Crafters knotted and quilters on building takeovers

Crafts Society building from: http://www.chinalightindustry.com/
The Chickadee Quilters from: http://www.chinalightindustry.com/
the old Bridgton town hall from: http://www.chinalightindustry.com/

The Chickadee Quilters have a hard decision to make – to give up their “nest” or take on the responsibility of owning the annex to the old Bridgton town hall that they call home.

The quilters are one of three groups faced with this decision in Bridgton, as the town looks to reduce the number of buildings it owns and maintains from seven to four.

The other two buildings to be turned over are the Arts and Crafts Society building on Depot Street and the People’s Regional Opportunity Program child development center on Meadow Street.

Town Manager Mitchell Berkowitz said the town has owned these buildings for more than 50 years, and getting rid of them could save the town money in operating costs and future capital expenditures for renovations.

The town pays for heat at the Arts and Crafts Society building, but otherwise the nonprofits pay for their own utilities. Though the PROP child development center staff does their own maintenance, town employees are responsible for maintenance of the other two buildings.

If the groups turn down the buildings, which the town is basically offering them for free, Berkowitz said the town would probably ask residents to approve the sale of the buildings at town meeting.

“Any potential expense for the town that’s not necessary, we want to eliminate it,” Chairman of the Board of Selectmen Arthur Triglione Sr. said about passing off ownership of the properties.

The Chickadee Quilters have been meeting for more than 35 years, sharing camaraderie and quilting tips as well as donating quilts and money to families in need and organizations such as Harvest Hills Animal Shelter in Fryeburg, the local food pantry and the Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital in Portland.

For the past five or six years the group has been meeting in the annex on North High Street, which members affectionately call “the nest.”

On Tuesday morning around 10 of the quilters met, the “Tuesday girls,” as Pat Glover of Bridgton described them. The women sat around long folding tables well-lit by large windows, worked on quilting and knitting projects, chatted and showed off their work to others.

Glover said the Tuesday group often works on community projects together, for example, making comfort quilts for families going through hardship or children in the hospital. The quilters also meet two Thursday evenings a month, with one of those meetings often including instruction or discussion with a guest quilter.

Several of the members talked about the benefits for the group of their current space.

“Here it’s cozy,” said Arlene Desrochers, 88, who lives half the year in Bridgton with her daughter and the other half with another child. Desrochers remembered having to set up and take down before and after meetings in the basement of the Bridgton town offices, where they met previously. “It was an awful job,” Desrochers said.

“It was a big change when we moved up here,” Desrochers said. “We got new members.”

“It’s like having a clubhouse,” Shirley Hoeman said, adding that members can lay out large quilts in the annex, a task that can be hard or impossible at home. The group also has storage space for cloth, quilt stands and a library.

Glover, a member for 35 years, said that if the group accepted the building, they would be saddled with the additional cost and responsibility of maintaining the structure, though they already pay heat and utilities.

Glover said the building will likely need work soon, including painting the exterior, replacing the furnace and fixing or replacing the roof. The group would also have to start paying insurance and taxes.

For a group with an annual budget of $8,000, this additional responsibility and expense seems daunting to some members, who are mostly women over 60 years old.

“You’ve got to maintain it. I’m not up for that,” said Lucile Parker, 83, of South Bridgton, adding that she is too old to work on the building herself.

Glover said the final vote about the building will happen at the quilters’ Sept. 18 meeting. They had a straw poll vote in August, with those interested in possibly owning the building winning by only one or two votes.

“It’s going to be a step backward for us,” Glover said.

The group paid $3,000 last year to minimally heat the building, but some are worried this figure will rise. Their big money-maker is a yearly two-day quilt show, held in July. There is also a $15 a year membership fee gathered from around 30 members.

“We’re so lucky to have a building that’s ours and we’d hate to lose it,” said Mary White, 66, while she worked on a colorful quilt square Tuesday. “It’s used a lot.”

White, who lives right down the road from the town hall annex and comes with her mother, Desrochers, acknowledged that the building needs repairs, but suggested maybe they could find individuals or groups interested in donating their time or materials.

“It’s a big commitment,” White said. “There’s so much we don’t know.”

Joanne Sullivan, 70, a retired home economics teacher from Harrison, said she thought the maintenance of the building would be too expensive and too much of a responsibility for the group.

Shirley Hoeman of Naples suggested turning the building into an arts center with fiber arts as well as quilting. “I think we have not looked at all the possibilities,” Hoeman said. “We need a little vision.”

Kathy Terhune of Naples, president of the Chickadee Quilters, said she would be very sad to lose the space but said the Bridgton Community Center would be available for their meetings in the future.

“We will still meet and we will still be a group even if we are pushed out of our home,” Terhune said. “The camaraderie is great. It’s the people who make the group, not the building.”

Arts and Crafts Society president Jean Hunt said they love the idea of owning the building they use on Depot Street.

“We were all for it,” Hunt said. Hunt said she has met with Berkowitz and expects a final meeting in September to buy the building from the town for $1.

Hunt said the group already pays their own utility, insurance and water bills. Owning the building would mean paying more insurance, heating costs and maintenance, Hunt said.

If the group owned the building, they wouldn’t have to worry about losing the space, Hunt said, and the town wouldn’t have to worry about a building they don’t use. Hunt called it a win-win situation.

Hunt said the arts and crafts society has been around for 27 years. Crafters have the chance to join and sell their wares. Around 30 people are currently showing their crafts in the shop, which is open from the end of May to September. In exchange, members pay 15 percent of their sales to the nonprofit and many volunteer in the shop.

“It gives people a chance who love to do a craft,” Hunt said, adding that having the chance to sell crafts provides a lot of older people with some extra money.

Article Source: http://www.mycontentbuilder.com

Crafts Society building from: www.chinalightindustry.com/ The Chickadee Quilters from: www.chinalightindustry.com/ the old Bridgton town hall from: www.chinalightindustry.com/

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