Bangor panel approves slate‑like asphalt roof for 42 West Broadway, citing lack of local slate craftsmen

The Historic Preservation Commission for the City of Bangor voted 5-0 on Sept. 11 to grant a certificate of appropriateness allowing owner Stephen Thomason to remove a deteriorating slate roof at 42 West Broadway and replace it with a slate‑like asphalt shingle.

Commissioners decided the homeowner had made a reasonable effort to find local slate repair craftsmen and that requiring full slate repair or replacement would cause undue hardship. Chair Edmond Cherneski read the rules governing certificates of appropriateness and the clerk recorded the roll calls during the meeting.

Thomason told the commission the house’s slate roof — identified in the staff materials as the Harry L. Parker House, built about 1910 and located in the Whitney Park Historic District (Map Lot 022‑053) — is “a little over 115 years old” and that prior estimates of routine maintenance had been too low. “Whenever we bought the property, we were told that it just required minor maintenance, maybe $3,500 every few years. It's actually been about $13,000 over the just 3 years,” Thomason said. He said full slate replacement quotes he was shown were prohibitively…