who try to keep up with street development, water and sewer line extensions etc. The level of creativity that is being demonstrated by communities working cooperatively with developers and investors is truly impressive. These modern living communities are often
developed along specific themes and architectural designs with matching landscaping. These become communities within communities. Being exposed to this creative environment has demonstrated to me that Berlin with its many natural and historical attributes, which if promoted and marketed would make the City a sought after location for the baby boomers who are part time residents and who require few public services.
The challenges of being a landlord became apparent again this month. At noon time on Saturday January 12th I received a call from the City Manager that we had an emergency at the Maynesboro Building at the Industrial Park. The Manager had received a call from the Fire Department who had responded to a 911 call that workers at Moonlight Machining were reporting feeling dizzy and sick. The Manager informed me that the Fire Department had detected very high levels of carbon monoxide in the Moonlight Machining area and that they had turned off all heating systems including the main valve supplying natural gas for the whole building. The cause of the incident was believed to be the use of a propane fueled fork lift being operated by Moonlight Machining. The
Manager also informed me that the Fire Department told him that the natural gas supply could not be turned back on until such time as a qualified heating technician had checked and verified that the heating systems were not defective. The Manager asked me if I thought I could handle the emergency from away and I accepted the challenge. As it turned out, the biggest issue was getting a qualified “gas” technician on the scene to verify the condition of the gas heating systems so that the natural gas valve could be turned back on. My being in Florida mattered very little in these events since all communications was by telephone and the main contractor for the gas systems Irving Oil emergency response is located in Prince Edward Island Canada. It took about two hours to dispatch a technician because Irving had no record on
their computer network that showed that BIDPA/City was a customer. It appears that when Irving upgraded their emergency response system from a locally driven system to a central/company wide system, whatever information the Berlin office had about our heating installations was never transferred to their main computer network. It took some fairly forceful language and name dropping to convince their operator in PEI that we indeed were a client and that we had an emergency situation that required their immediate attention and that we would take care of the record keeping during the following week. During the following week, I spent a considerable amount of time with Irving Staff in Littleton and Prince Edward Island updating information and systems so that we would not again have such a delay and challenge in responding to an emergency. I also instituted a preventive maintenance schedule so that the three natural gas fired systems will receive periodic inspections. In follow-up
conversations with Ray Godbout of Moonlight Machining he informed me that his fork lift had emission issues and at that time I was also made aware of the seriousness of the situation that Saturday. Ray told me that by the time that he got to a telephone his mind was so cloudy from the carbon monoxide that he could no longer remember telephone numbers and that he had difficulty dialing 911. As a result of the professional response taken by the Fire Department, I suggest that the BIDPA Board send a letter of appreciation to Assistant Fire Chief Robert Goudreau and his department for their professional actions to this emergency. Last week Ray Godbout was also very happy to inform me that the new converted to natural gas heating system installed by Irving has been installed and was working well.
I’ve been working with a machining company from Newport, New Hampshire who is looking for a partnership with local machine shops. To date I’ve had only a couple of conversations with the company, but expect to connect this clients with all the machine shops in Berlin.
This morning (2/12/08) I received a phone call from the mayor informing me that Fraser announced the shut down of two more paper machines at the Cascade mill. Although it was not an unexpected announcement, this is another disturbing event and another negative blow to our North Country economy. The region has never seen such a dramatic economic upheaval in its history and, replacing our pulp and paper economic base to other sectors will be a major challenge for all the communities in Coos County.
This announcement also followed the announcement from Groveton that a major biomass and biofuel project in that community had been shelved. The two major issues cited for the cancellation were the severe limitations on the power lines in Coos County and, uncertainties surrounding the availability of wood fiber. These two issues require our attention and may play a significant role in our attempts to diversify and expand our economy. I urge the BIDPA Board to become informed and remain vigilant to these issues.
Norman Charest
Economic Development Director
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