PORTLAND — The economic stimulus has trickled down to Clifton Street, where Storey Brothers Trucking of Cumberland is upgrading the city's sewer system under a $2 million contract that employs 18 workers – many of whom had been laid off last winter.

Across town on Ray Street, R.J. Grondin and Sons of Gorham has brought back a handful of laid-off workers for a $401,032 job replacing a water main for the Portland Water District.

And at City Hall, the public health division plans to hire 10 to 14 people over the next two years for a new community health center under a $1.3 million grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Three months after President Obama signed it into law, the $787 billion economic stimulus is beginning to have an impact in cities and towns around Maine.

The state is expected to receive about $1 billion in stimulus funding. As Maine's largest city and a major center for public services, Portland will receive a significant piece of that money. The exact total is not available, because some of the funds are going to institutions that are not city agencies, although their activities indirectly affect the city.

From street repairs to pollution controls for public works trucks, the diversity of stimulus projects illustrates the scope of the federal government's effort to bolster the sagging economy.

In a few cases, the money creates immediate jobs. The workers on Ray and Clifton streets, for example, have already begun collecting paychecks drawn from stimulus funding.

For other projects, the benefits are more remote. A $13.5 million grant to improve the baggage security system at Portland International Jetport will be incorporated into a $70 million terminal expansion that won't begin for at least a year.

The baggage security upgrade will yield benefits that are perhaps best measured not in jobs but in a more efficient and functional terminal.

Still, city officials say, there's no denying the value of the infusion of federal cash.

"Keeping people employed is by far the most important result," said City Manager Joe Gray. "But it's also helping take some pressure off our budget and meet some needs that would be very, very difficult to fund given all the other demands that are on us."

'GREEN' GOALS

Administrators have frozen wages, shut off streetlights and cut other spending to build the $189 million municipal budget that comes before the City Council for approval Monday.

The $91.3 million school budget Portland voters approved at referendum Tuesday avoided a tax increase only because of a $3.6 million boost from stimulus funds.

Municipal and school officials say they expect things will be even worse next year, with projected declines in state education subsidies and revenue from taxes and fees.

So there's at least a small measure of comfort in the backhoes and jackhammers that are ripping up asphalt in a few Portland neighborhoods.

The sewer job on Clifton Street will eliminate a combined sewer overflow pipe that funnels untreated waste into the city's scenic Back Cove, a habitat for birds and other wildlife, during heavy rains. Money for the project was to have come from a $60 million bond issue approved last year.

Having the stimulus money allows Portland to use some of the bonded funds for other sewer work and moves the city closer to compliance with Clean Water Act regulations.

"The desire is to get this done quickly, so it doesn't affect the migratory bird season," said Nicole Clegg, city spokeswoman. "The project puts people to work quickly, and it combines that with the environmental goals set by the president."

The stimulus is also funding $1 million worth of paving projects on Westbrook Street and Cumberland and Forest avenues – major traffic arteries on and off the Portland peninsula.

Federal dollars
pay for 80 percent of the work, which will begin after the city reviews recent bids from contractors.

Another grant – $684,700 in stimulus funds from the Department of Energy – will help the city reduce its energy consumption. Some of the money will be used to replace old streetlights with more efficient fixtures, while other expenditures await the results of an audit of city properties.

Portland police are evaluating how to spend about $700,000 in stimulus funding from Department of Justice grants. The money can be used for technology, equipment and specialized enforcement.

James Craig, the city's new police chief, said last week he wants to use some of the money to buy 10 Tasers, a weapon that stuns suspects with electrical charges. Craig wants to evaluate the weaspons, which Portland police have never used.

In the city's Health and Human Services Department, officials are drawing up plans for a new community health center using $1.3 million in stimulus money. The department also received $876,000 in stimulus money allocated to address homelessness.

Doug Gardner, director of health and human services, said the health center has begun advertising to fill nine or 10 new jobs, including a physician, nurses, office manager and medical assistant.

It is hoped that the center will open its doors by July 1, with an emphasis on primary care and preventive medicine. Under federal law, anyone can seek care at the center, although it will focus on serving people with little or no insurance.

"The premise is really around access, to make sure everyone has a home to go to for medical care," he said.

Gardner said the stimulus funding for homeless prevention will pay the salaries of four counselors who would have been laid off under the city's 2010 budget. In addition, Portland and the Preble Street Resource Center, the city's largest private provider of services for homeless people, will work together to fund six new positions for outreach workers, he said.

The city will also get $572,000 in Community Development Block Grant stimulus funding and may use that to help restore the Abyssinian Church, the nation's third-oldest church building established by a black congregation; or to purchase an elevator for the Maine Irish Heritage Center, a nonprofit organization that celebrates and preserves the city's Irish culture.

REIMBURSING MAINECARE COSTS

The stimulus funding has had a direct job impact on construction projects.

Storey Brothers Trucking, the company doing the Clifton Street sewer work, laid off the majority of its crew last winter, said Rob Storey, general manager.

He said the city job has allowed him to recall workers and hire a few extras in order to provide the 18 people needed for the sewer project.

"This project is very important to us," said Storey. "There was very little work that we had lined up prior to being awarded this contract."

Not all of the stimulus money in Portland is going to the city, and not every project translates directly into a worker's paycheck.

The Portland Water District, which provides drinking water to about 190,000 people in 11 communities, is replacing $4.5 million worth of water mains using stimulus funds in Portland and nearby communities. The district is not a city department.

Nor are Portland's two hospitals, Maine Medical Center and Mercy Hospital, which have received $19.3 million from the stimulus bill. That money, funneled through the state, reimburses the hospitals for services dating to 2005 under MaineCare, the state health care program for low-income residents.

But the payments still have an indirect economic impact.

Hospitals statewide have been cutting positions and services in response to declining revenue – even as rising unemployment increases the number of uninsured Mainers who need care.

Vivian Bean, spokewoman for Mercy Hospital, said the hospital has cut discretionary spending and is making contingency plans in case the economy gets worse.

Mercy will be receiving a $6.5 million payment toward unreimbursed costs of serving low-income patients under the state's MaineCare program.

Clegg, the city's spokeswoman, said the city is trying to quantify the benefits of stimulus money by tracking job creation and related impacts and posting the information on the city's Web site.

Some of that data is required under the stimulus bill, while in other cases, the city simply wants to let the public know where its money is being spent, she said.

"What we're trying to do is put up everything that's coming in," she said. "Our hope is to sort of create a one-stop shopping sort of thing."

Published by THE PORTLAND PRESS HERALD

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story.php?id=256836&ac=PHnws&pg=1

Political Correspondent Dieter Bradbury can be contacted at 791-6329 or at:

dbradbury@pressherald.com