Colorful lawmaker prepares to bid Augusta farewell

AUGUSTA – Eddie Dugay can tell stories.

The Hancock County legislator settled on one to describe his pending transition from elected official to private guy.

He and some developers of the former Cutler Navy base recently were sitting in the Baskin-Robbins shop in Machias. In walked two parents, their 3-year-old son and someone Dugay didn’t recognize.

“Eddie!” the dad called out, and Dugay greeted the parents and the boy warmly.

The developers just watched, not sure who Dugay was hugging this time.

The family knew Dugay because he had interceded in their battle with the state Department of Health and Human Services over the boy’s welfare.

The parents – both former heroin users – had run into Dugay during a supervised visit with their son. Earlier, they had come within two weeks of having their parental rights terminated. Dugay’s interest in their case had stopped that action.

The ice cream shop encounter was a moment when Dugay’s two worlds intersected. He was discussing plans with his new colleagues about how to bring new people and new jobs to the former base, now privately owned with Dugay on board with a contract.

Yet he was reminded of his work with families and children, one of the touchstones of his service in the Legislature.

Friday the most public part of his role as an elected official was closing in. The adjournment of the 122nd Legislature was at hand – until the Senate voted to break and return on May 22. Term limits will keep him from coming back.

A Democrat from Cherryfield, Dugay is completely comfortable in Augusta. Many legislators wear name tags, but he goes without one. “Everybody knows me,” he said during one of his last workdays in Augusta.

His current colleagues note that Dugay is rarely in his seat in the House chamber. He turns up for roll-call votes, but usually skips the hometown sentiments and even many debates.

He’s usually working just as intensely as the rest of the representatives.

“He’s just Eddie,” is how other legislators see him.

“Even people who say they don’t like him, like him,” Rep. Earl Bierman, R-Sorrento, said Thursday. “How can you not? He has a contagious personality.”

DuGay, 48, is ever-casual in manner and dress. He always runs late, and he offers hugs freely. He is forever checking his cell phone.

Surrounded by suits when he mingles at the State House, he’s the one wearing khakis and a sport coat. Even when he accompanies Gov. John Baldacci to appearances back in Washington County – which is often – DuGay wears golf shirts.

He is exiting Augusta, but he plans on returning frequently. Several of his economic development projects coming up within Washington County will call for state support from either the Legislature or the governor.

His role the last eight years has been as a swing vote. He’s not always predictable, but the Democrats count on him for his talents working one-on-one.

House Speaker John Richardson, D-Brunswick, and House Assistant Minority Leader Joshua Tardy, R-Newport, are two of his best friends in Augusta.

“Eddie maneuvers behind the scenes,” Richardson said. “He is very smooth and often underestimated. He never looks for credit. He’s the consummate team player and he is extremely loyal to the governor.”

Democrats “have had tremendous success in these two years, and we owe a lot of that to Eddie. He’s a conduit that really assists and opens up lines.”

Bierman teasingly refers to DuGay as “the pope,” alluding to the movie, “The Pope of Greenwich Village.” With the exception of the main character’s portrayal as a low-level mobster, Bierman said, DuGay is that guy in every other way.

“In the movie, if you needed something done, the pope could just get it done,” Bierman said. “I see that in Eddie. If Eddie has disappeared, you know he’s somewhere else, working on the next day’s or the next week’s vote.”

Bierman and DuGay share the fact that their fathers worked together – nearly 40 years ago – at the Winter Harbor Navy base. DuGay’s dad was a guard at the gate.

DuGay and his five siblings had moved to Milbridge from Dover-Foxcroft when he was 3. When he was 12, his father died – while the two were watching the Red Sox on television together.

DuGay graduated from Narraguagus High School in 1975. One year later, he married Milbridge gal Sheila Huckins. In October they will mark 30 years together. They have two children, Cassandra, 21, and Brandon, 17.

DuGay joined the Navy just out of high school. He worked at the Winter Harbor base for four years with a top-secret security clearance.

Then came 19 years of working with a Connecticut family that owned an oceanfront home in Harrington. The family’s business was in commercial and consumer fragrances.

When DuGay wasn’t a caretaker at the Pineo Point house, he traveled to consumer shows around the country and buttonholed hundreds of women to sample the fragrances.

He has always loved politics and a good campaign. When Baldacci was running for the U.S. House of Representatives in 1993, DuGay volunteered to drum up the Washington County vote.

Then, once Baldacci was in Washington, DuGay was tapped to be his field representative for Washington, Hancock and Penobscot counties.

He loved that, too. He worked out of Baldacci’s Bangor office for four years before running in 1998 for the District 31 seat, now redrawn as District 33.

“He personalized the office,” Baldacci said recently of DuGay’s early work with him. “He was the one who stayed late at night, talking to veterans with Agent Orange. He’d sit there like he was a counselor.

“He’s genuine. He just can see the potential for a situation, and he knows many people. He also knows how to point them in the right direction.”

“Eddie has a good heart,” Bierman said. “Although he’s been tainted by gossipy mouths, he generally cares about people.”

Back in District 33 – nine towns from Steuben to Jonesport – constituents either like DuGay or they don’t. Either way, they love to talk about him and his financial setbacks of the last few years.

DuGay has heard it all – and he’s gotten through it. Two months ago he and Sheila sold their Cherryfield house for nearly $300,000. He has been paying off back commitments ever since.

The buyer was Rep. Tardy, who was happy to help a friend in a pinch and wanted a part-time place Down East.

Just when DuGay needed a break, just when he’s rejoining the work force in Washington County, he has rebounded. He said he looks forward to his new priorities, but he called leaving Augusta “bittersweet.”

As he sat in his office on Thursday, he recalled his true passion of the last eight years, helping as many as 45 families reunite with their children after DHHS removed them from their homes.

His assignment for six years was on the Legislature’s Health and Human Services Committee. When he arrived in Augusta, the reunification rate for families in Washington County was 18 percent – less than one in five families. Today, it’s 65 percent.

Families statewide have called him for help. They knew he had walked 88 miles from Ellsworth to Augusta in December 2003, just to bring attention to those whose lives were affected by DHHS.

He thought about the parents he ran into at Baskin-Robbins recently. His eyes welled up and he reached for a tissue.

“That one was an emotional case,” he said after a pause. “They all are. I’ll miss that, for sure.”