PORTLAND — The record rain fall totals in Portland last Friday has left the Portland Senior Center on Waverly Avenue with quite a bit of clean up on its lower level.It had been a storage room for both donated prom dresses and food and clothing for the Portland Food Bank, both of which are suffering major losses from the water damage.“I’m guessing about 90-100 (dresses) are lost,” said Jill Deane, a resident who started a program called ‘Perfect Prom’ last year out of her home in Portland. “These dresses are dry clean only and were dripping wet. The damage was up to 18-inches on some gowns, some had fallen and were completely saturated.”Deane collects donations of prom and bridesmaids dresses to lend to anyone in need for a special occasion. She had been storing about 150 of the dresses in the senior center.“They’re so nice to let me store my dresses there,” Deane said. “It was really convenient. It really worked out well for girls to try on gowns.”For now, Deane has transferred the dresses she was able to save to her home while dry wall is replaced and the senior center basement dried out. She hopes to be able to return the dresses to the senior center and said she hopes to use plastic bins to keep the dresses off the ground in the future.“I have lived here 26 years and never seen anything like it,” Deane said. “I’m just hoping people can donate gowns again.”Anyone looking to donate dresses can call (860) 301-4345 or email Deane said it is hard to put a price tag on something donated in terms of possible insurance reimbursement, whether dresses or food, but First Selectman Susan Bransfield has plans to meet with an insurance adjuster about the damages to the gowns. The Portland Food Bank lost a lot of its donated food stored on the lower shelves as well, senior center director Mary Flood said.Ruth Maio, who runs the food bank, is developing a list of what was lost. That list will be distributed in a newsletter and to local papers once storage room is available, Flood said.“We need to take a real inventory,” Maio said. “We’ve just been focusing on the damage right now.”Packaged foods like boxed macaroni and instant potatoes were lost. Clothing and some books were lost as well.Maio is discussing options for a temporary location with Bransfield and town hall. The goal is to be able to get hours and space to reopen so at least families in need can be fed, Maio said.People have been really good about calling to help, Flood said, but the food bank and the center can’t take any donations right now because it has no storage space.“If people just want to hold on to what they have, we’d welcome the donations once we have someplace to put it,” Maio said. “We will be looking for donations of clothing again, and probably some food items.”Kelly Ann Gore-Oleksiw can be reached by email at . Text MIDNEWS to 22700 to get news alerts directly to your cell phone. Standard messaging and data rates apply.
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