Big City Voted Off the Island

An ice-encrusted metal ladder on the ferry that links this tiny New England town to the mainland was the unlikely catalyst for a municipal revolution.

Day after dank day, the residents of Long Island climbed the frozen ladder that joined boat to land. They clung to rungs in snow, and they clung to rungs in rain. Morning and night. Sometimes, they slipped.

And though they complained, nothing was ever done.

Finally, in the early 1990s, islanders decided they’d had enough. Their list of grievances with Portland, the mainland city to which they were attached, included much more than the ladder, but its icy, slippery steps crystallized many of their feelings of neglect, disrespect and isolation.

Today, some of those same emotions are propelling the San Fernando Valley and Hollywood to consider breaking away from Los Angeles.

Ten years ago, on the nation’s opposite coast, it was Long Island, Maine, that was pushing to become its own city.

The stakes were far different. Together, the Valley and Hollywood have roughly 1.4 million residents; Long Island boasts about 1,000 on a busy summer day, and year-round, its population is about 200.

Still, the complaints of Long Islanders a decade ago sound strikingly similar to those debated in Los Angeles’ secession campaigns. Residents felt they paid too much in taxes for too little in public services.

They feared a diminishing quality of life. They thought they could govern themselves better than downtown bureaucrats did.

Geography also adds to the separatism in both cases. Substitute saltwater for mountain ranges, and the sense of being cut off from City Hall is powerful in both communities.

Across the country, secession campaigns have occasionally piqued the interest of unhappy communities, but most fall short. Neighborhoods in Atlanta, Seattle and Tucson tried to break away, but failed. Staten Island came close in 1993 when residents voted to leave New York City, a plan ultimately denied by the state.

When Key Biscayne formed an upscale, water-ringed community off the South Florida coast in 1991, it sparked an unsuccessful but attention-getting drive to dismantle Miami.

An international brouhaha erupted in 1998 when a Minnesota fishing community tried but failed to break from the United States and become part of Canada.

In Maine, tiny Frye Island split from the town of Standish in 1998 while the even-tinier Hope Island launched a one-family effort last year. Long Island, however, reigns as one of the nation’s few secession successes.

The ferry ride between Portland and Long Island takes about 45 minutes across Casco Bay, comparable to a freeway trek from the Valley to downtown Los Angeles. Commuters include sunscreen-slathered tourists donning Maine-made L.L. Bean gear, as well as professionals in ties and heels. Similar to Southern California, workers making the daily trek from downtown Portland to the islands bemoan their exhaustion, boredom and lack of time.

The 4.5-mile boat ride stops at two islands en route to Long Island, a rustic town three miles long and one mile wide, a place where neighbors decorate lawns with wire lobster traps and squawking seagulls sunbathe on white Adirondack chairs. The coast alternates from sharp-edged rocks to fine white sand beaches.

The centuries-old town served as a fuel base for the North Atlantic fleet during World War II before year-round fishermen and summer vacationers claimed the island’s Victorian beach cottages and two-story New England farmhouses. Most homes in the largely middle-class community have waterfront views of private wharves and bobbing lobster buoys, and most stay within families for centuries.

On Tuesdays, a popular day for grocery shopping, islanders crowd the ferry with banana boxes for packing food and wagons for lugging home goods.

During the summer, the ferry ride invigorates like a splash of saltwater on a hot afternoon. In the winter, when the bay becomes rough and icy, there are fewer boat runs. Air chills the bones while gray skies obscure the mainland.

It was under these conditions, more than a decade ago, that the frozen ladder confronted islanders exiting the ferry--and then, angering residents further, Portland jacked up property taxes.

It was then that talk of secession began. Mark Greene, a longtime island resident, was the first to mention it. He invited islanders to town meetings and to his beach cottage, served strong cups of coffee and advocated seceding from Portland.

“You’re nuts,” said Nancy Jordan, 57, who helps at the two-room schoolhouse.

But then Jordan considered the pros: The more than $700,000 that Portland reaped from Long Island taxes could be better spent improving the town’s battered roads, dilapidated dock and substandard rescue boat.

It could be used to stop zealous developers from destroying forests of perfuming balsam firs, pines and maple trees and wild blueberries.

Jordan quickly came around to supporting the breakup, and others joined as well. Chris McDuffie and Ruth Peterson were early advocates, and the core group set out to build their case.

Secessionists divided up the research, meetings and clerical work to include all supporters in the movement and prevent burnout. They succeeded, they said, because of this strategy.

“Everyone knew what was going on,” said Peterson, 67, a longtime resident who now serves as a Long Island elected official who sits on six committees. “Everyone was so committed and dedicated.”

From the start, the effort tapped deep veins. Islanders pride themselves on their Yankee roots and independence--as well as their knowledge of history. Secession seemed to speak to all those notions.

“A small government allows for true democracy,” said Greene, a quick-talking, 56-year-old science teacher who splits his time between Sterling, Mass., and Long Island, where his family has had a home since the 1880s.

The Long Island independence campaign grew in 1991 and 1992 as secessionists collected petition signatures and argued their cause before state legislators.

Proponents of the breakup won the right to put the measure on the November 1992 ballot.

Turnout was strong on election day. Lines greeted voters at the polls. Secession opponents, though in the minority, tried to sway supporters until the last minute. “You’re going to be sorry,” they warned.

When ballots were counted, secession won 129 to 44. Long Island had its independence. At Greene’s beach cottage, supporters cheered, hugged and celebrated into the wee hours.

But that was the beginning of a process, not the end. That first year, the new island town had no money to budget. Portland bureaucrats did not help matters. Since the island was now on its own, they argued, it should return the city’s lawn mower.

Secession leaders reacted by urging residents to pay their property taxes early and by selling $15 green and gray T-shirts promoting the town’s birth.

Long Islanders also organized fund-raisers--a hit in a town where a typical summer week of social activities includes a boat-naming party on Wednesday, an annual island potluck on Saturday afternoon, a wine-tasting soiree Saturday night and a housewarming brunch on Sunday. For even more money, they recycled aluminum cans and glass bottles (and still do). “We’d have a drink for the town,” Greene joked.

Most islanders agree their town benefited from independence, though they also acknowledge it was not easy. Under the divorce settlement, Long Island had to take on $1.3 million of Portland’s debt. In return, it received $600,000 worth of city property on the island.

Problems still exist for the town, where most of the residents are white. Roads need fixing. Affordable housing is rare. Environmental and conservation issues abound. The deer population is multiplying, and no one is quite sure what to do.

Drivers continually drive outside road lanes, a problem that may seem laughable by L.A. crime standards but that nevertheless nettles Long Island residents.

Property taxes dipped only slightly after secession. But money went toward fixing their potholes, not Portland’s. A boarded-up Navy office and fuel depot became a cozy town hall painted white with green trim. The town is constructing a new library with a climate-controlled room for historical archives. Long Islanders plan to add a medical clinic in the town, which lacks a hospital.

One of their biggest achievements, residents say, is buying a high-speed rescue boat that can zip across sometimes-choppy Casco Bay and dock in Portland in 12 minutes.

Under the old system, they said it sometimes took more than an hour. For people in trouble, Greene said, islanders used to offer a New England prayer: “Good luck to you and the Red Sox.”

The new government was so successful that other island and mainland towns in Maine also started breakup efforts, secessionists said. Portlanders paid little attention to Long Island when it threatened to secede. But once it broke away and other islands threatened to follow, the city appointed a liaison to other island neighborhoods and coordinated public meetings with ferry schedules, said Joe Gray, Portland’s city manager.

Because Long Island is small, its departure left only a bruise on Portland’s economy, Gray said. But money is money, and Portland’s schools could use more to improve education, particularly for immigrant students who may speak any of 40 languages. The city could use extra funds for housing programs and harbor projects, he added.

Now, secession threats are common in Maine, a state with 1.27 million people and 492 municipalities. The tiniest town, Glenwood Plantation, has six residents while Portland, its largest, has 64,358, according to the Maine Municipal Assn.

Most residents want to keep their communities small so they can be involved in and control local issues. “I can’t think of a year when there hasn’t been a secession campaign,” said Michael Saxl, Maine’s Democratic House speaker.

Some see that as a turn for the worse. “Long Island opened Pandora’s box,” said Orlando Delogu, a law professor at the University of Maine. “The idea that every enclave should be the king of its own hill is ridiculous.”

Rather than shatter towns and lose tax revenues, Maine politicians said they try to negotiate problems with dissatisfied neighborhoods. For its part, the state Legislature has made it harder for communities to secede by increasing the number of signatures required for a cityhood petition. “We generally prefer to keep the cities together,” Saxl said.

Long Islander Tony Donovan is one who wishes the town never left Portland, where he also has a home. Zipping through Portland’s historic streets and coastal roads, past art museums and upscale boutiques, the 47-year-old real estate developer said secession happened because of a high school-like clique of connected and vocal people who wanted to duck out of their responsibilities to the mainland.

Donovan parked at a Portland dock as a green truck hauled away Long Island’s trash. “See, they still depend on the city,” Donovan said, throwing up his hands in exasperation. “They come into the city, enjoy its restaurants, libraries and shows, but they don’t want to help with its problems.”

The alimony agreement takes care of Long Island’s obligation to Portland, secessionists countered.

“Secession generally doesn’t benefit minorities or people without a lot of wealth,” said Donovan. “This is a Yankee mentality. We don’t want to share. We want to do our own thing.”

Donovan’s Long Island neighbors see things differently. The island today, they said, is self-sufficient and proud of it, looking forward to its 10th anniversary next summer as its own town.

And the ice-coated ladder that once was a touchstone for island anger? Today, when the ferry pulls up, passengers still can step off onto the ladder, but if it’s slippery, there’s a nearby launch that provides safe passage to shore.