Tree Growth Tax does its job
In a Nov. 12 BDN article about lawmakers touring pulp paper mills, Sen. Mike Thibodeau condemned Maine’s small-private landowners as hindrances to the pulp industry. He parroted the LePage administration’s gag line that, if only landowners enrolled in Maine’s Tree Growth Tax Law harvested more timber, then our mills would be flush with cheap wood.
Two weeks ago, the Baileyville mill’s wood procurement supervisor told our foresters’ gathering that wood entering that mill travels 105 miles on average. That mill sits on the border and procures Maine and Canadian wood. It is implausible that a few Tree Growth landowners are creating those long commutes and high costs.
Please also consider the Maine Forest Service’s 2014 report to the Maine Legislature. It stated “that landowners enrolled in the Tree Growth program in the organized municipalities were responsible for an average of 53 percent of reported harvest acres … [though] Tree Growth properties comprise 44 percent of the total forestland acreage… and landowners enrolled in the Tree Growth program appear to be … keeping up their end of the bargain.”
Though the mills want cheap wood, the reality is that their procurement policies set the prices. If the mills are paying too much, I assume it’s to the large suppliers, who bargain with their large volumes, not the small owner enrolled in the Tree Growth program. Tree Growth serves Maine well, and sustains a steady supply of wood and related employment and helps provide plentiful bird, mammal and fish habitat.
Harold Burnett
Two Trees Forestry
Winthrop
Delegation should support park
May I offer a challenge to Sens. Angus King and Susan Collins and Reps. Bruce Poliquin and Chellie Pingree to together introduce legislation to create a national park and recreation area? In doing so, they would join those great legislators who have proven themselves to be conservation leaders.
President Barack Obama has already proven his eligibility as a conservation leader by protecting more than 2 million acres of public land, including establishing or enlarging 19 national monuments. Obama could through an executive order designate as a national monument the area proposed by landowner Elliotsville Plantation Inc. to become a national park and recreation area, but how much better it would be if our Maine delegation took the reins and introduced national park legislation.
Their action would best reflect the consensus reached by area stakeholders and the landowner to guarantee hunting and snowmobile access while preserving the unspoiled beauty of this magnificent area and ensured economic development in the Katahdin region and beyond.
Edith Manns
Camden
Combat human trafficking
The Maine Women’s Fund, as a funder of the important work to combat human trafficking, applauds the Maine Coalition Against Sexual Assault on the release of the first Maine human trafficking needs assessment executive summary. Two-hundred victim advocates and law enforcement officials attended the Governor’s Summit on Human Trafficking on Nov. 12 and 13 in Lincolnville, to raise awareness and to highlight the statewide effort (at governmental, organizational, and individual levels) to combat human trafficking in Maine. We encourage Maine residents to learn more about this critical issue by reading the assessment’s executive summary.
The Maine Women’s Fund, the only Maine foundation focused exclusively on advancing economic security for women and girls, invests in nonprofits committed to helping achieve this goal. Since 1989, the fund has granted more than $1.9 million to nearly 200 organizations. The fund has made multiple grants in recent years to the Maine Coalition Against Sexual Assault to invest in the work combating human trafficking and providing support services for victims and survivors.
Natalie Solotoff
President
Maine Women’s Fund board of directors
Portland
Where is the bravery?
I was appalled, but not surprised, to learn that Rep. Bruce Poliquin voted against the president’s (very modest) plan to allow 10,000 Syrian refugees into the United States. This looks very much like craven fearmongering.
What has a country of some 330 million people to fear from a small number of desperate men, women and children who have given up everything to flee the hell-hole that is Syria? Dispersed among 50 states, that would amount to 200 people per state. Surely we can handle that.
Our own national anthem calls this “the land of the free and the home of the brave.” How brave is the vote in Congress? France, which has suffered the most from recent terrorist attacks, has not wavered from its pledge to accept tens of thousands of Syrian refugees. France, which has been derided in the past, by some, as a feckless ally of the U.S., is showing what bravery really means.
Pamela Storm
Brooksville