SAD 27 falling apart
I made an appearance at the fourth SAD 27 budget meeting on Oct. 27. There were approximately 100 people in attendance, 95 percent of whom were financially dependent on the budget. I left.
At the last three budget meetings, the dozen or so voters in attendance who were not dependent on the budget, including myself, were jeered, ridiculed and humiliated when we attempted to make adjustments in the budget, so as not to affect the students. This childish behavior continued for some time after the meeting by some of the SAD 27 dependents.
I now feel like most of the voters, and finally understand and agree that there is no point in attending these meetings. The only way to have a voice in the budget procedure and the resulting tax consequence is for voters to make their opinion known at the local referendum. Remember it worked the last three times. Continue to be heard.
Winterville has withdrawn from the district, Wallagrass and Eagle Lake are presently in the seventh step of the state withdrawal procedure, and a petition for withdrawal is presently being circulated in Fort Kent. This will leave, New Canada, St. John and St. Francis in the district, with a total of approximately 100 students remaining in SAD 27.
I hope the administration, the board and the employees of the district realize what is happening and why.
Robert Michaud
Fort Kent
Debates for Democrats
Why are the Democrats not allowing any conservative media outlets to hold a presidential debate for them? How can American citizens get honest answers from the Democrats when all they do is reply to their own party lines? Or is it that they don’t want to answer questions from conservative media outlets?
Judy Carter
Cherryfield
Suicide not ‘successful conclusion’
On Oct. 30, I read an article titled “ Waterville Rite Aid robber found dead.” It described the death of 22-year-old Nathan Boulette. He is suspected to have stolen prescription drugs from the Rite Aid with a knife around 3 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 29. He was found dead by police Friday around noon. He was holding a pill bottle similar to those stolen.
At the end of this article, a police officer said this is a “successful conclusion.” This comment is offensive to his grieving friends and family. The death of a young person is not a “successful conclusion.”
Boulette’s actions were characteristic of suicide. His Facebook page is littered with evidence of his depression. His death emphasizes the need for more access to mental health services and health care in Maine. He should have gotten help to improve his mental health months ago. It would have been a success for Boulette to overcome his depression.
If the police had caught Boulette alive last Thursday, that would have been successful. How was his death successful? If this is what the police consider a successful conclusion, I wonder what makes a failure.
Lorelei Looker
Ellsworth
LePage lacks stewardship
On Oct. 5, I was one of many Mount Desert Island’s silent and stunned taxpayers listening to Gov. Paul LePage’s town hall meeting. I was shocked by his belligerent behavior speaking to us as if he had a mandate.
Unfortunately, no one asked this governor about the Juniper Ridge Landfill and the long-term toxic waste that will be released into the Penobscot River watershed if it is expanded.
LePage’s notion of stewardship defies every concept of economic and ecological discussions we have ever had in Maine. It goes against every core human ecology concept ever spoken about at the College of the Atlantic or any institution of higher education.
Northern Maine’s rivers flow from the headwaters near Mount Katahdin and the western mountains. Maine people must protect these headwaters with a national park, which will also produce jobs in northern Maine. The Penobscot and Kennebec rivers are the lifeblood of the Gulf of Maine fisheries.
The people of Maine must protect the headwaters of Maine’s great rivers for the future just as George B. Dorr, John D. Rockefeller and the great forward thinking men and women of the late 1800s protected Mount Desert Island and Acadia National Park.
The 61 percent, who did not vote for LePage in 2010, are fed up with the total disregard for our state’s resources. Another three years of this behavior will destroy the fabric of our great state.
I am one of the proud 61 percent who never voted for him. Please resign, governor.
Michael J. Good
President and owner
Down East Nature Tours LLC
Bar Harbor
More biofuel better
I applaud the state’s efforts to develop a cellulosic ethanol industry as explained in the Oct. 24 BDN article, “Is there fuel in those trees? Maine’s forests, distant hopes of alternative fuel revolution.” But it should be noted Maine already has an advanced biofuel producer that could use a little encouragement from the federal government.
At Maine Standard Biofuels, we collect used cooking grease from more than 900 restaurants — from Bar Harbor to Connecticut — and recycle it into cleaner-burning biodiesel. In fact, the California Air Resources Board recently found that biodiesel reduces greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 81 percent when compared to petroleum.
The Environmental Protection Agency, however, earlier this spring proposed only modest increases in the volume requirements for biodiesel under the Renewable Fuel Standard. For example, the biodiesel industry produced more than 1.8 billion gallons in 2013 and the EPA has proposed volumes of just 1.9 billion gallons for 2017.
It only makes sense to take advantage of more biodiesel to help meet our climate change goals. A study for the industry found that increasing the Renewable Fuel Standard biodiesel target by 350 million gallons annually would eliminate 18 percent of the U.S. transportation sector’s reduction obligation under a new commitment made by the Obama administration. That’s equivalent to removing 11.5 million cars from U.S. highways.
Before the Renewable Fuel Standard volumes are finalized, the EPA should re-evaluate their earlier proposal and give biodiesel production the significant boost it deserves.
Jarmin Kaltsas
Portland