Legislator's Complaint Prompted Congdon Resignation

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The resignation of Phillip Congdon from his position as commissioner of the Maine Department of Economic and Community Development came after Representative John Martin (D - Eagle Lake) sent a letter to the governor informing him of remarks allegedly made by Congdon while at a local event in Caribou.

Martin characterized Cogdon's comments as "out of character for a public official, racist in nature for some of them, and some were anti-Aroostook."

Martin heard about the meeting and Congdon's remarks from several constituents last week, during the Legislature's April break.

"Everywhere I went, people were coming up to me telling me the comments this guy made and people were really upset," said Martin. "People asked me if Governor LePage would approve of those kinds of remarks and I said I don't think so."

On Monday, Martin sent a letter to LePage requesting that he look into the issue and says the governor's staff then made calls to people in the County with knowledge of the incident to confirm that it had occurred.

On Wednesday, the LePage administration put out a press release announcing a number of staff changes including the resignation of Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Darryl Brown, which included the sentence "On Wednesday, the LePage Administration released that Department of Economic and Community Development Commissioner Phil Congdon resigned. Commissioner Congdon took the post in January." No further information was given.

Martin says he's glad that the innapropriate remarks led to Congdon's resignation.

"I thought the public and Aroostook County should be treated a little better than that," said the veteran legislator.