Paul Sylvain

With less than six weeks remaining before the start of the county’s new fiscal year, and frustrated by the lack of forward movement on a 2026 spending package by the budget advisory committee (BAC), Washington County Commissioner Chairman David Burns on Nov. 13 proposed staffing cuts, totaling some $900,000. 

That would buy the county about two months of salaries and operational expenses. At current  staffing levels, the county’s payroll is about $200,000 every two weeks.

Will Tuell

If Machias Christian Fellowship Pastor Aaron Dudley and Arise Addiction Recovery Executive Director Paul Trovarello had met for coffee and a meal in the Elm Street School gymnasium on a cold November Saturday night ten years ago, the police might well have hauled them off for trespassing. Yet on Saturday, Nov. 15, the two — joined by upwards of 300 of their closest friends — packed into that gym to celebrate the tenth anniversary of Arise, the faith-based recovery program born from a simple conversation all those years ago.

Will Tuell