‘I Participate,’ all win
During the week of October 19-24, the “I Participate” initiative will feature all four major television networks highlighting volunteer service in their top-rated shows such as “30 Rock,” “CSI: New York” and “Grey’s Anatomy.”
This announcement made me realize that from the White House to the boardrooms of the top television networks, the value of service in local communities has seen a surge of national attention this year. And amazing stories of service are happening here in Maine every day.
Recently, a group of volunteers transformed an outdoor living area at a local transitional housing location. By clearing underbrush, planting perennials and establishing a picnic area, volunteers created an inviting place for residents and families in the community to gather that otherwise wouldn’t have existed. This is just one ex-ample of how critical volunteering is to meeting the needs of our community.
We all witness the effects of our volunteers as they offer their time and resources daily throughout the state to tackle the tough challenges facing our communities. In order to keep meeting those tough challenges, volunteers will always be in demand.
What can you do? Help provide locally grown foods to public school children; help someone prepare their taxes; be a greeter in a local hospital. There really is something for everyone!
I challenge every Maine resident to visit VolunteerMaine.org and get active by finding a local service initiative. You’ll be glad you did!
Lauren Kelly
AmeriCorps*VISTA
Augusta
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Nearly unenforceable
I recently read about the enforcement of the new distracted driver law.
Statewide, very few stops have been made. Anyone who thought about it knows that this was predictable. Why? Because it places the burden of making instant value judgments on the police officer. It is nearly unenforceable.
Why did this come about? Because our Legislature could not muster the intestinal fortitude to address the real issue head-on — the use of handheld cell phones at the wheel. In like manner, they have never been able to come to terms with a law requiring all motorcyclists and their passengers to wear a helmet. They could not confront the howls from the Harley folks (it’s that image, you know?) or all of the cell phone users who would scream at a law which simply states, “If you have to make a handheld cell phone call or text someone, pull off the road to do it, or if you have to answer a call, do the same, when safe to do so.”
Because of this, I do not think we will see significant enforcement of the distracted driver law anytime soon, nor do I believe that it will have any appreciable impact on the number of accidents and near misses resulting from the use of handheld cell phones while behind the wheel.
Bill Shook
Bangor
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Firefighters for the rich
I am a 74-year-old Maine resident who is ashamed of the way we handle health care in our country. We stand alone among developed nations of the world in denying life-saving care to the most vulnerable of our citizens, those who through circumstances of employment or random bad luck cannot benefit from modern medicine.
I am fortunate that my medical expenses are covered by Medicare and private insurance, through my husband’s federal retirement plan. I am recovering from knee surgery; although painful, I did not bear the additional pain of possible bankruptcy. Why shouldn’t every citizen have an equal opportunity to good health care?
The onset of disease is like having a fire in your home, a random unanticipated disaster that requires immediate professional help. What if the fire department only helped those who were wealthy, or else could prove they were very poor and on Medicaid, or elderly and on Medicare?
The present system has been given more than enough time and clearly does not work — except to line the pockets of the executives and shareholders of private insurance and pharmaceutical companies, and the politicians who are lavishly supported by contributions from their lobbyists.
We need a publicly supported alternative along the lines of Medicare or military and congressional health plans and nonprofit private providers like the Mayo Clinic. This will give private corporations some long overdue real competition, which no doubt is why they so vigorously oppose it. I support President Obama’s efforts and hope that Congress will ignore partisan demagogues and lobbyists who oppose it.
Dorothy Odell
Belfast
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Anti-TABOR effort
The opponents of TABOR are out in force, all taking a break from their government or government-funded jobs to oppose tax breaks for hardworking Mainers. It’s a tired act and I hope Maine people won’t buy it. I certainly won’t; we need TABOR and we need it badly.
The group “Maine Can do Better,” which is leading the charge against real tax relief in Maine, has about 100 groups signed up to oppose TABOR. I just saw a report from MainePolicy.org that notes that these groups receive more than $700 million in taxpayer dollars combined. So when you hear these groups claiming doom and gloom if TABOR passes, keep in mind that they survive almost solely off your tax dollars.
They say TABOR will “harm business”; they are completely wrong. It will give business more opportunity to grow because their heavy tax burden will be lightened, and give them more freedom to grow and prosper in Maine.
I’m voting yes on Question 4 because I know that even though entrenched, government-funded opponents are satisfied with the status quo, most Mainers are not, and we need something to help businesses in Maine prosper.
Nicholas Wood
Bradley
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Waiting too long
When will we learn? From the time our country was founded until today, history has shown us that when downtrodden people finally say, “We will wait no longer to be treated equally and fairly,” they eventually triumph.
For nearly a century before the 19th Amendment was passed, women endured ridicule, arrest and jail while seeking the right to vote.
They had to wait too long. On Dec. 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, now thought of as the mother of the civil rights movement, refused to give up her bus seat to a white man, which was the start of a long overdue move toward fairness and equality. Millions of our finest people had to wait too long.
In November, many of our friends and neighbors whom Mother Nature decided would be gay will reach the same fork in the road. They have waited and suffered too long.
History has again shown us that their cause will eventually succeed, if not this year then the next, or the next.
Maine voters will do themselves proud and the state a big favor by voting no on Question 1 and upholding the law passed by our legislators and governor, and possibly avoiding repeating the same thing with more divisiveness, hurt and cost.
Harlan and Dorothy Gardner
Marshfield