Letter: What Commissioner Camuso is doing is working

BANGOR DAILY NEWS • June 2, 2025

V. Paul Reynold’s May 28 column, “Is this the role of Maine’s fish and wildlife commissioner?” criticizes Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife Commissioner Judy Camuso over her efforts to bring more women into Maine’s sporting community. But he fails to mention a critical fact: these outreach efforts are working to keep Maine’s hunting and fishing economies alive. Maine sold more hunting licenses in 2022 than it did in 2002. Here’s part of the answer: women! Maine now boasts one of the highest hunting license rates among women in the country. ~ Rachel Libby, Milford

Opinion: Collins should protect clean power investments, lower energy costs and jobs

BANGOR DAILY NEWS • May 31, 2025

As an IBEW member in Maine representing over 4,000 workers, I know firsthand how important clean energy is to making our economy work for all of us. The U.S. House budget reconciliation bill, however, proposes what amounts to a total repeal of many clean energy investments, putting our jobs at risk. This bill is a direct assault on American manufacturing and American-made energy right here in Maine. The Trump Administration has already arbitrarily attacked Mainers’ access to energy efficient heat pumps that can help bring the costs of heating and cooling our homes under control, even as Maine is embracing them more and more, but now U.S. House Republicans want to immediately repeal all federal tax credits that can help working people lower their energy bills. ~ Rep. Kilton Webb

Iceland’s Panoply of Birds, Wells, Jun 17

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • June 2, 2025

During the summer months, Iceland’s round-the-clock sunlight draws in a panoply of birds: Razorbills, guillemots, phalaropes, godwits, plovers, terns, and puffins. Wildlife photographer Shawn Carey shares images and stories from his journey to two Icelandic islands. In Mather Auditorium at Wells Reserve at Laudholm, June 17, 7 pm, free. Sponsored by York County Audubon.

Maine tree spraying will kill any caterpillars, not just forest pest

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • June 2, 2025

A government-funded campaign has begun spraying insecticides and biological agents on 240,000 acres of Maine’s North Woods infested with spruce budworm, a voracious forest pest that killed millions of spruce and fir trees during its last population explosion. JBI Helicopters began spraying tebufenozide over 9,000 acres in far western Maine on Thursday. The spraying, approved by the Board of Pesticide Control in April, could last through June 25 of this year. The tebufenozide (MIMIC) kills the budworm caterpillar by triggering a premature molt. Any caterpillar that eats it will die, however, including those that turn into beneficial moths and butterflies. A biological agent, Bacillus thuringiensis kurstaki (Btk) is also authorized for use, but will likely be applied in much smaller amounts. It destroys the caterpillar’s gut lining.

Pineland Farms sells its historic Maine dairy herd

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • June 2, 2025

Pineland Farms has shut down its milking operation and sold off all but two cows in its Holstein herd, considered one of the oldest in the nation. It’s keeping a pair of youngsters for educational purposes. It’s a bittersweet change for staff at Pineland Farms — a farm, education center and major cheese producer with a large campus in New Gloucester. And it’s an upsetting change for some community members. But milking and caring for 100 cows had become too costly — Pineland Farms said it lost $500,000 to $600,000 a year on the operation in recent years. Dairy producers across the state have expressed similar concerns: that costs are unsustainable, profits are shrinking and smaller farms in particular are struggling to stay afloat.

Lewiston’s effort to improve its image starts with Kennedy Park

SUN JOURNAL • June 1, 2025

City Administrator Bryan Kaenrath told city councilors last week Kennedy Park is the “crown jewel of our city park system,” but is currently “not an inviting place” for all residents and visitors. He said a new effort between Public Works and the Police Department will aim to change that. The city will be placing more emphasis on maintenance and minimizing “behaviors” in the park that make it uninviting, including public intoxication. The renewed focus on Kennedy Park is part of a larger, multi-pronged effort to improve Lewiston’s image. Initial efforts will include graffiti cleanup, trash violation enforcement, and renovations to the Wiseman Bridge. Public safety is the No. 1 concern and the downtown’s biggest barrier to economic development.

Maine leading the way in seaweed farming, the new frontier of American agriculture

BANGOR DAILY NEWS • June 2, 2025

From Eastport to Biddeford, a new kind of farming is transforming Maine’s working waterfronts. Seaweed farming, one of the fastest growing forms of aquaculture, is no longer a niche idea. It’s a serious agricultural sector with growing demand, measurable environmental benefits, and real opportunity to enhance rural prosperity. And Maine is leading the charge. But seaweed farmers need the same science-based support that land-based agriculture has received for generations. Maine has the farmers. We have the science. We have the opportunity. Let’s match it with the investment and policy support needed to lead the next chapter of American agriculture — from the water up. ~ Deborah Bronk, Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences

Editorial: A Maine with more trails is a better Maine

MAINE SUNDAY TELEGRAM • June 1, 2025

We express our firm support for the passage last week in Augusta of two trail development bills, LD 29 and LD 30. The advancement of both is the result of hard work by advocates of outdoor recreation in our state. LD 30, the replacement of the abandoned rail line connecting Portland and Auburn with a multiuse pedestrian the Casco Bay Trail is supported by the mayors of both cities. “Economically, trails bring real dollars into local businesses,” wrote Mark Dion (Portland) and Jeffrey Harmon (Auburn). The viability of passenger rail in Maine, while hotly and persuasively defended, is still grimly theoretical. There is no doubt that a forward-looking Maine would benefit greatly from robust networks of both rail and trail. These trails pay off. Let’s start bringing them into being.

10th annual Walk the Working Waterfront celebrates Portland’s coastal culture

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • May 31, 2025

Ocean and seafood lovers braved the rain Saturday to celebrate Portland’s working waterfront culture during the 10th annual Walk the Working Waterfront event. All along Commercial Street, people in rain jackets stopped by booths marked with orange flags, learned about lobster traps and aquaculture, and sipped samples of hot clam chowder. “It’s a celebration of Portland’s protected waterfront,” said Katie Tims, of the city’s Sustainability Office. “We’re preserving the working waterfront industry and how Portland became a prominent city.”

Tracking Maine’s wild mussel beds: Declining or retreating into the deep?

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • May 31, 2025

The wild blue mussel beds that once blanketed Maine’s dynamic intertidal zone are disappearing, driven out by warming water that not only hurts the mussels themselves but benefits one of its chief predators, the highly invasive and always hungry green crab. Scientists at the Gulf of Maine Research Institute want to know if the intertidal disappearing act is a sign the blue mussel population is in decline or in retreat, with its local beds gradually moving out of the easy-to-spot intertidal into the colder waters of the more far-flung subtidal zone.

Androscoggin River, once a ‘national disgrace’, should be recognized for cleanup efforts, advocates say

SUN JOURNAL • May 30, 2025

Over 50 years after U.S. Sen. Edmund Muskie helped usher in the federal Clean Water Act, the Androscoggin River, which he once called “a national disgrace” for its pollution, may be on the verge of a momentous milestone. The Maine Department of Environmental Protection is considering upgrading the classification of key stretches of the river, including through Lewiston-Auburn, from the current lowest-quality designation. Such a move would reflect years of improvement to a river that was once emblematic of industrial contamination. The push to reclassify the river’s water quality from Class C to Class B comes as the Department of Environmental Protection seeks public input as part of a three-year review process.

Letter: Camuso is great IF&W commissioner

BANGOR DAILY NEWS • May 30, 2025

In response to V. Paul Reynolds’ May 28 opinion column about Inland Fisheries and Wildlife Commissioner Judy Camuso; I think he couldn’t be more wrong. Commissioner Camuso has been one of Maine’s best. Maybe Reynolds should go back to the 1900s and fight women’s suffrage. It seems that’s where he belongs. ~ Ed Pineau, Orono [Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine lobbyist]

Maine fish and wildlife commissioner defends department after recent criticism

BANGOR DAILY NEWS • May 30, 2025

The Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife was in the public crosshairs this week when criticism from former employees got traction on social media. Commissioner Judy Camuso on Thursday defended the department after former employees accused her of giving favoritism to women for promotions, using inappropriate publicity stunts to get people into events and straying from the missions of the department. Camuso said Thursday that the department needs to adapt if the state’s hunting and fishing traditions are to survive. “I believe that the outdoors is for anyone,” she said. “We are doing everything we can to protect fish and wildlife for the public and making sure the public understands what we’re doing.”

A fisherman’s new boat is caught up in Donald Trump’s cuts to Maine

BANGOR DAILY NEWS • May 30, 2025

More than 40 years of pulling lobster traps ruined John Cotton’s shoulders. Cotton, 64, started Ice House Oysters in 2016 to stay working on the water without hiring staff, after he found it difficult to find reliable help. Cotton was working with a federally funded program at UMaine Cooperative Extension called AgrAbility, which helps blue-collar workers overcome disabilities so they can remain on the job. The program was helping him purchase a boat with a mechanical arm. But the program was one of the dozens of federal grants that President Trump has terminated. Cotton’s situation shows how the impact of these cuts has trickled down across the state, including to the ordinary people who make up the state’s heritage industries like fishing, farming and logging.

Bill to facilitate coastal rebuilding in Harpswell expanded to all towns

HARPSWELL ANCHOR • May 29, 2025

A bill initiated and co-written by Harpswell officials to facilitate coastal rebuilding from the January 2024 storms has been expanded to include all coastal communities in Maine. Maine Senate President Mattie Daughtry, D-Brunswick, submitted the bill, L.D. 1864, to the Legislature in early May. It would allow working waterfront property owners to bypass certain zoning rules so they can rebuild structures damaged during the back-to-back coastal storms. If passed, the bill would let communities grant variances to their shoreland zoning and floodplain management ordinances to repair or rebuild structures that don’t meet the typical threshold for approval.

NOAA predicts colder than normal deep-water temperatures for the Gulf of Maine

MAINE PUBLIC • May 29, 2025

The Gulf of Maine will again experience colder than normal bottom-water temperatures, according to a new forecast from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NOAA projects deep water temperatures in the Gulf of Maine will be cooler by 0.9 to 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit this summer, compared to the seasonal average. The forecast appears to continue a trend that Maine scientists observed for the last year and a half. Nick Record, a senior scientist with the Bigelow Laboratory, said recent measurements taken through the lab's survey are consistent with NOAA's outlook. Colder deep waters may create more favorable conditions for lobster, groundfish and whales.

Scientists say algae are waging 'chemical warfare' on kelp forests in the Gulf of Maine

MAINE PUBLIC • May 29, 2025

Rapidly growing turf algae are effectively waging chemical warfare on kelp forests in the Gulf of Maine, according to a new study from researchers at Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences and the University of Maine. Lead author Shane Farrell said the algae have proliferated due to warming waters, and are releasing chemicals that make it harder for kelp to survive. Farrell said losing those kelp forests threatens a linchpin of the marine ecosystem. "They're much like coral reefs or rainforests, you know, they provide habitat, food and refuge for a variety of species, making them biodiversity hotspots," he said.

Mills signs bill to shut off fire suppression systems with forever chemicals at Brunswick Landing

TIMES RECORD • May 28, 2025

Gov. Janet Mills has signed LD 07, An Act to Prohibit the Use of Aqueous Film-Forming Foam at the Former Brunswick Naval Air Station. It stipulates that starting Jan. 1, 2026, the use and storage of AFFF — a fire suppression foam containing a toxic PFAS chemical known as PFOS — will be prohibited at the former air station. LD 407 among several “forever chemicals” bills that lawmakers are considering this session following a catastrophic firefighting spill at the Brunswick Executive Airport’s hangar 4 in August 2024.

Maine House passes bill to require landlords to test for PFAS

MAINE PUBLIC • May 28, 2025

The Maine House has given initial approval to two bills that expand testing for the "forever chemicals" known as PFAS. State law already requires landlords in Maine to test for arsenic in private well water every five years. A bill that received initial approval Wednesday in the House would add PFAS to that list as concerns grow in rural Maine about contamination linked to PFAS-laden sludge that was spread as fertilizer on farm fields.

Here’s what a Texas oil executive from DOGE is doing inside the Interior Department

ASSOCIATED PRESS • May 27, 2025

Tyler Hassen, Texas oil executive from Elon Musk’s government efficiency team. He lacks Senate confirmation, has no public administration experience, hasn’t divested his energy investments or filed an ethics commitment to break ties with companies that pose a conflict of interest. Yet, he has been given sweeping powers to overhaul the federal department that manages vast tracts of resource-rich public lands. “It’s a dereliction of duty to offload decisions about staffing and funding at the Interior Department to someone who hasn’t even been confirmed by the Senate,” said Kate Groetzinger, with the Center for Western Priorities, a nonpartisan conservation group. A department spokesperson said that Hassen is helping achieve the president’s vision for major changes.