Published in the Current and the American Journal
With its principal owner in bankruptcy, the company that owned Chancellor Gardens on Scott Dyer Road has sold the Cape Elizabeth assisted living home, as well as a sister facility in Saco, to Commonwealth Communities of Massachusetts. The home has been renamed Village Crossings of Cape Elizabeth.
Abraham Gosman, who lives in Florida, was the majority owner of the company that owned Chancellor Gardens and Chancellor Place.
He was also a founder of Carematrix, the company that managed the Chancellor properties. Carematrix will not continue its management functions, according to Beth Derrico, a spokeswoman for the company.
Gosman, who made millions in real estate and healthcare, filed for bankruptcy in 2001, according to William King of Development Specialists Inc., the Miami-based firm that was appointed by the court as trustee for Gosman’s assets.
His filing was cited as an example of a problem some legislators see with the federal bankruptcy system – the unlimited homestead exemption. Sen. Herb Kohl, D-Wisc., told the U.S. Senate in March 2001 that Gosman, while owing as much as $233 million, was keeping a 64,000-square-foot mansion in West Palm Beach, Fla.
In his Maine business dealings, Gosman had guaranteed a mortgage taken out by the Chancellor company, with the two homes as collateral. “The value (of the properties) was significantly less than the mortgage,” King said.
Rather than foreclosing on the homes, the lender agreed to cooperate in the sale of the properties and take the proceeds as partial payment of the debt, King said.
The change of ownership took effect March 1, bringing Chancellor Gardens and Chancellor Place in Saco into a company that already operates 12 nursing homes and rehabilitation facilities, six assisted living homes and four specialized hospitals in Massachusetts.
“This is our first step into Maine,” said David Calendrella, vice president of operations for Commonwealth Communities.
Last year Commonwealth bought two Massachusetts nursing homes from the same owners.
“They proved to be quality facilities,” Calendrella said. That experience led to this recent deal.
“We’re very bullish on the Maine marketplace,” he said.
The company does not have significant plans to change things at Chancellor Gardens. “At the moment, the plan is to introduce ourselves as the new owners,” Calendrella said. No staff changes are in the works, he said. Everyone has signed on with the new owners.
Calendrella plans to pay close attention to hiring practices and employee supervision, in the wake of an employee’s February arrest on charges of stealing medication from several patients. He said the company would be open about any problems that might arise.
It is the second turnover of a senior living facility on Scott Dyer Road in three months. In January Haven Healthcare of Cromwell, Conn., took over the management of the Viking Nursing Home and Crescent House, with plans to take ownership in the next several months.
Wednesday, March 26, 2003
Thursday, March 20, 2003
Bliss wants to lower voting age to 17
Published in the Current
Rep. Larry Bliss, D-Cape Elizabeth and South Portland, is the lead co-sponsor of a bill that would lower Maine’s voting age to 17. He and bill sponsor Rep. Glenn Cummings, D-Portland, have been touring the area talking to high school students about it.
The reaction has been mixed, Bliss said. The 18-year-olds in the classes aren’t impressed by the idea, while the 17-year-olds really like it. Bliss said he and
Cummings, both former high school history and government teachers, want to make government more accessible to young people.
“If you’re 17 years old when you’re learning about how the government works, you ought to be able to have a say in it,” Bliss said. Further, many 17-year-olds in Maine are paying income tax and have no voice in how that money is spent.
Rep. Larry Bliss, D-Cape Elizabeth and South Portland, is the lead co-sponsor of a bill that would lower Maine’s voting age to 17. He and bill sponsor Rep. Glenn Cummings, D-Portland, have been touring the area talking to high school students about it.
The reaction has been mixed, Bliss said. The 18-year-olds in the classes aren’t impressed by the idea, while the 17-year-olds really like it. Bliss said he and
Cummings, both former high school history and government teachers, want to make government more accessible to young people.
“If you’re 17 years old when you’re learning about how the government works, you ought to be able to have a say in it,” Bliss said. Further, many 17-year-olds in Maine are paying income tax and have no voice in how that money is spent.
Lady ghost roams Crescent Beach
Published in the Current
Cape Elizabeth’s resident ghost, the “Lady in White” of Crescent Beach, made a cameo appearance in a lecture at the Cape Elizabeth Historic Preservation Society’s meeting earlier this month.
Bill Thomson of Kennebunk, a retired history professor from Salem Teachers College in Massachusetts, spoke on ghosts and coastal hauntings in New England. He first addressed what a ghost is, explaining that “98 percent of all ghost stories can be explained” by something rational, rather than supernatural.
He told of a Maine landlord who had a hard time keeping tenants in an apartment; all of them complained of an eerie singing sound coming from one particular wall. The tenants blamed a ghost. Eventually the landlord got tired of the problem and took a shotgun to the wall, Thomson said. He discovered an old saw hanging inside the wall, and rubbing against a partly exposed nail in such a way to make a singing or screeching noise.
It is the other 2 percent of ghost stories that interest Thomson, particularly
vivid smells, unexplained noises and voices, moving furniture, appliances going on and off for no reason and apparitions.
He has a theory about visions people have of ghosts: Living people emit energy in “waves,” which intensify at times of great stress. Many ghosts are of people who have died violently, and therefore would have put out a lot of these energy waves just before they died.
Thomson theorizes that those waves remain in the room or building where the person died, “bouncing around.” When other people come into that room and, by virtue of their own psychological situations, become attuned to the frequency of those waves, they see the vision.
He admits it sounds outlandish, but said he didn’t believe in ghosts for a long time, until he began studying them and experiencing ghostly phenomena.
When he was filming a special on hauntings for a TV network, Thomson was in the Kennebunkport Inn, which supposedly is haunted by “Cyrus the Ghost.” When filming a segment, a red ball appeared on a television monitor and bounced all over the screen.
“I never believed in the stuff before I saw it,” Thomson said.
Cape residents have seen their share, too.
Crescent Beach is home to such a haunting. Lydia Clark, a 24-year-old daughter of a Portland businessman, had been sent to Boston to buy a wedding dress. She was returning with her new dress on the schooner Charles on July 12, 1807, when it was caught by
a storm just south of Portland Head, and wrecked on Little Island Ledge.
Clark drowned and washed up on Crescent Beach. Beside her in the morning was her trunk, containing the new wedding gown. Since then, people have seen a figure in white, with an anxious expression on her face, pacing the beach.
There may be houses in town that are haunted, too. Beckett’s Castle on Singles Road may be haunted by Sylvester Beckett, who built the home and died in 1882. While many hotels and bed-and-breakfasts advertise their ghosts to attract spirit-loving guests, most homeowners keep mum about their ghosts, fearful that potential buyers might lose interest or scuttle the deal.
And though there are 11 haunted lighthouses in Maine, none of those are very close by. “Portland Head Light is not haunted,” Thomson said, later confirming that the others are without ghosts, too.
Cape Elizabeth’s resident ghost, the “Lady in White” of Crescent Beach, made a cameo appearance in a lecture at the Cape Elizabeth Historic Preservation Society’s meeting earlier this month.
Bill Thomson of Kennebunk, a retired history professor from Salem Teachers College in Massachusetts, spoke on ghosts and coastal hauntings in New England. He first addressed what a ghost is, explaining that “98 percent of all ghost stories can be explained” by something rational, rather than supernatural.
He told of a Maine landlord who had a hard time keeping tenants in an apartment; all of them complained of an eerie singing sound coming from one particular wall. The tenants blamed a ghost. Eventually the landlord got tired of the problem and took a shotgun to the wall, Thomson said. He discovered an old saw hanging inside the wall, and rubbing against a partly exposed nail in such a way to make a singing or screeching noise.
It is the other 2 percent of ghost stories that interest Thomson, particularly
vivid smells, unexplained noises and voices, moving furniture, appliances going on and off for no reason and apparitions.
He has a theory about visions people have of ghosts: Living people emit energy in “waves,” which intensify at times of great stress. Many ghosts are of people who have died violently, and therefore would have put out a lot of these energy waves just before they died.
Thomson theorizes that those waves remain in the room or building where the person died, “bouncing around.” When other people come into that room and, by virtue of their own psychological situations, become attuned to the frequency of those waves, they see the vision.
He admits it sounds outlandish, but said he didn’t believe in ghosts for a long time, until he began studying them and experiencing ghostly phenomena.
When he was filming a special on hauntings for a TV network, Thomson was in the Kennebunkport Inn, which supposedly is haunted by “Cyrus the Ghost.” When filming a segment, a red ball appeared on a television monitor and bounced all over the screen.
“I never believed in the stuff before I saw it,” Thomson said.
Cape residents have seen their share, too.
Crescent Beach is home to such a haunting. Lydia Clark, a 24-year-old daughter of a Portland businessman, had been sent to Boston to buy a wedding dress. She was returning with her new dress on the schooner Charles on July 12, 1807, when it was caught by
a storm just south of Portland Head, and wrecked on Little Island Ledge.
Clark drowned and washed up on Crescent Beach. Beside her in the morning was her trunk, containing the new wedding gown. Since then, people have seen a figure in white, with an anxious expression on her face, pacing the beach.
There may be houses in town that are haunted, too. Beckett’s Castle on Singles Road may be haunted by Sylvester Beckett, who built the home and died in 1882. While many hotels and bed-and-breakfasts advertise their ghosts to attract spirit-loving guests, most homeowners keep mum about their ghosts, fearful that potential buyers might lose interest or scuttle the deal.
And though there are 11 haunted lighthouses in Maine, none of those are very close by. “Portland Head Light is not haunted,” Thomson said, later confirming that the others are without ghosts, too.
Cape kids sending troops cookies
Published in the Current
They didn’t do it for the fame, and they don’t support war, but two Cape kids are sending Girl Scout cookies to U.S. troops in the Middle East.
After watching the evening television news last week, 11-year-old
twins Jonathan and Lexi Bass were moved to do something to support the troops they had seen interviewed in the Kuwaiti desert.
The soldiers didn’t have much to do, and were feeling both proud and worried about the prospect of serving their country in wartime. Lexi, a Girl Scout, had loads of boxes of Girl Scout cookies in the back hallway ready for delivery, and the pair decided to buy some more for the troops.
Jonathan and Lexi wrote a letter to the people who live in their neighborhood off Mitchell Road, explaining what they had seen on the news and what they wanted to do. They asked for donations, saying the soldiers “were very serious and very nervous” about war, and were in the desert without their families.
It was Tuesday night. By Saturday, neighbors had donated enough money to buy over 100 boxes of Girl Scout cookies. Some neighbors sent notes with their donations, including one from a woman who said she didn’t support the war, but her husband had served in Vietnam, and she wanted to be sure to support the troops.
Jonathan and Lexi spent Sunday packing the cookies up and getting set to send them off, with notes saying “Thinking of you from Cape Elizabeth, Maine.”
Because of increased security, sending unmarked boxes to “any soldier” in the Persian Gulf region is complicated, so the kids are making arrangements to send them through the USO.
They didn’t do it for the fame, and they don’t support war, but two Cape kids are sending Girl Scout cookies to U.S. troops in the Middle East.
After watching the evening television news last week, 11-year-old
twins Jonathan and Lexi Bass were moved to do something to support the troops they had seen interviewed in the Kuwaiti desert.
The soldiers didn’t have much to do, and were feeling both proud and worried about the prospect of serving their country in wartime. Lexi, a Girl Scout, had loads of boxes of Girl Scout cookies in the back hallway ready for delivery, and the pair decided to buy some more for the troops.
Jonathan and Lexi wrote a letter to the people who live in their neighborhood off Mitchell Road, explaining what they had seen on the news and what they wanted to do. They asked for donations, saying the soldiers “were very serious and very nervous” about war, and were in the desert without their families.
It was Tuesday night. By Saturday, neighbors had donated enough money to buy over 100 boxes of Girl Scout cookies. Some neighbors sent notes with their donations, including one from a woman who said she didn’t support the war, but her husband had served in Vietnam, and she wanted to be sure to support the troops.
Jonathan and Lexi spent Sunday packing the cookies up and getting set to send them off, with notes saying “Thinking of you from Cape Elizabeth, Maine.”
Because of increased security, sending unmarked boxes to “any soldier” in the Persian Gulf region is complicated, so the kids are making arrangements to send them through the USO.
Cape musicians must choose between prom and performance
Published in the Current
Seven Cape Elizabeth High School students, four of them seniors, may have to give up their high school prom in mid-May in order to participate in the All-State Music Festival at the USM campus in Gorham.
No students will be able to commute to the three-day festival, which runs from May 15 through May 17, according to Joan Hamann, president of the Maine Music Educators Association, which hosts the event.
“We have about 450 students that we are responsible for,” she said.
Students will stay in USM dorm rooms and attend lots of rehearsals and special programs. “The activities will go quite late,” until 9:30 or 10 p.m., Hamann said. Students also will have to observe a curfew.
CEHS principal Jeff Shedd had asked the organization to consider allowing Cape students to stay until the end of evening rehearsals on Friday, May 16, and then leave to attend the prom.
“They would arrive late for the prom, but at least they’d have an opportunity” to attend part of it, Shedd said. It would likely finish too late for students to drive back to Gorham, so Shedd proposed allowing them to stay at their homes and arrive back at the festival early Saturday morning.
He questioned an interpretation of the rules of the festival. Organizers said students had to stay overnight, while Shedd read them differently.
Hamann said students who knew they were going to the prom would not be focused on their music. “It’s hard to believe that that student isn’t going to be watching their watch” all afternoon, she said.
She also wants to be sure students get proper rest. “It’s so strenuous,” she said, “we’ve had students that have passed out” from exertion.
And she wants to be fair about the event. “It’s expecting (students) to make choices,” she said. “It’s trying to provide a good experience with the kids.”
She also said the national association of music educators has issued guidelines for statewide music festivals, which include a recommendation that all participants stay overnight. “Nationally there have been events” that led to the policy suggestion, she said.
No other districts have asked for exemptions, Hamann said. “We’re certainly trying to work with the school system,” she said. She noted that attendance is not mandatory. Students were selected by audition to participate, and there are more students who would want to take any open slots.
CEHS Music Director Tom Lizotte said the decision was “disappointing,” but he was glad that the association had given Shedd’s request “very, very serious consideration.”
Part of the problem is that a scarcity of prom locations means the date for next year’s prom was chosen three months ago, Shedd said. Next year’s music festival won’t be scheduled until this year’s festival actually takes place.
“I hope there will not be a conflict,” he said.
Seven Cape Elizabeth High School students, four of them seniors, may have to give up their high school prom in mid-May in order to participate in the All-State Music Festival at the USM campus in Gorham.
No students will be able to commute to the three-day festival, which runs from May 15 through May 17, according to Joan Hamann, president of the Maine Music Educators Association, which hosts the event.
“We have about 450 students that we are responsible for,” she said.
Students will stay in USM dorm rooms and attend lots of rehearsals and special programs. “The activities will go quite late,” until 9:30 or 10 p.m., Hamann said. Students also will have to observe a curfew.
CEHS principal Jeff Shedd had asked the organization to consider allowing Cape students to stay until the end of evening rehearsals on Friday, May 16, and then leave to attend the prom.
“They would arrive late for the prom, but at least they’d have an opportunity” to attend part of it, Shedd said. It would likely finish too late for students to drive back to Gorham, so Shedd proposed allowing them to stay at their homes and arrive back at the festival early Saturday morning.
He questioned an interpretation of the rules of the festival. Organizers said students had to stay overnight, while Shedd read them differently.
Hamann said students who knew they were going to the prom would not be focused on their music. “It’s hard to believe that that student isn’t going to be watching their watch” all afternoon, she said.
She also wants to be sure students get proper rest. “It’s so strenuous,” she said, “we’ve had students that have passed out” from exertion.
And she wants to be fair about the event. “It’s expecting (students) to make choices,” she said. “It’s trying to provide a good experience with the kids.”
She also said the national association of music educators has issued guidelines for statewide music festivals, which include a recommendation that all participants stay overnight. “Nationally there have been events” that led to the policy suggestion, she said.
No other districts have asked for exemptions, Hamann said. “We’re certainly trying to work with the school system,” she said. She noted that attendance is not mandatory. Students were selected by audition to participate, and there are more students who would want to take any open slots.
CEHS Music Director Tom Lizotte said the decision was “disappointing,” but he was glad that the association had given Shedd’s request “very, very serious consideration.”
Part of the problem is that a scarcity of prom locations means the date for next year’s prom was chosen three months ago, Shedd said. Next year’s music festival won’t be scheduled until this year’s festival actually takes place.
“I hope there will not be a conflict,” he said.
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