Sen. Pat Flood, R-Winthrop, deserves our thanks for his tireless work in the Senate and as a member of the Appropriations Committee, which did a masterful job working on the state budget in these difficult times.

I was deeply disappointed, however, in Flood’s poor voting record on issues affecting Maine’s clean air, water, forests and wildlife.

For example, I was dismayed that Flood failed to vote to override the governor’s veto of L.D. 1744, a bill that would have improved the health of Maine’s lakes. The governor’s misguided veto of this bill was successfully overridden in the House by a huge margin, but Flood was one of 14 Republican senators who flipped their vote in order to sustain the governor’s veto.

Why would he do this, given the many lakes in his district that suffer serious algae blooms?

And why did Flood change his vote on L.D. 1252, a bill to help home and business owners invest in solar energy systems? Flood voted against the bill, then for the bill, then against it following the governor’s veto of the bill. This bill would have become law if Flood and one additional senator had voted to override the veto.

I know that Flood can be an independent thinker, willing to ignore partisan pressure, but he did not do so this year on important bills to protect Maine’s lakes and help Maine develop more solar energy. And that to me is disappointing.

Judith Hasey-NisbettMonmouth