Lewiston police Chief David St. Pierre, right, talks Thursday with Auburn City Councilor Adam Platz, center, carrying his child, Asher, as Auburn Mayor Jeff Harmon listens at a “meet and greet” of Lewiston and Auburn municipal officials at the Hilton Garden Inn Riverwatch in Auburn. Russ Dillingham/Sun Journal

You might say that municipal leaders in the Twin Cities are building a bridge over troubled waters. 

In recent years, mayors in Lewiston and Auburn have been occasionally at odds, particularly over matters such as water rates and zoning changes around Lake Auburn’s watershed. 

But that was then and this is now. Auburn has a new mayor in Jeff Harmon and councils in both cities are looking for a fresh start. 

With that goal of unity in mind, city leaders from both sides of the Androscoggin River got together Wednesday night at the Hilton Garden Inn. 

At first it was just introductions. Handshaking. Idle chatter over food and drink. 

Eventually, though, they got down to business, discussing matters that affect both cities. Breaking off into groups, city councilors with their mayors and police chiefs chewed over ideas for bringing events to the area. 

After that matter was heartily discussed, Lewiston City Administrator Heather Hunter prompted them to start talking over matters of economic development. Then the topic was infrastructure that needs work. After that, the groups swatted around ideas for marketing the Twin Cities, up to and including the possibility of developing a mascot. 

It was all very laid back — there were no rules of order and no official votes cast for this agenda item or that one. But city officials found this meet-and-greet style brainstorming session very productive nonetheless. 

“It gives us kind of a jump-start on not only creative thinking, but also looking at what we do with that creative thinking — what kind of initiatives we’re looking at pursuing,” Hunter said. “I think this allows us to be able to look at things in a more holistic way, and we’ll see what kind of ideas they come up with.” 

The mayors of both cities were on board with the informal joint session, in large part because there were so many changes and new members to both city councils after the last election. 

Auburn Mayor Jeff Harmon is new to the job, but he could see the benefit of such a meeting as soon as the idea was floated. Lewiston and Auburn are the closest of neighbors, after all. It’s important that they get along and in many ways, they are twice as powerful when they work together. 

“I think there’s an effort to have more cooperative relationships between the cities,” Harmon said. “There are lots of issues that I think are better solved if the cities collaborate on potential solutions. This is just an initial effort to have both councils get together.” 

Lewiston Mayor Carl Sheline went into the meeting not knowing exactly what to expect — Hunter kept some of the night’s activities to herself until it was go time. Still, Sheline knew that getting officials from both cities was a good idea — and and one that was possibly overdue. 

“I’m really glad we can get together tonight,” he said. “We have new councilors on both sides of the river, so it’s great to get to know each other and form working relationships as we move forward during this next term.” 

Lewiston Mayor Carl Sheline, right, talks Thursday with Lewiston Fire Chief Mark Caron, left, during a “meet and greet” of Lewiston and Auburn municipal officials at the Hilton Garden Inn Riverwatch in Auburn. In back, Auburn Mayor Jeff Harmon, second from right, greets Lewiston City Councilor Scott Harriman. Russ Dillingham/Sun Journal

It wasn’t just the councilors approaching those issues laid out by Hunter. Lewiston police Chief David St. Pierre was in the middle of the fray, as was Auburn’s Deputy Chief Tim Cougle. 

Lewiston’s Fire Chief Mark Caron was there along with his Auburn counterpart, Fire Chief Bob Chase. Also in attendance were directors from various municipal departments from both cities: public works, economic development and engineering among them.

Auburn City Manager Phil Crowell was in the thick of it, too, as were many former city officials who came to see how the night would progress. 

Former Lewiston School Committee member and county Commissioner Matthew Roy liked the idea of the mingling event overall, although he wished it had been held in Council Chambers in one city or the other so that it could have been livestreamed to the public. 

But for Hunter and others who planned the event, the idea was to get these city leaders away from the trappings of that kind of atmosphere in favor of the roll-up-your-sleeves kind of approach. For this night, anyway, the men and women at the tables could act like neighbors instead of strictly like city leaders and department heads. 

The laid-back setting seemed to work its magic, at any rate. After Hunter began giving the group prompts for discussion, those discussions ground on for more than two hours with the councilors batting ideas back and forth and taking vigorous notes on everything put forth. 

Standing back and watching it all, Lewiston Director of Marketing & Communications Angelynn Amores thought the event was a good start to more productive things to come. 

“It’s nice,” she said, “to see both city councils working in harmony.”