CARIBOU, Maine — Just like over 2,000 Caribou residents, Joan Theriault would live in the proposed Town of Lyndon should a secession effort go through, spearheaded by about 20 members of a group called the Caribou Secession Committee.
The group would take 80 percent of Caribou’s acreage with it on a quest to have lower taxes and fewer “unessential” services in Lyndon — like streetlights and the city’s airport. Committee spokesman Paul Camping says the seceded town would represent a return to a New England style of government where once a year, every voter turns out to cast a vote on the town’s bottom line.
Many of the members of the Caribou Secession Committee once belonged to a group called Citizens for Responsible City Management — a group that was vocal on city matters in 2011-12. Theriault, now a Caribou City Councilor, was that group’s secretary.
As the Citizens for Responsible City Management’s secretary, Theriault even wrote letters to the Aroostook Republican that criticized city administration for wasteful spending.
“Call your councilors, stop them on the streets, send e-mails, do whatever it takes until they get the message that it is costing too much to live in Caribou!” she wrote in one of her editorialS from June of 2012.
Theriault was appointed to a vacant seat on the Council a few months later and she was elected by the citizens in 2013.
Camping remembers Theriault telling him how things looked very differently as a councilor.
“Everything she said before becoming a councilor no longer applies, and she’s voted for every mil rate increase since she’s been there,” Camping said.
Theriault remembers her editorials, and remembers working with the group to correct some problems the group had with city administration at the time.
“It was just an awful time in Caribou when morale was low and people didn’t like how things were going,” she recalled, and she wasn’t afraid to vocalize her opinions.
“I told (Director of the Caribou Parks and Recreation Department Kathy Mazzuchelli) that we were over recreated in this town, that the budget was too heavy, that it was open for too long and that it was way more than Caribou needed — that is not the case,” Theriault recalled, describing how increased information has altered her stance during her time as a councilor. “The people in this town love the rec department. They want it and they don’t mind paying for it — and that’s the way with most of the things in town.”
During the primary election, the city councilors put together a survey for Caribou’s voters and received nearly 550 results. The data indicated that the majority of the people are happy with the current level of services offered in the city. For instance, Theriault knew that people liked the recreation department, but she didn’t realize how much they liked the recreation department until she saw that 70 percent of survey participants were happy with it.
While Theriault has changed her position on certain issues, she said it’s because she’s looking at the community as a whole.
“I look at every issue and I make sure to understand every issue before I vote on; I know what I’m voting on, and it makes a difference,” she said.
Councilor Theriault has people calling her at home, stopping her in the supermarket and even on the street to share their opinion; paired with the details in councilor packets and the privilege of executive session — where the city deals with sensitive issues neither the public nor the press are privy to — and she says these perspectives influence how she votes.
“If it seems the majority of people want certain things, I’m going to lean that way because that’s why I’m (on the council) — to give them what they want while they’re living in this town,” she said, adding her support for the city’s current administration.
Back when she was the secretary for the Citizens for Responsible City Management, the primary goal was removing then-city manager Steve Buck.
“Now, we have two of the best people in my lifetime that I’ve ever seen running this town, and I’m telling you that you can see it downtown during Thursdays on Sweden,” she said, referring to City Manager Austin Bleess and Assistant City Manager Tony Mazzucco. “People aren’t going to like everything, but I think there’s a whole lot more respect than there ever was.”
Theriault frequently attends Thursdays on Sweden, and two weeks ago plenty of people were talking about the secession movement — mostly about how they didn’t want to live in Lyndon.
While Theriault is hearing from people who are opposed to the secession movement, spokesperson Camping says he’s heard abundant support for the movement — and City Mayor Gary Aiken thinks the only person who has a true understanding of the public’s opinion would be Camping.
“My take would be that the only person who would know (the public’s opinion) would be Paul Camping by the number of signatures he has on his petitions,” Aiken said on Tuesday afternoon. In order for the secession process to move forward, the citizens of the proposed Lyndon must authorize a public hearing with the City Council by signing a petition. Once the petition is signed by approximately 1,040 registered voters of the proposed township, the effort will be put to the state legislature and, if approved at that level, the secession movement will be put to the Lyndon voters.
On Tuesday afternoon, Camping wouldn’t speculate on the number of signatures Secession Committee members had received because there were, that afternoon, 20 petition circulators out and about.
“But I do know the support is overwhelming,” he said. “In some neighborhoods, we’re running 95 percent of people in support of this movement.”
Camping did add that the summer is a difficult time to go door-to-door for signatures, as many are away on vacations or summering at a camp.
“We’re trying to contact every household in the rural Caribou area to give everyone an opportunity to say ‘yes, they’re for it’ or ‘no, they’re not,’” Camping said. “We’re not going to catch everybody, but we’re trying to give everybody a chance.”
In Camping’s experiences, “the people that don’t like secession or have formed an unfavorable opinion about secession are people with limited knowledge of government, especially local government,” he explained. “We’re still encountering people who think that Lyndon would have to build schools because Caribou owns the schools — and the truth is Caribou doesn’t own any schools or busses, RSU 39 owns the schools and the busses,” he clarified, adding that’s why he puts information posts on the Caribou Secession Committee community Facebook page.
“I always put information on the community page about how citizens need to know their rights, they need to understand the law, and they also need to know the benefits of secession — why it’s good for them,” he added. “It’s much more than (reducing) high taxes.”
