CHERRYFIELD — Dianne Tilton, new director of the non-profit Job Opportunity Zone, has moved quickly to sow seeds of economic development in Lubec; and in February she will invite Maine’s community development director to help bring economic development to other towns in Washington County.

Later this month, at a meeting of the JOZ economic development group, a new name will be selected for the program to better represent its countywide base and its objectives. The state-funded JOZ was established about four years ago to include six towns in the Cobscook Bay region. The bay group formed one of four such zones in Maine.

Tilton wants to expand the area of operations to include all of the county. On Friday, Jan. 29, she made progress toward that goal by establishing her an office on the second floor the Howard’s Mens Store on Main Street at Machias. The office will be open from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday, Wednesday and Friday. The JOZ office at the Calais Information Bureau will be open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily.

Tilton and her assistant, Glenn Greenhalgh of Lubec, told the Down East Resource Conservation & Development Council last week that they were continuing their efforts to develop a detailed plan for reviving Lubec to its former position as a leading Down East business community.

“If it can be done in Lubec, it can be done in any other community,” said Greenhalgh, a representative of the newly invigorated Lubec Chamber of Commerce.

The two community developers said that Lubec is at a great disadvantage because it is so isolated. The town, once a thriving center for sardine processing, canning and shipping, recently bounced back from industrial oblivion, according to Tilton, because of the Atlantic salmon farming industry. With salmon, Lubec has the potential to surpass the economic power that the town once had in the sardine industry.

Under the development plan being shaped by local residents, and with technical and financial assistance from the state, Lubec’s waterfront will be transformed to benefit the fishing industry, ferry services and enhance tourism.

A key intersection on Water Street near the Roosevelt-Campobello International Bridge will be redesigned to encourage more traffic to enter Lubec, rather than continue non-stop across the bridge.

John McCurdy’s smoked herring curing and processing facilities in downtown Lubec will be an anchor and showplace for the downtown makeover. McCurdy’s old processing plant and his smokehouse, a matching pair of buildings that will never lose their smells, will form a museum. It will include a mall with outdoor lunch tables. “We are still collecting resources and ideas,” Tilton said.

Greenhalgh believes Lubec will become a model for many other economically disadvantaged communities in Washington County. “People now laugh, snicker and scoff at the idea,” he said, “but they will see a big change.”

Nobody should be surprised at what may be planned for the Lubec project. Tilton said the future may see a hovercraft ferry doing with ease, and at much less cost, what the big car ferries are struggling to achieve during the busy summer tourist season. Speed and maneuverability in open seas would help resolve the problems of long lines and crowded terminals during the tourist season.

John Pike Grady of Eastport offered his support for the hovercraft ferry that would not require elaborate, landing facilities. He said the region’s beaches would provide easy access for a hoverercraft.