Published in the Current
George Walters of 58 Coach Lantern Lane – charged with three counts of unlawful sexual contact – was arrested Nov. 8 for violating bail conditions after he attended the Scary Hayride at Bayley’s Campground where he was in contact with a 10-year-old girl.
He remains in Cumberland County Jail without bail, awaiting a Nov. 25 hearing on whether he will be required to remain in jail until his trial, scheduled for Dec. 30.
Walters is charged with violation of his bail conditions, but no other crime related to the Scary Hayride incident. The bail conditions stem from three charges, filed in July, of felony unlawful sexual contact between January and April of this year, and prohibit him from being in the presence of any females under 16 years of age.
Court documents allege that on three successive days, Oct. 25, 26 and 27, Walters was in the presence of a male friend of his, who lives in Portland, and that friend’s 10-year-old daughter.
Oct. 25 they were roller-skating together in Portland. Oct. 26 there was a party at the Walters home in Scarborough, at which the girl and her father attended. Following the party, the group again went roller-skating. And on
Oct. 27, Walters and members of his family as well as the man and his daughter went to the Scary Hayride at Bayley’s Campground on Pine Point Road in Scarborough.
Officer Robert Moore, who arrested Walters on the initial charges and the new charge of violating his bail conditions, said the presence of the girl in Walters’s company is cause for allegations of violation of bail conditions.
Moore said he presently has no evidence Walters committed any crime at the hayride.
In July, Walters was charged with three counts of unlawful sexual contact with three separate victims. In court documents filed by Moore supporting the charges, the three alleged victims are named, as are three other
girls who, the documents say, suffered “some degree of sexual molestation” by Walters. The documents also allege Walters “views and collects child
pornography.”
The alleged victims were all known to Walters and the unlawful sexual contact allegedly occurred in the Walters home while the girls were visiting.
Court documents allege Walters repeatedly grabbed, touched and rubbed several of the girls on more than one occasion, despite the girls’ screams and cries for Walters to stop.
The bail conditions under which Walters was allowed to post $5,000 cash bail in July include prohibiting Walters from having contact with one of the
victims named in the charges, as well as two other girls not named in the charges but mentioned in supporting documents. He is also prohibited from having contact with any girl under the age of 16, and from owning or using a computer with Internet access.
Moore learned of the alleged contact at the hayride as well as the alleged prior incidents through his work at the Scarborough Middle School, where he is the school resource officer. A court document indicates the school’s principal is concerned for other girls who may visit the Walters home.
A witness statement in court documents suggests Walters’s attorney had warned him against going roller-skating and passing out Halloween candy to trick-ortreaters.
Walters is a first-class petty officer with 20 years’ service in the Coast Guard, according to Lt. j.g. Jeff Craig of the Coast Guard station in South Portland, where Walters is stationed.
He is qualified as a cook but, Craig said, Walters is currently working on the station’s maintenance staff.
Craig said the Coast Guard is not conducting a separate investigation but is cooperating with the Scarborough investigation.
Moore said the Coast Guard had asked him to arrest Walters outside the base, and Moore did so. “They had him leave the base,” Moore said.
Scarborough Detective Sgt. Rick Rouse said Walters had no prior record of sexual crimes. Walters’s attorney, Peter Rodway, did not return multiple phone calls from the Current.
Thursday, November 21, 2002
Thursday, November 14, 2002
Teaching everyone to drive
Published in the Current
Scarborough’s Bill Kennedy helps physically disabled people learn to drive cars, allowing them to be more independent than they might otherwise be.
Kennedy, who owns and runs Downeast Driving School, uses a wide variety of adaptive equipment to help people drive, even if they can’t use some parts of their bodies.
“I’ve given lots of people driving lessons,” Kennedy said. Some of them are older people who have had a stroke or other medical condition that requires the state to give them another driver’s test.
Others are younger people who have a variety of disabilities that don’t affect their thinking or vision, but may make it more difficult for them to operate a car without additional help and practice.
Kennedy, who also drives a Scarborough school bus, worked for the state Bureau of Motor Vehicles as the supervisor of testing in Southern Maine for 11 years, and gave as many as 500 individual tests each year.
Now he uses that experience in his business, founded 18 months ago. “I do individual lessons to try to get them ready for the road test,” he said.
He said many of the issues he works on with drivers are bad habits, such as cutting left corners too closely. Other times he helps people use specific devices, such as a lever controlling the gas pedal and the brake, to handle the car safely.
“A lot of times what they need is a little boost in confidence,” Kennedy said.
He said some car manufacturers may help pay for equipment required for a disabled person to drive, and cautioned people to be sure their equipment is installed professionally.
Kennedy gives lessons all over the state, and recently drove up to Lewiston to teach a disabled girl to drive there, because her school didn’t have the equipment she needed.
He gets referrals from occupational therapists and also takes his car to a fair showcasing adaptive technology, hosted by Alpha One, a South Portland-based non-profit helping people with independent living.
Sue Grant, an occupational therapist and program director for driver evaluation at Alpha One, said driving is a very important ability for people. “In Maine it makes a huge difference” Grant said.
There is not much public transport, and not much of that is accessible to disabled people. Also, people who live away from bus lines may have a hard time getting to the bus stop.
There are transit arrangements for people who need help getting to and from medical appointments, but those don’t help with groceries or social visits, Grant said.
The Independent Transportation Network serving Greater Portland does offer door-to-door service for a variety of reasons, but only for seniors and people with low vision. That leaves out a lot of people.
Grant sees lots of children with developmental disabilities, but who still have the motor, thinking and visual skills to be able to drive with some adaptive equipment. She also sees people who have driver’s licenses but have recently had a stroke or other medical condition that affects their driving.
Some people in the state, she said, have full-size vans into which they drive their power wheelchairs, and drive the car using a joystick. That can be very expensive. Other modifications, though less expensive, can still be hard to afford.
Medical insurance, Grant said, usually will not cover adaptive driving equipment. “Independent transportation is not a medical necessity,” she said. And while the inability to drive is unlikely to cause injury or death, independence is very important, Grant said.
Lexi Luce, 23, grew up in central Maine where car modifications were not well known, she said. She took driver’s education and driving lessons when she was 16. Because her right side is partially paralyzed, she had an extension put on the gas pedal and drove using both feet, one for the gas and the other for the brake.
When she moved to Portland a little over a year ago, she learned about other modifications that would help her drive using only her left foot and left hand.
She bought a car, had the modifications made, and contacted Kennedy after a recommendation from Grant. After 12 hours or so of driving lessons, Luce got her license in mid-September.
She uses a left-foot gas pedal and a steering knob. “Often people have trouble adapting to a left gas pedal,” Luce said, but because her left side is her dominant side, she had no trouble at all.
Now she drives just about every day, for a wide variety of purposes, and thanks Kennedy for teaching her those skills.
Scarborough’s Bill Kennedy helps physically disabled people learn to drive cars, allowing them to be more independent than they might otherwise be.
Kennedy, who owns and runs Downeast Driving School, uses a wide variety of adaptive equipment to help people drive, even if they can’t use some parts of their bodies.
“I’ve given lots of people driving lessons,” Kennedy said. Some of them are older people who have had a stroke or other medical condition that requires the state to give them another driver’s test.
Others are younger people who have a variety of disabilities that don’t affect their thinking or vision, but may make it more difficult for them to operate a car without additional help and practice.
Kennedy, who also drives a Scarborough school bus, worked for the state Bureau of Motor Vehicles as the supervisor of testing in Southern Maine for 11 years, and gave as many as 500 individual tests each year.
Now he uses that experience in his business, founded 18 months ago. “I do individual lessons to try to get them ready for the road test,” he said.
He said many of the issues he works on with drivers are bad habits, such as cutting left corners too closely. Other times he helps people use specific devices, such as a lever controlling the gas pedal and the brake, to handle the car safely.
“A lot of times what they need is a little boost in confidence,” Kennedy said.
He said some car manufacturers may help pay for equipment required for a disabled person to drive, and cautioned people to be sure their equipment is installed professionally.
Kennedy gives lessons all over the state, and recently drove up to Lewiston to teach a disabled girl to drive there, because her school didn’t have the equipment she needed.
He gets referrals from occupational therapists and also takes his car to a fair showcasing adaptive technology, hosted by Alpha One, a South Portland-based non-profit helping people with independent living.
Sue Grant, an occupational therapist and program director for driver evaluation at Alpha One, said driving is a very important ability for people. “In Maine it makes a huge difference” Grant said.
There is not much public transport, and not much of that is accessible to disabled people. Also, people who live away from bus lines may have a hard time getting to the bus stop.
There are transit arrangements for people who need help getting to and from medical appointments, but those don’t help with groceries or social visits, Grant said.
The Independent Transportation Network serving Greater Portland does offer door-to-door service for a variety of reasons, but only for seniors and people with low vision. That leaves out a lot of people.
Grant sees lots of children with developmental disabilities, but who still have the motor, thinking and visual skills to be able to drive with some adaptive equipment. She also sees people who have driver’s licenses but have recently had a stroke or other medical condition that affects their driving.
Some people in the state, she said, have full-size vans into which they drive their power wheelchairs, and drive the car using a joystick. That can be very expensive. Other modifications, though less expensive, can still be hard to afford.
Medical insurance, Grant said, usually will not cover adaptive driving equipment. “Independent transportation is not a medical necessity,” she said. And while the inability to drive is unlikely to cause injury or death, independence is very important, Grant said.
Lexi Luce, 23, grew up in central Maine where car modifications were not well known, she said. She took driver’s education and driving lessons when she was 16. Because her right side is partially paralyzed, she had an extension put on the gas pedal and drove using both feet, one for the gas and the other for the brake.
When she moved to Portland a little over a year ago, she learned about other modifications that would help her drive using only her left foot and left hand.
She bought a car, had the modifications made, and contacted Kennedy after a recommendation from Grant. After 12 hours or so of driving lessons, Luce got her license in mid-September.
She uses a left-foot gas pedal and a steering knob. “Often people have trouble adapting to a left gas pedal,” Luce said, but because her left side is her dominant side, she had no trouble at all.
Now she drives just about every day, for a wide variety of purposes, and thanks Kennedy for teaching her those skills.
Cape reviews $9 million project
Published in the Current
Cape Elizabeth School Board members will take up discussion of a $9 million school building project at a workshop Nov. 19, to hammer out the details of a recommendation the board will make to the Town Council in January.
The full board got a comprehensive look at the project at its regular business meeting Tuesday.
Though all the town councilors were invited to attend the presentation, only three showed up: Council Chairman Jack Roberts, Finance Committee Chairman Mary Ann Lynch and Councilor Anne Swift-Kayatta. The meeting was broadcast on Cape’s community television station.
The project will allow the high school to accommodate increasing enrollment by reclaiming classrooms and administrative space now used for kindergarten and put the kindergarten back at Pond Cove School, with the rest of the elementary grades.
It will upgrade mechanical and electrical systems at the high school and add sprinklers to the 1960s-era building. It also will reconfigure teaching, instructional and physical education space and bring the high school into compliance with requirements for the disabled, such as reduced-height science lab tables.
“We are using our high school much differently today than we did 30 years ago,” said Marie Prager, who is both chair of the School Board and chair of the building subcommittee. “When the high school was built, we didn’t have special education,” she said, or computer technology.
Architect Bob Howe of HKTA Architects in Portland presented the options for work at the high school and Pond Cove separately, offering two options for each.
The more expensive high school option, at $9.4 million, would be, Howe said, an overhaul of nearly the entire building, including three small additions for the cafeteria, the entrance and physical education storage, as well as a large amount of exterior site work, including increased parking and disabled access to the upper field and track.
The second option, recommended by the building committee and likely to be more seriously considered by the School Board, is now proposed to cost $7.7 million, with the possibility that it could drop to $7.5 million.
Prager described the cheaper option as “what absolutely needs to be done” at the high school. Fewer classrooms would be renovated and the only addition would be for the cafeteria, which would be smaller than in the more expensive plan. Most of the cost savings would come from reduced work around the school, in the parking area and connecting roads and paths.
The expansion to Pond Cove would be an additional wing to offer new space for the kindergarten, which would otherwise not fit in the school for at least the next 10 years, Prager said.
The first option, slated to cost $2.5 million, would put on a two-story wing at the east end of the school, into the area between the new playground and the fire station. The upstairs would have four classrooms and space for group work, teacher work and occupational therapy services. The lower level would be built into the hill a bit and would provide two multipurpose spaces, as well as a basement-like storage area, Howe said.
The second and cheaper option, at $1.5 million, and more likely to be considered seriously, would provide a one-story addition, with five classrooms, group and teacher workspace and occupational therapy room. The addition would be ready for a second story to be
added in the future, Howe said.
Pond Cove Principal Tom Eismeier summed up the proposal by saying, “We simply don’t have enough room to bring the kindergarten back. The high school needs the space. I think we have to do it.”
The School Board will decide next month what to do and make a formal proposal to the Town Council in early January. Some or all of it could be placed on the town ballot for a May referendum. Lynch, who also serves on the building committee, has said in the past that the Pond Cove part of the project may not need to go to the voters.
Town Manager Michael McGovern told the board the town’s overall debt load was low as compared to the value of the buildings it owns.
The town has about 85 percent equity in its school buildings, and expects to pay off all of its school bonds by 2015, McGovern said. Because the schools will retire $1.7 million in debt next year, the $1.5 million Pond Cove project could be done “with no negative impact on the tax rate,” McGovern said.
Bonding out the $7.7 million high school project and the Pond Cove work over the course of the next several years, McGovern said, would put peak pressure on the town’s tax rate in 2006, when roughly $2.25 of tax per $1,000 of assessed value would be needed to provide debt service on school bonds. After 2006, the debt load would drop off “rapidly,” McGovern said, with the final payments in 2024 costing less than 50 cents of the tax rate.
The School Board will discuss the proposals at a workshop session at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 19, at the high school library. Public attendance and input is welcome. The board will then decide on recommendations at a meeting scheduled for 7:30 p.m., Dec. 10, in the Town Council Chambers.
Cape Elizabeth School Board members will take up discussion of a $9 million school building project at a workshop Nov. 19, to hammer out the details of a recommendation the board will make to the Town Council in January.
The full board got a comprehensive look at the project at its regular business meeting Tuesday.
Though all the town councilors were invited to attend the presentation, only three showed up: Council Chairman Jack Roberts, Finance Committee Chairman Mary Ann Lynch and Councilor Anne Swift-Kayatta. The meeting was broadcast on Cape’s community television station.
The project will allow the high school to accommodate increasing enrollment by reclaiming classrooms and administrative space now used for kindergarten and put the kindergarten back at Pond Cove School, with the rest of the elementary grades.
It will upgrade mechanical and electrical systems at the high school and add sprinklers to the 1960s-era building. It also will reconfigure teaching, instructional and physical education space and bring the high school into compliance with requirements for the disabled, such as reduced-height science lab tables.
“We are using our high school much differently today than we did 30 years ago,” said Marie Prager, who is both chair of the School Board and chair of the building subcommittee. “When the high school was built, we didn’t have special education,” she said, or computer technology.
Architect Bob Howe of HKTA Architects in Portland presented the options for work at the high school and Pond Cove separately, offering two options for each.
The more expensive high school option, at $9.4 million, would be, Howe said, an overhaul of nearly the entire building, including three small additions for the cafeteria, the entrance and physical education storage, as well as a large amount of exterior site work, including increased parking and disabled access to the upper field and track.
The second option, recommended by the building committee and likely to be more seriously considered by the School Board, is now proposed to cost $7.7 million, with the possibility that it could drop to $7.5 million.
Prager described the cheaper option as “what absolutely needs to be done” at the high school. Fewer classrooms would be renovated and the only addition would be for the cafeteria, which would be smaller than in the more expensive plan. Most of the cost savings would come from reduced work around the school, in the parking area and connecting roads and paths.
The expansion to Pond Cove would be an additional wing to offer new space for the kindergarten, which would otherwise not fit in the school for at least the next 10 years, Prager said.
The first option, slated to cost $2.5 million, would put on a two-story wing at the east end of the school, into the area between the new playground and the fire station. The upstairs would have four classrooms and space for group work, teacher work and occupational therapy services. The lower level would be built into the hill a bit and would provide two multipurpose spaces, as well as a basement-like storage area, Howe said.
The second and cheaper option, at $1.5 million, and more likely to be considered seriously, would provide a one-story addition, with five classrooms, group and teacher workspace and occupational therapy room. The addition would be ready for a second story to be
added in the future, Howe said.
Pond Cove Principal Tom Eismeier summed up the proposal by saying, “We simply don’t have enough room to bring the kindergarten back. The high school needs the space. I think we have to do it.”
The School Board will decide next month what to do and make a formal proposal to the Town Council in early January. Some or all of it could be placed on the town ballot for a May referendum. Lynch, who also serves on the building committee, has said in the past that the Pond Cove part of the project may not need to go to the voters.
Town Manager Michael McGovern told the board the town’s overall debt load was low as compared to the value of the buildings it owns.
The town has about 85 percent equity in its school buildings, and expects to pay off all of its school bonds by 2015, McGovern said. Because the schools will retire $1.7 million in debt next year, the $1.5 million Pond Cove project could be done “with no negative impact on the tax rate,” McGovern said.
Bonding out the $7.7 million high school project and the Pond Cove work over the course of the next several years, McGovern said, would put peak pressure on the town’s tax rate in 2006, when roughly $2.25 of tax per $1,000 of assessed value would be needed to provide debt service on school bonds. After 2006, the debt load would drop off “rapidly,” McGovern said, with the final payments in 2024 costing less than 50 cents of the tax rate.
The School Board will discuss the proposals at a workshop session at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 19, at the high school library. Public attendance and input is welcome. The board will then decide on recommendations at a meeting scheduled for 7:30 p.m., Dec. 10, in the Town Council Chambers.
On Active Duty: Capt. John Ginn
Published in the Current
John Ginn, the son of Cape resident Gregg Ginn and stepson of Town Councilor Mary Ann Lynch, is an attack-helicopter pilot in the U.S. Marine Corps. Capt. Ginn attended high school in Massachusetts and went to Colby College in Waterville, graduating in 1997.
“The idea of military service was always something that interested me,” said Ginn, whose father is a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo. He chose a civilian college rather than a military academy or enlisting right out of high school because he wanted to continue to participate actively in football, basketball and lacrosse.
Stationed at New River, N.C., just adjacent to the large Marine base at Camp Lejeune, Ginn completed his flight training a year ago, after four years in the Marines, attending officer school, a rigorous six-month basic training course, infantry officer school, and primary and advanced flight school. He flies AH-1W SuperCobra, an attack helicopter that can carry a wide range of weapons, including missiles and rockets.
This summer, Ginn was qualified as an attack-helicopter commander, meaning he is now responsible for an entire helicopter, its crew and any weapons it may carry.
The military flight training is rigorous, he said, but rewarding. His advanced training means he has had to spend a long period of time in the service and still “owes” five additional years of service before he has the option to leave or renew his commission.
Flying Cobras, he said, is a good challenge and provides a good opportunity for camaraderie. “The Cobra community has always been a very competitive community and that was always a big draw for me,” he said.
Ginn said his infantry training has been a benefit because it allows him to know first-hand what soldiers on the ground expect from the helicopters he now flies.
“Everything in the Marine Corps is supporting the grunt on the ground,” Ginn said.
Many of the people he went through initial infantry training with are already leaving the military for civilian work, he said, while he is just getting started in a real duty station and is in early preparations for his first overseas deployment.
His wife, Jenn, has family in North Carolina, which played a big role in his choice of duty station. “There is one thing you can count on: You are going to be gone a long time,” Ginn said. He wanted to be sure his wife would have a good support structure nearby when he is away for six-month missions or shorter training missions.
Before they got married, he and Jenn had a lot of open discussions about the reality of his responsibilities, and continue to trust in their faith that things will work out well in the end.
He knows veterans are worried about the prospect of future wars, but trusts the government’s experience to handle the present Iraq and Afghanistan problems well.
A number of his fellow pilots are looking to use their flight training as a stepping-stone to commercial aviation, either for helicopter companies or major airlines. Ginn said that’s not what he’s interested in. “I wouldn’t want to trade places with anybody,” he said.
But he is not yet sure if the Marines will become a career or whether he will leverage his leadership skills into a civilian job. He has his own goals for the next few years of his service, in addition to the Marines’ goals for him. He wants to keep his options open and has considered, among other possibilities, the Secret Service.
John Ginn, the son of Cape resident Gregg Ginn and stepson of Town Councilor Mary Ann Lynch, is an attack-helicopter pilot in the U.S. Marine Corps. Capt. Ginn attended high school in Massachusetts and went to Colby College in Waterville, graduating in 1997.
“The idea of military service was always something that interested me,” said Ginn, whose father is a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo. He chose a civilian college rather than a military academy or enlisting right out of high school because he wanted to continue to participate actively in football, basketball and lacrosse.
Stationed at New River, N.C., just adjacent to the large Marine base at Camp Lejeune, Ginn completed his flight training a year ago, after four years in the Marines, attending officer school, a rigorous six-month basic training course, infantry officer school, and primary and advanced flight school. He flies AH-1W SuperCobra, an attack helicopter that can carry a wide range of weapons, including missiles and rockets.
This summer, Ginn was qualified as an attack-helicopter commander, meaning he is now responsible for an entire helicopter, its crew and any weapons it may carry.
The military flight training is rigorous, he said, but rewarding. His advanced training means he has had to spend a long period of time in the service and still “owes” five additional years of service before he has the option to leave or renew his commission.
Flying Cobras, he said, is a good challenge and provides a good opportunity for camaraderie. “The Cobra community has always been a very competitive community and that was always a big draw for me,” he said.
Ginn said his infantry training has been a benefit because it allows him to know first-hand what soldiers on the ground expect from the helicopters he now flies.
“Everything in the Marine Corps is supporting the grunt on the ground,” Ginn said.
Many of the people he went through initial infantry training with are already leaving the military for civilian work, he said, while he is just getting started in a real duty station and is in early preparations for his first overseas deployment.
His wife, Jenn, has family in North Carolina, which played a big role in his choice of duty station. “There is one thing you can count on: You are going to be gone a long time,” Ginn said. He wanted to be sure his wife would have a good support structure nearby when he is away for six-month missions or shorter training missions.
Before they got married, he and Jenn had a lot of open discussions about the reality of his responsibilities, and continue to trust in their faith that things will work out well in the end.
He knows veterans are worried about the prospect of future wars, but trusts the government’s experience to handle the present Iraq and Afghanistan problems well.
A number of his fellow pilots are looking to use their flight training as a stepping-stone to commercial aviation, either for helicopter companies or major airlines. Ginn said that’s not what he’s interested in. “I wouldn’t want to trade places with anybody,” he said.
But he is not yet sure if the Marines will become a career or whether he will leverage his leadership skills into a civilian job. He has his own goals for the next few years of his service, in addition to the Marines’ goals for him. He wants to keep his options open and has considered, among other possibilities, the Secret Service.
Thursday, November 7, 2002
Tomassoni joins statewide emergency team
Published in the Current
Dr. Anthony Tomassoni of Cape Elizabeth, the only medical toxicologist in the state, has been chosen to help prepare Maine for public health emergencies.
While his official title is “medical director, office of public health emergency preparedness,” what he really does, he said, is team-building.
Tomassoni is a humble man who avoids talking about what he will do without also mentioning many of the other players involved, and he encourages input from a wide range of people.
His experience is mixed, including teaching school, going to graduate school in chemistry and doing medical work in emergency medicine, toxicology and urban search-and-rescue.
“I still view myself as a teacher more than anything else,” Tomassoni said.
His experience learning varied material and working with diverse groups of people, he said, should serve him well in his new job, which he is doing alongside his previous job as director of the Northern New England Poison Control Center. Tomassoni, who was named to his new post last month, reports to the head of the state’s Department of Health.
In his work with emergency medicine and poison control, he does a lot of outreach, educating the public about ways to stay safe and how to handle chemicals carefully.
He was part of a so-called “planned deployment” of emergency personnel at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, as well as responses to the Worcester, Mass., fire in December 1999 and the World Trade Towers after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
With a new national focus on safety and emergency response, Tomassoni said Maine is well prepared for emergencies, even with a small population and not much money. “We’re a small state. People know people, and we tend to haul together as a team,” he said.
That kind of collaboration can make an emergency response very effective, he said.
One of his major priorities is to smooth the process of communications between agencies around the state. As people get more used to communicating about everyday events and developments in public health, he said, they will both use and create a system that is useful in emergencies as well.
Hospitals, he said, are already talking more to each other and to public safety agencies than before Sept. 11, leading him to think communications will be easily improved, and to great effect.
As a doctor, Tomassoni is concerned with public health infrastructure. Unlike the past, today’s immunization programs are not carried out at every school across the nation all at once. Hospitals no longer have spare beds, waiting for patients. Both are expensive, Tomassoni said, but national organization and spare capacity are both important for planning how to handle disasters.
“There’s not a lot of slack in the system that you can begin taking up in the event of an emergency,” he said.
He will work with health and government officials around the state to design a system that has extra capacity without a lot of idle resources. In colonial days, when communities needed extra space for an extraordinary situation, they looked to schools and churches. Tomassoni said that may need to happen again, if an emergency occurs. He wants to set up those options ahead of time, to help everyone be better prepared.
“There is no such thing as a perfect response. They’re always improvised,” Tomassoni said. That’s because nobody knows what the next disaster will be, or where or when it will occur. “There is no way to be 100 percent prepared” for every possibility, he said. Instead, he will be working to create a strong system that can respond to any type of disaster.
Part of it will involve expanding a monitoring system at the poison center, where Tomassoni has worked since 1995, to automate reporting and monitoring of illness reports beyond specific poisons. Creating a public health alert network will help officials better understand the scope and pace of development of any disasters that may occur.
He said his work has just begun, and the challenges are many. But he expects to help reach desired goals for the emergency preparedness system, and work with many different initiatives at once to make them happen.
“It just seemed like the right thing to do at the right time,” he said.
Dr. Anthony Tomassoni of Cape Elizabeth, the only medical toxicologist in the state, has been chosen to help prepare Maine for public health emergencies.
While his official title is “medical director, office of public health emergency preparedness,” what he really does, he said, is team-building.
Tomassoni is a humble man who avoids talking about what he will do without also mentioning many of the other players involved, and he encourages input from a wide range of people.
His experience is mixed, including teaching school, going to graduate school in chemistry and doing medical work in emergency medicine, toxicology and urban search-and-rescue.
“I still view myself as a teacher more than anything else,” Tomassoni said.
His experience learning varied material and working with diverse groups of people, he said, should serve him well in his new job, which he is doing alongside his previous job as director of the Northern New England Poison Control Center. Tomassoni, who was named to his new post last month, reports to the head of the state’s Department of Health.
In his work with emergency medicine and poison control, he does a lot of outreach, educating the public about ways to stay safe and how to handle chemicals carefully.
He was part of a so-called “planned deployment” of emergency personnel at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, as well as responses to the Worcester, Mass., fire in December 1999 and the World Trade Towers after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
With a new national focus on safety and emergency response, Tomassoni said Maine is well prepared for emergencies, even with a small population and not much money. “We’re a small state. People know people, and we tend to haul together as a team,” he said.
That kind of collaboration can make an emergency response very effective, he said.
One of his major priorities is to smooth the process of communications between agencies around the state. As people get more used to communicating about everyday events and developments in public health, he said, they will both use and create a system that is useful in emergencies as well.
Hospitals, he said, are already talking more to each other and to public safety agencies than before Sept. 11, leading him to think communications will be easily improved, and to great effect.
As a doctor, Tomassoni is concerned with public health infrastructure. Unlike the past, today’s immunization programs are not carried out at every school across the nation all at once. Hospitals no longer have spare beds, waiting for patients. Both are expensive, Tomassoni said, but national organization and spare capacity are both important for planning how to handle disasters.
“There’s not a lot of slack in the system that you can begin taking up in the event of an emergency,” he said.
He will work with health and government officials around the state to design a system that has extra capacity without a lot of idle resources. In colonial days, when communities needed extra space for an extraordinary situation, they looked to schools and churches. Tomassoni said that may need to happen again, if an emergency occurs. He wants to set up those options ahead of time, to help everyone be better prepared.
“There is no such thing as a perfect response. They’re always improvised,” Tomassoni said. That’s because nobody knows what the next disaster will be, or where or when it will occur. “There is no way to be 100 percent prepared” for every possibility, he said. Instead, he will be working to create a strong system that can respond to any type of disaster.
Part of it will involve expanding a monitoring system at the poison center, where Tomassoni has worked since 1995, to automate reporting and monitoring of illness reports beyond specific poisons. Creating a public health alert network will help officials better understand the scope and pace of development of any disasters that may occur.
He said his work has just begun, and the challenges are many. But he expects to help reach desired goals for the emergency preparedness system, and work with many different initiatives at once to make them happen.
“It just seemed like the right thing to do at the right time,” he said.
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