Bob’s boilers are currently being made in Mexico, and he would like them to be manufactured in Millinocket. He has a good product and a proven market for his boilers, so it is past time the town has done something to bring the jobs here.

This is only one small step, and now it is up to the state of Maine to move this project forward. It will take time to get everything going but at least something is being done at last.

They don’t need to build a new building, as they are in the process of buying the E&R building - and they have the means and the know-how to do any repairs the building needs. They also will be able to heat the building with their own projects.

Both these men are local. Bob was born in Millinocket, and Dickey is from Medway. They know the area and its people, and they want to do something that will allow this area to live and be healthy again.

For years, one facet of our community has been accused of being negative, and this negativity has been blamed for having stopped jobs from coming here. Yet we are the people who have been saying all along that we have someone from town who has a product to make, asking why something hasn't been done for him?

We also knew that we did not want to be a gateway community, relying solely on tourism. This is not the way we wanted to go. That wasn’t being negative - that was trying to keep our community alive and viable.

With manufacturing jobs, more people will be hired. Our young can stay, and we will have a tax base. After depending on a paper mill for so many years, we (the negative people) did not want to depend on Mother Nature to bring jobs to our area, as she is fickle this winter. It is raining in Millinocket and what snow we have will be gone. This means no snowmobiling, and no money for our motels and other businesses.

If the people who called us negative would have listened to what we were saying rather than working so hard trying to destroy our credibility, maybe we would have had something done about Moscone’s boilers long before now.

We, the so-called negative people, now have some hopes that new jobs will come and that all will go well with this project that many others projects will follow and more jobs will be created.

We, the so-called negative people, wanted both tourism, which Millinocket has had for many years, as well as jobs to replace our paper mill. The negativity came from people that wouldn’t listen and who decided that our voices didn't count.

Let us move forward with Bob Moscone and Dickey Day and we all wish them good luck for the future and that all their projects will do well for them and the future of our area.