March 29, 2024
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Community service key to Hall

As a Boy Scout leader, Stephen Hall taught lessons he adopted early in life: community service, honesty, trust and loyalty.

Serving the public is nothing new for the 51-year-old Guilford man who recently was elected to District 5, ousting Charlie Pray from his 18-year Maine Senate seat. Hall’s life has been committed to public service, from serving as a game warden to working with Scouts.

“I’m a strong believer that people who live in a community should work for that community,” Hall said.

The Dover-Foxcroft native and Foxcroft Academy graduate worked after school and weekends at a local supermarket. Two years after graduation, he became the manager for that business and similar businesses in Dexter and Houlton. It was in Houlton that he found his roots and interest in law enforcement. A stint with the Houlton Police Department gave him the interest to pursue a career in the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife.

“He’s honest, a conservative, and listens to the issues,” Rod Edgerly of Guilford said of Hall. He said Hall is a nice person who is solid in his judgment, but listens to all sides of an issue before he makes a decision.

A family man, Hall found time to serve on his local school board, as president of the Piscataquis County Club and as a member of the Kiwanis Club of which he is a past president. He serves as the Guilford Republican Party chairman, is active in the Piscataquis County Republican Party and the AARP. He has spent years promoting and teaching hunter and snowmobile safety.

Hall, who is married and has six children, is an avid sportsman. He enjoys hunting with a muzzleloading rifle, improving his home, nurturing his garden or working as an associate real estate broker for a Guilford firm. His idea of relaxation is to bowl, golf or hunt.

John Goggin of Guilford described Hall as a “hard-working, honest, dedicated public servant. He is the type of person who will not be intimidated by professional politicians.”

Hall’s victory over Pray broke up one-half of the Martin-Pray axis that has controlled the Legislature for years. It opens the way for a host of reform-minded lawmakers to try their stuff as leaders. Pray and Senate Majority Leader Nancy Clark of Freeport were part of the Old Guard establishment.

Although he has no specific agenda in the first few weeks, Hall said he planned to get a fresh start. “I feel I will have a very strong voice in the Senate. … I want to go down there and work with everybody and do what we need to do,” he said.


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