A government freeze

Published in the International Press Institute's Global Journalist magazine

Reporters are to receive approval (for stories) from their editor, who will obtain National Science Foundation concurrence for all proposed stories to insure [sic] they meet U.S. government standards. — Guidelines for Editorial Employees of the Antarctic Sun.

Except, there are no written standards given by the National Science Foundation. The Antarctic Sun is an information outlet with significant access to the U.S. Antarctic Program, employing professional journalists and reaching members of the general public and even world media organizations. But the NSF sees the weekly newspaper as a “house organ,” analogous to a corporate newsletter providing the company line on events.

“There are times when it is better to not say anything,” said NSF’s Antarctic information manager Guy Guthridge.

Former editors of the Sun, including myself, aren’t so sure, though we agreed to the restrictions as a condition of our employment. Current Sun editors were unavailable for comment.

“There were some NSF managers who took the role as information flow manager to a level that was well above and beyond what was probably good for the NSF and for the people working (in Antarctica),” said Sandy Colhoun, who was the editor of the paper during the 1997-1998 and 1998-1999 austral summer seasons.

Josh Landis was my colleague when we were editors of the paper in the 1999-2000 and 2000-2001 seasons. When asked about press freedom in Antarctica, Landis said, “It doesn’t exist.”
Landis qualified that by saying he’s not sure there needs to be press freedom within the U.S. Antarctic Program. “It’s a program to execute a series of goals,” Landis said. That focus, he said, “does create frustrations for journalists,” adding that we learned about restrictions during the hiring process and during employment orientation. “I felt like I knew what the rules were going in,” Landis said.

The Sun’s planning and reporting are similar to any newspaper. Though NSF and program officials would make suggestions about interesting subjects to cover, “they never told us what to write,” Landis said. And Sun reporters do get to travel around the continent at times, reporting on research and logistics at field outposts, though NSF controls who goes where and when.

It is near the end of the production process that NSF’s power becomes clear. The paper publishes a note about itself indicating that it is “funded by the National Science Foundation,” and further saying, “NSF reviews and approves material before publication.”

The senior NSF representative on the continent reviews a draft copy of the paper and has carte blanche to change content and even kill stories before publication. Though some in that position are helpful, all have the power to “kill anything for any reason and there’s no recourse,” Landis said.

Some stories did not get killed, though they might have been. The Dec. 19, 1999, issue discussed severe pollution in Winter Quarters Bay, right next to McMurdo Station. And the Oct. 29, 2000, issue included a picture of a sea urchin using a tampon as camouflage on the sea floor. Both of those stories were about NSF-funded scientific research into Antarctic pollution.

Other stories, though, never see the light of day. Landis secured a series of interviews with people who had wintered at the South Pole with Dr. Jerri Nielsen, the doctor who discovered she had breast cancer while at the Pole in 1999.

“I probably had better access than anybody to get the details of the story,” Landis said. “When the NSF found out about this, it was very quickly ended.”

“I actually ended it when it became apparent that any final version would be so heavily edited for the purpose of removing things that I knew it wouldn’t be satisfying,” Landis said.

January 2002: Artur Chilingarov, a deputy chairman of the Russian Duma and a towering figure in Russian Antarctic research, was stranded at the South Pole because of mechanical problems with his aircraft. A Sun staffer was at the Pole at the time, but the paper carried less than a paragraph about the visit, making no mention of Chilingarov’s name or position.

November 1999: An LC-130H “Hercules” aircraft had to take a 12-hour trip in attempt to land at several runways due to whiteout conditions. The story ran, but with some restrictions. “That story was a perfect example of how censorship can be acceptable,” Landis said. All the facts in the story were accurate, but “I stayed away from certain things that might upset people about the flight,” Landis said, meaning not only officials in the program but employees who needed to get around the continent. “You don’t want everybody flying on a Herc for the rest of the season to be afraid,” he said.

November 1998: An Air National Guard plane went into a crevasse, with no injuries and only minor damage to the plane. “I wanted to get that story out right away, and I wasn’t allowed to,” Colhoun said. He had a photo of the plane in the crevasse the day the accident occurred, but “they wouldn’t let me use it,” Colhoun said, offering a possible explanation: The Air National Guard had just begun taking over Antarctic flying from the Navy, which had flown for the program since the 1950s. Air Guard officials had been reluctant to take Navy advice before the accident, and could have been embarrassed by the story.

Not only the big stories were cut, though. A short piece about a cave of boulders built for McMurdo’s rock-climbing community’s use was struck from the paper in October 2000. No reason was given for the large X on the proof page. Though that was more the exception than the rule, it and the other restrictions provide a look at what governmental control over media can do.

“It’s not an independent publication,” said Valerie Carroll, the Sun’s publisher and communications manager at Raytheon Polar Services, NSF’s Antarctic contractor. “We’re being paid by a client to put out a newsletter-slash-newspaper,” Carroll said.

NSF may have its own publicity plans, she said, and “it wouldn’t look good for us to scoop them,” Carroll said, adding that there are “other perspectives we’re not aware of and don’t need to be.”

Colhoun and Landis offer kudos, though, for some openness on the part of the NSF. “For their culture, for them to allow even what we did was pretty remarkable,” Landis said. “In general, you weren’t censored.”

“The NSF feels like they let you have 70 percent freedom,” Colhoun said. He wanted to show a complete picture of what was going on in Antarctica — good and bad. “That agenda was not the one that the NSF wanted for that product,” Colhoun said. “I was owned by the NSF. They were the editorial power.”

Guthridge agrees. All NSF publications must go through an official approval process, he said. The Sun’s process is streamlined because of the distance and time difference between McMurdo and Washington, as well as the volume of material published in the Sun each week.

“We’re using public dollars here to put out something, and so we’re responsible to the larger public,” Guthridge said. For him, that means keeping some things quiet.

Alex Jones, director of the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University, said it is reasonable to expect that the government would spend money on a publication to serve its purposes. But, he said, they run the risk of improving short-term image at the expense of long-term credibility.

“The more frank and open the government is in publications of that kind, the more valuable they are,” Jones said. “The long-term best interests are in being open and honest.”

All parties agree that the Sun is not in the role of watchdog of the U.S. Antarctic Program, though there isn’t any other organization that is or could be. Logistics are the main problem. “Journalists can’t just hop on a plane and go talk to who they want to,” Carroll said.

The Sun staff is based at McMurdo and has limited access to field camps and Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, giving them better access to Antarctic information than any other U.S. journalists.

“It’s not meant to be what (a newspaper) is in the world,” Landis said. “NSF gets to control what facts become public.”

Other journalists do come to the continent, after applying to NSF and having their plans approved. Some of these have included staff members from U.S. News & World Report, the Baltimore Sun, and National Geographic.

When journalists do come from outside organizations, Guthridge said, “They do what they want,” Guthridge said.

The time they are allotted, Colhoun said, is often too short for real reporting. Weather delays, survival training, and other commitments can mean there is little time to get into issues of waste or mismanagement on the ice, he said. “The only kind of reports that can come back are happy reports,” Colhoun said.

Guthridge said all signatory nations to the Antarctic Treaty are required to publish annual plans and reports on their activities. Countries can verify that information by appointing observers who have free access to the stations and equipment of other nations. The public, though, has little access to the U.S. Antarctic Program, only experiencing life and work at research stations when in the employ of government organizations or their contractors.

“It’s their show, they make the rules,” Landis said, adding that being more open would help. “More press freedom would create better dialogue in the Antarctic community,” Landis said.

More than Monologues: If we see this as just entertainment, we’re not seeing it

Published in the Portland Phoenix

My vagina singing all girl songs, all goat bells ringing songs, all wild autumn field songs, vagina songs, vagina home songs. — Not since the soldiers put a long, thick rifle inside me. So cold, the steel rod canceling my heart. Don’t know whether they’re going to fire it or shove it through my spinning brain.”

These words describe a particularly violent rape that occurred in Kosovo, but scenes like it — perhaps without the rifle, but with similar spirit-deadening effects — will play out not only on the stage at Merrill Auditorium June 28 as part of The Vagina Monologues, but across the state, in our neighborhoods, even our homes, at an increasing rate, according to the state police.

Annual crime survey numbers indicate that Maine has seen an increase from 273 rapes and 3,986 incidents of domestic violence in 1999 to 325 rapes and 4,944 incidents of domestic violence in 2001. State numbers also indicate that 22 percent of all domestic violence in the state occurs in Cumberland County, more than in any other county.

In the Portland area, Sexual Assault Response Services of Southern Maine received 453 calls in 2001, and spent over 200 hours on the phone, in hospitals, police stations, and courthouses assisting victims of rape and sexual assault. As of June 19, the Portland Police Department had responded to 29 calls for sexual assault this year.

The department has also responded to 545 calls for domestic violence. Assistant district attorney Anne Berlind, in the Cumberland County DA’s domestic violence unit, says about 40 percent of domestic violence incidents reported to her office go unprosecuted, largely because the victim is unwilling to testify. But of those in which a defendant is charged, 60 percent are convicted.

Berlind says first-time offenders convicted of domestic violence assault or terrorizing typically get two days in jail for a first offense, with two years probation (including batterer’s counseling courses and possibly substance-abuse treatment), and 118 days in jail hanging over their heads for violations ranging from continuing to abuse women all the way down to failing to call a probation officer on time. In 2001, Berlind said, about 300 people in Cumberland County went to jail for domestic violence.

Portland Mayor Karen Geraghty will issue an as-yet-undetermined proclamation in Portland on June 28, and will give playwright Eve Ensler the key to the city as well. Ensler will star in the production, a rare event anywhere and a first in Maine.

The Phoenix sat down with Geraghty to talk about the issues and how regular people, even those who don’t know their neighbors, can help combat domestic violence and sexual assault.

Phoenix: You don’t stop domestic violence by issuing proclamations or putting on a play.

Geraghty: What helps prevent domestic violence is awareness, and anything we can do to draw attention to the problem here in Portland — and here in Maine — will cause people to intervene earlier in situations that they may know about, or if they live next door to somebody who’s in that situation. This production gives us the opportunity to highlight that some people in our community are suffering. Though the proclamation is symbolic and the key to the city is involved, I think it’s important to elevate the issue in whatever way we can.

Q: What is the nature of the proclamation going to be?

A: Well, we haven’t written it yet. We’re in the process of drafting it right now. But basically it will talk about the problem of domestic violence. It will talk about the fact that people in Portland are killed as a result of domestic violence, and it will talk about the importance of intervention and also prevention strategies.

Q: Have sexual assault and women’s issues been one of your focuses as mayor?

A: Everybody on the [city] council works full-time. I work as a lobbyist at the Legislature, so I’ve had the great pleasure to work with both the Sexual Assault Coalition and the Domestic Violence Coalition in that capacity. It’s something that I’m very committed to, trying to end violence against women. You don’t grow up as a woman in this culture without being constantly aware that you could be the victim of a sexual assault. I have good friends in Portland, one friend in particular, who has been victimized in the last year. I don’t think there’s any woman in this country — and certainly nobody that I know — who doesn’t have a story: a sister, a sister-in-law, a niece, a mother, a grandmother . . . It’s so widespread that I think every woman, and I would assume every man, is aware of it

Q: One of the groups The Vagina Monologues will benefit is Mainely Men Against Violence Against Women.

A: That’s one of the really neat things that I’ve noticed in the last couple of years, that the Domestic Violence Coalition did the “Silent Witness” program. They have those — I don’t know if you’ve ever seen them — but they’re all painted red and they have a plaque on them which gives the woman’s name and a little bit of her story. Every time there is another homicide from domestic violence they take the Silent Witnesses out to — like if it happens in Portland, then they come to Portland — and there are lot of men, in particular police officers, who come out and stand and be part of that demonstration and call for an end to the violence. That has done a great deal to raise awareness and to get more people in the community focused on [the fact] that it shouldn’t just be women standing up decrying this violence. It should be every member of the community. I think that the Silent Witness project gives people something concrete they can do: They can actually take to the streets and say, “This is wrong.”

The Sexual Assault Coalition has something called “The Clothesline Project.” What they have is T-shirts, just regular, plain T-shirts, that people who have been victimized either by childhood sexual assault and incest or as adults have been sexually assaulted and raped, and they have painted these T-shirts. The T-shirts say a variety of things, and it’s wherever the person is in their recovery and healing. It’s just a powerful, powerful image when you go into an event where they have strung this clothesline and there are all these T-shirts and some of them are very small, so they’re [made by] children who have been assaulted and they write things on there — just really incredible. And then there are T-shirts from 75-year-old women and every age in between. Images are very powerful and they make us think. They just make you think. They make you think about what could you do to help change this situation for women.

Both coalitions have done a great job in Maine trying to be creative about how they educate the public about what’s happening to women in our state and in our community.

Q: What can we do, either as a man or a woman, to end or to attack domestic violence and sexual assault?

A: There are a whole variety of things. The first thing we can do is make sure that we’re clear in our own lives and in our own relationships about how we’re behaving . . . In terms of domestic violence, I don’t know how many times I’ve heard somebody say, “Well, you know, I heard something. I think the woman who lived below me, or I think the woman who lived in the apartment next to me — I used to hear fighting and I never was sure what was going on.” A lot of people have a story like that, or “I work with a woman who occasionally would come in and had ‘fallen.’ ” Just being aware of what’s happening to the people around you, the people at work, the people in your own family, the people who you may live near. Just being aware and trying to offer some intervention. That’s incredibly helpful. And not being judgmental, not saying “Oh you’re so crazy, why are you with that person?” but understanding all of the reasons why people are afraid to leave. There’s a lot that we can do.

Clearly, people who are raising children have a huge responsibility to raise boys and to teach them non-violent ways of expressing their anger and their frustration and teaching them that women are not the outlet for their aggression when things don’t go well or when they feel powerless. There’s a million things that we can do, and I think many good things are being done.

Q: Sometimes that’s hard, to hear a neighbor who maybe you don’t know because it’s a big apartment building, or you’re next door in a different house. To step in.

A: Call the police right away. If people call 911 and say, “There is a violent argument going on next door to where I live or in the apartment below me,” the police will respond immediately. You don’t have to know the person’s name that lives next door to you or below you. You don’t have to know anything other than, “There is a violent fight occurring and I feel someone may be in danger.” That’s all you have to do, and the police will go right away. Sometimes it’s the police who are in the best position to be the interveners and to try to provide a way out for the woman and her children. I wasn’t suggesting that people should run over and get involved directly.

Q: But even to say after the fact, “I heard something at your apartment last night.” In one sense maybe that’s too late, but in another sense there’s a privacy barrier.

A: You have to get to know the person. I think there are ways to make friends with people. If you suspect somebody and you don’t know them very well but they’re a neighbor, there are ways to make friends with people. And through the process of trying to reach out and make friends they may share things with you or they may give you clues which would then allow you to have that other conversation about, “Hey by the way . . .” But I don’t think you can go up to a complete stranger and say “I think . . .” because clearly that wouldn’t be safe for the person to reveal anything to you. But just trying to get to know people who you think might be in trouble and then waiting for the opportunity.

Q: Are there things that government can do, at the city or the county or the state level?

A: There’s a great deal that is already being done by the federal government, by the state government, and certainly through the city level. [There are] many, many different programs aimed particularly at the victims, but also now we’re starting to see more programs targeted at the abusers. So yes, I definitely think there is a role for government in any kind of violence against people.

Q: Are you going to be at the performance?

A: Yes. Yes definitely. I’ve never seen a production of it and this one is going to be really fabulous, because it’s using so many Portland-area performers. That’s going to make it really, really interesting and exciting to showcase local talent.

Sexual Assault Response Services of Southern Maine hotline (sexual assault and rape): (800) 313-9900.

Family Crisis Services hotline (domestic violence): (800) 537-6066.

The Vagina Monologues shows at Merrill Auditorium, in Portland, June 28. Call (207) 842-0800.

Tourism season off to strong start

Published in the Current

Southern Maine tourism operators are expecting to do at least as well as last year, and numbers are already up.

Fred Kilfoil, owner of the Millbrook Motel, said his bookings from January through April were higher than last year, in keeping with his upward trend over the past four years.

His May numbers continued the trend, ending up, he said, “way ahead of previous Mays.”

“I’m expecting it to be as good as any other year and probably better than most,” Kilfoil said.

But the foundation is still a bit shaky. “A bomb in India or something may change that,” he said.

Maureen McQuade, innkeeper of Cape Elizabeth’s Inn By the Sea and vice-president of the Maine Innkeepers Association, said a new state tourism ad campaign is working. “The state of Maine has been doing some outstanding advertising,” she said.

The promotions, she said, began in September and have continued to target people who can drive to Maine.

But, McQuade added, in-state traffic is up, too. “We’ve had a lot more Maine people traveling,” she said.

Bob Westburg, owner of the Higgins Beach Inn, said most of his weekends are full through the season.

“The bookings are coming on solid,” he said. “It looks like it’s booking up pretty good.”

He said he needs mid-week bookings to fill in a bit more, but expects that to occur.

Many Scarborough businesses look to Old Orchard Beach for indications of how the season will go. Bud Hamm, executive director of the OOB Chamber of Commerce, said he expects a strong season.

The inquiries and advance bookings at Hamm’s office, he said, were high even by late April.

“This year, so far, it’s looking the same if not better,” Hamm said, adding that it could be “another banner year. ”

Visitors to the area, mostly from New England, mid-Atlantic states and Canada, are arriving somewhat later this year than they have in the past, but the numbers are up, Hamm said.

“They’re not booking as far ahead as they used to,” McQuade said.

“Our pre-bookings are a little ahead of last year,” said Dick Schwalbenberg, innkeeper at the Black Point Inn. But he is optimistic.

“It does really look to be a strong season all over,” he said.

Some Maine inns and tourism destinations have had trouble hiring help from overseas this year, as a result of new government scrutiny of short-term visa applicants. McQuade has avoided this by hiring locally.

“We have a lot of local people that we hire and college kids that come back year after year,” she said. Her inn has had good response to its help-wanted ads, as well, with larger numbers of well-qualified people applying.

Schwalbenberg has also avoided government delays, by filing paperwork as early as possible for the 18 foreign workers he has hired. “Our employees actually arrived when they said they would,” he said.

But even if workers leave, visitor numbers fall apart and the weather turns foul, all is not lost on the coast of Maine.

“Even the bad summers are good,” said motel owner Kilfoil.

State cuts more from local school budgets

Published in the Current

With a projected state deficit of more than $100 million, further cuts to schools will be needed and that means officials in Cape and Scarborough will have to revise next year’s school budgets in the coming months.

In what was already a tough budget year in each town, Scarborough stands to get about $90,000 less than it was expecting, and Cape expects to lose nearly $40,000.

In March, Maine Revenue Services had predicted a $90 million shortfall for this fiscal year, and a similar shortfall for next year.

But now that April and May revenue numbers are in, the state is expecting a further reduction in revenue of as much as $25 million.

In light of that, $10 million has been cut from General Purpose Aid to education. The Department of Education revised the money each school district will get in what is being called an “emergency curtailment” of the funds.

Gov. Angus King also has proposed taking $10 million from funds for the laptop initiative and other cutbacks, including mandatory furloughs for state employees.

The state Legislature’s approval is required for about half of the proposals, according to King spokesman Tony Sprague, but legislators and the governor are reluctant to hold a special session this summer to deal with the problem.

Local legislators are upset about the cutbacks, but say there is little they can do.

“It stinks,” said Sen. Lynn Bromley, a Democrat. But, she said, “GPA is such a big piece of the budget” that it’s hard to ignore when cuts need to be made.

Most legislative leaders, she said, were hoping to avoid a special session. Bromley is among them, she said, because reopening the budget discussion may make matters worse for her constituents.

“It’s not going to get any better,” she said.

Bromley will be holding a series of community meetings about the issue in South Portland, Scarborough and Cape Elizabeth, in coming weeks.

“We absolutely need tax reform,” Bromley said.

One of the subjects she wants to discuss is the way school construction is funded, which presently takes away money from the funds available to GPA, and provides state funds to build schools in communities that have trouble paying to keep them open, she said. “We need to think about how to do more things in a regional way.”

Bromley also expects the Legislature to reopen discussions of other ways for communities to raise money, including the local option sales tax, or broadening the sales tax.

Bromley’s colleague, Sen. Peggy Pendleton, also a Democrat, is unhappy with the cuts to GPA. “I think they’re really unfortunate,” she said. “That is a very wrong move. It shifts the burden back onto the property taxpayer.”

And if a special session is required, Pendleton said, she wants the governor to communicate his plans first. “We’ve had no briefing on this from the governor,” Pendleton said.

She also expects the state’s entire budget to be laid open again. “We have to look at the whole budget,” Pendleton said, especially those funds in the current budget that are for programs not slated to begin until 2004.

Either way, she said, “before I get called in, I want to have the information.”

Rep. Larry Bliss, a Democrat, said he wants to reopen the budget process. “Some of the things the governor wants to do, he can’t do without legislative approval,” Bliss said.

He said the GPA money should be preserved. “Do I think the money should come out of GPA? Definitely not. Cape Elizabeth and South Portland really got hit hard already,” he said.

Bliss also said he likes the laptop idea a lot, but given budget constraints, “this might not be the right time.”

Referring to claims by the governor that the state’s contract with Apple may be as expensive to get out of as to fulfill, Bliss said he had originally heard that the contract included a low-cost way out for the state, but is now being told otherwise.

Rep. Harold Clough, a Republican, wants to go back into session to deal with the crisis, though he admitted he didn’t know what would happen. “I don’t know what to expect,” Clough said. But he advised meeting soon.

“The problem is getting worse by the day,” he said. “The sooner you deal with it, the better.”

Specifically, he said, the governor’s proposal to save money by furloughing state employees is flawed.

“We need to really get at the overspending that we do,” Clough said.

Sprague in the governor’s office and Laurie Lachance, an economist at the State Planning Office, both say Clough’s hurry is unwarranted.

“The proposals that (King) put forward do not rely on a specific date for the Legislature to have acted,” Sprague said.

He pointed out that last year, the total amount distributed via GPA was $700 million. Under the governor’s revised plan, the total would still increase to $720 million, but that is less than originally hoped for, he said.

But if the revenue projection has declined, he said, it would be expected to be lower next year, meaning the budget shortfall could change from $180 million over two years to as much as $230 million.

Lachance said her office has not had a chance to review and analyze the new projects from the Maine Revenue Service, and said new “official” revenue projections won’t be available until August, because final numbers for the 2002 fiscal year, which closes June 30, will not be available until mid-June.

“Year-end results are very important,” she said.

After Sept. 11, 2001, the revenue forecast declined, and King used some “rainy day fund” money to balance the budget, Lachance said.

“That has moved the balancing problem into fiscal year 2003,” she said.

If the projections fall further, 2003 could be a far tighter year than this one, she said.

And looking forward, the numbers don’t get any better, with state economists predicting between $350 million and $750 million in “structural
gap”–the difference between costs to fully fund all of the state’s legal obligations and the revenues available to pay for them – in 2004-2005.

Living a life of laughter and love

Published in the Current

Leland P. “Jimmy” Murray, volunteer, businessman and fireworks enthusiast, brought peals of laughter to his family, friends and community before his death June 19 after a long illness.

Sometimes called “the heart of the town,” Murray, 60, was eulogized by his lifelong friend Everett Jardine as having left legacies of “love, laughter and
joy.” Jardine told what he said were “only a few” of the stories about Jimmy’s fun-filled life, including his love for cars and speed.

Jimmy had a daredevil streak that led him to—among other stunts—drive his car between a guy wire and a telephone pole on Two Lights Road, Jardine said.

In the early 1970s, Jimmy joined the town rescue squad. He had a business in town, which made it easier for him to respond to calls. That business, L.P. Murray and Sons, a construction company, was founded by his father.

At the time of his death, Jimmy had retired as president of the company, ceding control to his son, Skip.

Within a few years of joining the rescue squad, Jimmy had become captain, a post he held for 15 years, said Fire Chief Phil McGouldrick. Jimmy also volunteered with the fire department and became deputy chief in the mid-1980s.

It was a typical Jimmy endeavor, in which he gave generously of his time and energy, but remained modest about his work and his impact. But others saw, and they knew.

“He was always giving, always trying to help everybody out. You could always depend on him,” McGouldrick said.

Eleven years ago, Jimmy began an effort to revive Cape’s Memorial Day celebrations. He served as Grand Marshal and master of ceremonies for this year’s event.

He was praised by Town Manager Mike McGovern and the assembled crowd for his work.

And though not himself a veteran, Jimmy made a special point to honor not only veterans in uniform who marched in the parade, but also those who simply attended the ceremony.

While many of those he helped honor were strangers to him, Jimmy also took good care of the people he knew.

Fire Lt. Jason Allen’s father died several years ago, and Allen remembered Jimmy was “the first guy that called. He was incredibly caring.”

Help wasn’t all Jimmy had to offer. “He was just a character, ” McGouldrick said.

“That’s what I’m going to miss is the loud voice and the comments,” Skip Murray said.

Jimmy and his wife, Carol, opened their home on Fowler Road to anyone passing by, and there was always coffee and doughnuts inside, ready to accompany conversation. Police officers, firefighters and other members of the community stopped every time they drove down Fowler Road, McGouldrick said.

Doughnuts and other sweets were a particular Jimmy weakness. “Dunkin’ Donuts was his second home for many years,” McGouldrick said. “He bought ‘em by the dozen and he ate ‘em by the dozen.”

And at busy fire scenes, firefighters knew they could always find a snack – a candy bar or piece of chocolate – under the seat of Jimmy’s truck. He also often had a box of his favorite doughnut – the Dunkin’, “the one with the handle”–there, too, Skip said.

When hunting at his camp in Baldwin—another of his passions—Jimmy was known for bringing along a pile of goodies. In stops at a market in Standish, Skip said, “he would fill a cart with junk food, and we were only going for the weekend.”

Generations of Cape kids learned to shoot at that camp, including Jimmy’s cousin Gerry, who was also a former fire captain, and Gerry’s kids.

But that was where the fun had limits. Jimmy made sure all the kids knew how to handle guns safely, and even when he handed out fireworks for kids to set off, Jimmy kept a close eye on them, making sure nobody got hurt.

“He played it by the rules,” Gerry said. And he knew them all, going so far as to keep a handbook of federal worker safety guidelines in his truck for reference during inspections at his company’s construction site.

When fighting fires out in rural Cape, McGouldrick and all the firefighters relied on Jimmy’s memory for locations of water and sewer lines throughout the town.

“He was a common-sense fire chief,” McGouldrick said. Jimmy was always eager to learn more, too, and McGouldrick remembered taking him to a big fire in Portland to teach Jimmy more about how fire behaves in big buildings.

Always wary of being too serious, Jimmy knew how to keep everyone amused. “There wasn’t anybody that could make you laugh the way that Jimmy could,” Lt. Allen said. He recalled Jimmy’s habitual late arrivals at fire company meetings. He would always walk in and slam the door to announce his arrival, Allen said.

“He had an unbelievable presence about him,” Allen said. Some of the bang in his personality might have been gunpowder, left over from his fireworks shows, known throughout the region as literally “good bang for the buck.”

Jimmy made little if any profit off his shows, which included shows at Portland Sea Dogs games and the Yarmouth Clambake, as well as Family Fun Days in Cape.

Skip said he’s not sure he’ll keep that business going, though he and Carol will finish out this summer’s obligations. They set up the show for Family Fun Days, using what Skip said were some fireworks from Jimmy’s “secret stash,” unique shells found only at fireworks conventions. The show was rained out, and Skip joked that the downpour could have been one of Jimmy’s last stunts.

But Jimmy wouldn’t have wanted to deprive the community of a really great show. Skip said he wanted Jimmy to see those shells, which he never used because they were “too good to shoot.”

Patrolman Vaughn Dyer met Jimmy 27 years ago, when Dyer first joined the Cape Police Department. “I wish it was longer,” Dyer said. “He was one of those people that you meet and instantly become friends with.”

“Jimmy is going to be very sadly missed,” said Dyer, who served in the honor guard for Jimmy’s casket. “This town doesn’t realize what it’s lost.”

In response to his service and efforts, the community came together to honor his life, filling pews and extra chairs in St. Bartholomew’s Church, and parading down Ocean House Road from the church to Seaside Cemetery.

Murray was escorted to his grave by an honor guard of six public safety officers, including members of the Cape police and fire departments and the state fire marshal’s office. His memorial service and burial were attended by over 50 uniformed firefighters, rescue squad members and police officers, from as far away as Bangor.

At the request of the family, it was not a formal firefighter’s funeral, with a parade of fire trucks and other honors. “It was informal, just like Jimmy,” Dyer said.