Letter: Civil discussions needed in wildlife management strategizing

SUN JOURNAL • August 24, 2023

Re: V. Paul Reynolds’ column, “Outdoors in Maine: Should anti-hunting activists be included in shaping wildlife management strategies?” (Aug. 12). When deer are found in ecosystems where they naturally belong and are meant to thrive, coyote’s presence helps the herd to remain in good health and resilient. As a member on this coyote management sub-committee 2020-2030, I felt the whole process left much to be desired. There were five biologists, and every single one voted in favor of a closed season for our coyotes … except Gerry Lavigne, Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine affiliate. He strongly advocates for the killing of Maine’s coyotes, non-stop, year-round, including the killing of coyote pups and/or the killing the parent coyotes. “Fox guarding the hen house.” ~ Claire Perry, Owl’s Head

Maine CDC says federal funds to remove lead pipes should go to other states

CBS 13 • August 23, 2023

The Biden administration has set aside $15 billion from its 2021 infrastructure law to remove more than 9 million lead pipes carrying water to homes across the country. But Maine, along with Washington, Oregon and Alaska are all turning down the funds in the first year they’re being made available. The Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention says Maine does not appear to have the lead service line issue that other states across the country are facing, in part because Maine banned the use of lead pipes in 1926.

Column: ‘In such an ugly time’

MORNING SENTINEL • August 23, 2023

The effects of overheated air and oceans are happening right before our eyes. They’ve been especially numerous and destructive this summer, and they’re going to get worse, as David Wallace-Wells in his well-researched book, “The Uninhabitable Earth,” and Bill McKibben in “Falter” both show. We are on the edge of an ecological catastrophe at least as devastating as nuclear winter. The insane thing is, we caused it and are continuing to push it along. Many people who can see what climate change is going to do suffer from a psychological condition recently named “environmental melancholia” — a complex stew of feelings such as grief, anxiety, dread, remorse, helplessness, anger, depression, fear and other mental experiences sprung from the scientific near certainty that Earth cannot escape an ecological catastrophe, and that the catastrophe has been launched by us. It’s excruciating. ~ Dana Wilde

The deer population in this Orono neighborhood is considerable — and fascinating

BANGOR DAILY NEWS • August 23, 2023

When it comes to seeing deer, Alma Otto might have one of the best vantage points in all of Maine. She lives in a former farm in Orono near the University of Maine, on the edge of a large field that experiences a ton of deer traffic. One day a “deer was lying down in the field north of our barn in the early evening. Four deer stood near it,” Otto said. “A woman accompanied by a dog on a long leash walked by on the nearby sidewalk. Three of the deer walked very slowly and cautiously toward the dog, while the smallest deer stayed behind and watched the deer that was still lying down.” Otto said it looked like the deer were protecting the one lying down from predators. “When [the deer] had progressed halfway to the dog, the resting deer had gotten up and headed for the woods with the smaller deer. The other deer then bounded after them,” Otto said. Nathan Bieber, deer biologist for the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, said it was more likely curiosity among the deer.

Commentary: Whale entanglement is a real problem, one Mainers can help solve

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • August 23, 2023

Maine’s lobster fishery has the most rope in the ocean within right whale habitat. It’s legally obligated to reduce unintentional harm to species that are threatened or endangered. Maine politicians and lobster industry representatives make the unsupportable claim that Maine lobster gear hasn’t entangled any right whales since 2004. Contrary to assertions, no one is trying to put the lobster fishery out of business. Instead, people are working tirelessly on solutions for both fishermen and whales. Change will likely demand compromise and adaptation, but with federal funding and state investment, change is possible. The cost of entanglement prevention should not fall on our fishing communities. The Maine delegation should secure the money promised to fund and implement ropeless gear testing and adoption. It defies logic and common decency that Maine is not leading the effort to prevent all whale entanglement. ~ Sean K. Todd, Ph.D, and Brenna Sowder, Maine Coalition for North Atlantic Right Whales

Letter: What makes a utility well run? Its management.

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • August 23, 2023

It is the senior management of the utility that determines how well it is run. In over 50 years of working in the industry, including work in more than 25 countries, I have consulted with investor-owned, consumer-owned, federally owned and state- and provincially owned utilities and have seen well-run and not-so-well-run utilities of all ownership types. What we have in Maine are two poorly run investor-owned utilities, probably poorly run because their ultimate management comes from outside the United States. Let’s see if we can have a better-run utility with local senior management and local decision making that does not emphasize profits over performance. Let’s pass the Pine Tree Power referendum in November. ~ Bill Dunn, Yarmouth

Extreme heat is sending more Mainers to the hospital

BANGOR DAILY NEWS • August 23, 2023

The temperature peaked on July 6 at 92.2 degrees, causing 27 people on that day alone to head for emergency rooms here with symptoms including high body temperature, heat exhaustion and cramps. Unofficially, it was the hottest day on record this summer, according to the University of Maine. Visits to ERs, per 100,000 population, were higher in Maine that day than in most of the rest of the country, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control Heat & Health Tracker. More heat days and hospital visits is a growing trend across the country as the climate and oceans warm, even in cooler states like Maine. All Maine counties are predicted to see the number of days topping 90 degrees double over the next three decades. For Maine, which is the oldest state in the nation by median age, extreme heat presents elevated risks.

In rebuttal: Katie Hansberry: Non-hunters should have say in wildlife management

SUN JOURNAL • August 23, 2023

Yes, the nearly 85% of Mainers who do not hunt or trap should have a say in how wildlife is managed here (“Outdoors in Maine: Should anti-hunting activists be included in shaping wildlife management strategies?,” Aug. 12). This helps to ensure that our wildlife decisions take account of the best available science, evolving public attitudes and the substantial economic contributions and perspectives of non-hunters in respect to wildlife management. Mainers who take a broader view deserve a seat at the table when crucial decisions are made about the fate of wildlife in their state. ~ Katie Hansberry, Maine state director, Humane Society of the United States

Coastliner train running Wiscasset-Bath trips this weekend

TIMES RECORD • August 22, 2023

The new Coastliner train connecting Brunswick and Rockland is launching another trial run this weekend ahead of its expected launch next month. The train, which debuted during the Maine Lobster Festival in Rockland earlier this month, will make three round trips from Wiscasset to Bath Saturday. Billed as an excursion experience, it will take about two hours to reach Rockland from Brunswick, with stops in Bath, Wiscasset and Newcastle planned.

Maine’s cannabis boom is leaving behind Aroostook growers

THE COUNTY • August 22, 2023

As Maine’s vigorous cannabis scene explodes in retail markets, Aroostook County growers say the boom means more work for less money. Safe Alternatives of Caribou was the first medical marijuana shop on the East Coast when it opened in Frenchville in 2011. Now The County has nearly 20 medical and adult-use storefronts from the St. John Valley to Houlton. Medical and adult-use cannabis sales in Maine netted more than $460 million in 2022. That’s nearly double the $258 million potatoes brought in last year. Potatoes are still the state’s No. 1 food crop, with around 90 percent of them grown in northern Maine. But unlike potatoes, little of the state’s cannabis comes from The County.

Lavish and looming, gigayacht bobbing in Portland harbor attracts curiosity and contempt

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • August 22, 2023

Rising Sun, a five-story, 82-room, $381 million gigayacht owned by billionaire David Geffen, was docked in Portland on Monday. Geffen is No. 229 on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index with a net worth of $9.14 billion. Rising Sun has a gym, a wine cellar, a spa, a movie theater and can accommodate up to 16 guests and 45 crew members, according to superyachtfan.com. It was built in 2004 by a German shipyard for Oracle Corp. CEO Larry Ellison. Geffen bought it from Ellison in 2010. The Rising Sun’s environmental impact? The diesel engines powering the gigayacht belch an estimated 16,320 tons of carbon-dioxide-equivalent gases into the atmosphere annually, almost 800 times what the average American generates in a year, according to a New York Times report citing the journal Sustainability.

State proposes more quarantines to slow spread of tree-killing invasive species

MAINE PUBLIC • August 22, 2023

State officials are considering proposals to expand several quarantine zones for firewood and other tree parts to slow the spread of three invasive species that kill trees. York and Cumberland counties as well as parts of Oxford and Aroostook counties have been under quarantine for several years to prevent further spread of emerald ash borers. The small beetles burrow under ash bark and eventually kill the trees, which occupy important ecological, cultural and economic niches in Maine. But now the Maine Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry wants to expand that quarantine to all of Androscoggin, Knox, Lincoln and Waldo counties as well as parts of Penobscot, Franklin, Somerset and Piscataquis counties.

A $35 million biosolids facility in Norridgewock could be answer to state’s sludge disposal crisis

MORNING SENTINEL • August 22, 2023

Waste Management Disposal Services is working to secure approval for a $35 million biosolids processing facility at its landfill in Norridgewock that would offer a long-term solution to the state’s sludge disposal crisis. The town’s planning board last week approved a site plan for a plant that each day would dry, treat and landfill 200 wet tons of wastewater sludge sent there by cities and towns across the state. The 18,000-square-foot facility would be constructed at the Crossroads Landfill operated by Waste Management on Mercer Road. The intention is to have it operational by the end of 2025.

Borealis: At Outcast Camp, fly fishing is for everyone

MAINE PUBLIC • August 22, 2023

Reporter Murray Carpenter heads to the Wild River in Bethel to meet with organizers and guests of "Maine Outcast Camp," a program hosted by the Confluence Collective. Attendees discover creative and informed ways of approaching how to tie a fly, and along the way, they uncover new things about themselves.

Unmanned robotic sailboats will be deployed to the Gulf of Maine for seafloor mapping project

MAINE PUBLIC • August 22, 2023

Fishermen are being asked to watch out for two robotic sailboats that will be cruising in the Gulf of Maine starting next week. The wind and solar-powered boats, called Saildrone Voyagers, will operate at low speeds between a series of predetermined survey lines. Officials with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the 33-foot unmanned boats, which are bright orange in color, will collect data needed to make high resolution maps of a 1,900 square mile stretch of seafloor in the Gulf of Maine. NOAA officials said the area is known to contain deep sea coral habitat, and it's also of interest to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management as a potential site for commercial offshore wind development.

Invasive zebra mussels are on Maine's doorstep

MAINE PUBLIC • August 22, 2023

The Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife has issued a warning that invasive zebra mussels have been found less than 30 miles from the state's border with Canada. Infestations have been found in a lake in Quebec that flows into the Madawaska River, which flows into the Saint John River. IF&W spokesperson Mark Latti says it's urgent that boaters in the Saint John River watershed take precautions to prevent spreading the mussels, which are often transported at their microscopic larval stage , when they aren't visible. "The best thing to do is to clean, dry, and drain your boat or your watercraft after being in a water body," he says.

Rural towns invited to propose project for Maine Service Fellow by Sept. 8

KENNEBEC JOURNAL • August 22, 2023

Maine Service Fellows are recent college graduates (within last five years) who commit a year to living and serving in a community as the additional human resource needed to address a community issue. Volunteer Maine is now accepting letters of intent from communities in Oxford, Franklin, Somerset, Piscataquis, Aroostook, Washington, Hancock, Waldo, Knox, and certain parts of Penobscot counties. The deadline for submitting for the 2023-24 year is Friday, Sept. 8.

Mosquitoes in southern Maine test positive for Jamestown Canyon virus

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • August 22, 2023

Mosquitoes collected in York County have tested positive for a virus that can be transmitted to people and was last detected in Maine four years ago, the state said Tuesday. It is the first time since 2019 that Jamestown Canyon Virus, or JCV, has been detected in the state. The virus is more common in other parts of the country, especially the upper Midwest. It causes a fever and flu-like symptoms.

Editorial: ‘Then came the fires’: Dire warnings about climate change from Canada

BANGOR DAILY NEWS • August 22, 2023

A recent article in Maclean’s magazine offered a description of a heatwave – and its consequences – in British Columbia that sounds like it came from a horror movie. Dealing with the climate havoc will be expensive, costing the country $100 billion a year, every year, the magazine reported. As we’re seeing more and more, these aren’t scare tactics. They are the reality of a planet that is rapidly warming. Data, and the reality of the devastation of wildfires in British Columbia, and Hawaii, should alarm us all. They should also spur more comprehensive action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions while also building resilience to the environmental changes that we know are coming, and in some cases, are already here.

Opinion: Our ‘backyards’ should not be shared without our permission

BANGOR DAILY NEWS • August 22, 2023

In October 2022, the Maine Public Utilities Commission approved a bid from LS Power Grid Maine (a subsidiary of Missouri-based LS Power), to construct a new 140 to 160 mile, 345-kilovolt transmission line. It had also approved an Aroostook County wind farm (King Pine Wind Maine, LLC, a subsidiary of Boston-based Longroad Energy). On June 13,  the Maine Legislature passed LD 924 “to Provide Legislative Approval of the Transmission Project.” We need to make clean energy a reality in Maine but we need to work together for a fair plan. Maine’s “Northern Maine Renewable Energy Development Program” says the PUC shall give preference to proposals that: “Favor use, where practicable, of existing utility and other rights-of-way.” Are other corridors and rights-of-way available? We stakeholder taxpayers and voters care about what happens in our Maine “backyards” when lawmakers serve it up without asking us first. ~ Carole L. Getchell and her husband own property in Corinth that potentially abuts the proposed transmission line corridor