Two of the towns in the Mount Desert Island Regional School System, facing different challenges, have stepped a bit outside normal processes in addressing them. In Trenton, the Board of Selectmen created a School Evaluation Options committee, separate from the School Committee, to discuss ways to reduce the cost to taxpayers of the elementary school. …
In the last 31 years, three Maine women have been fatally shot by hunters, each while she was on her own property. Each death was an avoidable tragedy, and each time the incidents raised questions about Maine law regarding hunting access to private land. However, there has never been enough support to change Maine’s tradition …
Policy change in a small town can be a bit like home renovation. A homeowner might be inspired by home and garden television, in which professionals advise starry-eyed clients that it will be a simple matter to knock out a wall here, create a nook there and re-grade the backyard. But when it comes time …
Settling on a new revenue model for funding Maine roads, bridges, rail, air and shipping ports has confounded previous state legislatures and, so far, persists as an unsolvable predicament. So, we greet the recent announcement of the establishment of the Blue Ribbon Commission to Study and Recommend Funding Solutions for The State’s Transportation Systems with …
The last two weeks saw a flurry of activity in Maine related to climate change. Two weeks ago, students throughout the state conducted the second Youth Climate Strike of the year, often joined by allies of all ages. Last Monday, Governor Mills addressed the Climate Action Summit at the United Nations General Assembly and announced …
Conflicts on the water are nothing new. It wasn’t that long ago that autumn brought the start of scallop fishing season and an increase in tensions between lobstermen who set their traps on the sea floor and scallop draggers who towed their metal drags along it. That’s less of an issue now, but recently Maine’s …
Competing video advertisements were released last week in the public relations battle over the role of the Maine lobster industry in the plight of the endangered North Atlantic right whale. One was from Oceana, featuring actor Sam Waterston, pleading with viewers to “act now before it’s too late” to save the whales. The other is …
Sept. 11 is a date indelibly inked on the American psyche. Eighteen years after the terrorist attacks, last Wednesday marked another national annual day of reckoning, remembrance and reflection. It was cause to look back on the nearly 3,000 lives lost, but also on the incredible acts of selfless heroism that drew us together as …
The Bar Harbor Town Council has a workshop scheduled for next week to discuss housing. One major policy question, and the most controversial, is off the table for that meeting: whether or how to further regulate or limit vacation rentals. A moratorium on new, non-hosted vacation rentals was one of six ideas floated by councilor …
At Mount Desert Island homes and businesses last week, folks were busy buttoning up before Hurricane Dorian arrived. Boats and floats were hauled, ships altered course and Acadia National Park officials closed some areas. While the storm wreaked havoc in the Bahamas and knocked out power in Atlantic Canada, here in Downeast Maine it was …
