The good folks at KVCAP saw a need and answered it.

The agency, formally known as the Kennebec Valley Community Action Program, provides a range of services to local residents, from home repair, weatherization and heating assistance to a teen center, parenting classes and childcare.

As part of their good work, KVCAP also runs a low-price minibus public transportation service in -- and sometimes among -- the Kennebec County towns of Augusta, Hallowell, Gardiner, Waterville and Fairfield. For the county's many low-income and elderly residents, the transportation service is a godsend. How else would they get their groceries, make it to the doctor's office or visit friends?

KVCAP didn't run transportation services in Winthrop, though.

Until now.

The Mister Market grocery store in Winthrop will close on Sunday. It will then be demolished to pave the way for a spiffy new Hannaford supermarket in its place. So that means Winthrop's residents who get to Mister Market on foot won't have a full-service grocery store within a walkable distance. And that's not a good thing.

Enter the KVCAP angels, with an assist from Hannaford Bros. Hannaford requested that KVCAP run a bus from Winthrop to its Augusta store and gave KVCAP a $250 donation to help pay for the cost of the new route. So, starting on June 5 and running through mid-July, the agency will run a temporary bus route every Friday from the Mister Market site to the Whitten Road Hannaford Bros. supermarket in Augusta. The bus will leave Winthrop at 10 A.M. and depart from Augusta at noon.

We wish all our problems could be solved so quickly and easily.

Editorials represent the opinion of the Editorial Board of this newspaper: Publisher John Christie, Executive Editor Eric Conrad and Opinion Page Editor Naomi Schalit.