By Allison Carrier
You may not see him day to day, but you’ve definitely seen his work. Dan Desimio is a member of the Scarborough Public Works crew and plays a big role in the behind-the-scenes of keeping our town running smoothly. From maintaining the road signs, to fixing damaged trash carts, winter plowing, cemetery coordination, and more, he is an integral part of our town and has been for 33 years.
Dan starts his workday at 7:00am with the rest of the crew in the morning meeting. They’re dispatched to priority work orders and assigned who they’ll be working with for the day. Today, he has two work orders to start his day: removing road debris that was spotted this morning and fixing a sign that was hit yesterday.
A GIS mapping program on his computer shows Dan all the 5,000+ signs around town. Each is assigned a number. He looks here to see which sign was damaged before heading out to fix it. The one today is a quick fix, but sometimes it’s more of challenge if the sign is in an area of heavy traffic, like the Route 1 median, or if it’s in a newer development with underground utility lines.
Dan can map out his day based on location of work orders. After replacing the signpost, he goes to a neighborhood where a trash cart’s wheel is broken. He brought new wheels in the truck and determined that it also needed a new axle.
While today is a typical clear day, Dan along with the rest of the Public Works crew will be ready to salt, sand, and plow as the weather turns. He is on-call 24/7 from November 15 to April 15. A select group of eight people are on a weekly rotation for managing the roads with sand and salt if they become icy overnight. If it’s a snowstorm, everybody comes in. Instead of starting at 7:00am, the day begins when it starts snowing. It could be 1:00, 2:00, 3:00 in the morning, or 9:00 or 10:00 at night.
There are 18 total plow units on the road when everyone is in (including part-time workers). Everyone has their assigned route for the season. Dan’s route for several years has been Route 1 from the Saco line to the medical campus, and some side roads. The days go by fast for him when there is a constant snow; it’s more engaging. And after decades of winter plowing, he urges drivers to slow down and give him and the other plow drivers room to do their job, because they’re out there for all of us. The toughest part of plowing for him is the tiredness of doing it for so long.
Dan has to plan his life around the weather in the winter months, but makes it a point to pick up other hobbies, like motorcycling and auto racing. He is a lifelong Westbrook resident, where he lives with his wife and daughter, a senior in high school. Outside of work and his fair-weather hobbies, he enjoys spending time with his family and supporting his daughter in her music competitions across the state and region.
On non-storm days, it’s back to many of his regular duties of replacing carts and signs, plus repairing mailboxes that inadvertently get hit by the plows. And in no time, it will be spring, which brings with it additional duties like cleaning culverts and catch basins, line-striping the roads, and marking out cemetery plots.
Whether it’s a snowstorm, repairs and road clean-ups, or a small fix no one else notices, Dan’s reliability and loyalty to our community help make Scarborough a clean, livable and safe place.
Allison Carrier is Marketing and Communications Manager for the Town of Scarborough.
(Photo courtesy of Town of Scarborough)
