Time to talk policy
Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump should stop all the personal attacks and spend their time explaining in detail exactly what they would do to help our country and, most importantly, how they would pay for their proposals. Let’s get down to the nitty-gritty and ask them the important questions.
Frank Carr
Bangor
Fund better support for students
As a survivor of violent crime, a mother and child advocate, I appreciate Regina Rooney’s point of view in her Oct. 14 BDN OpEd about how we talk about domestic violence. It is important to recognize that domestic violence also is an acute childhood trauma that our children may experience before coming to school each day. Education and support are the keys along with a community partnership in the educational process for helping children suffering from abuse.
When a child feels safe and secure in her environment at home and at school, her ability to learn is exponential and far more cumulative. Not only is domestic violence an adverse childhood experience affecting our students’ ability to learn, so are homelessness, bullying, neglect, poverty, physical, emotional and sexual abuse, death of a loved one, immigration and refugee status, severe medical interventions and community violence.
One way to address these traumas that affect our children’s behaviors and learning abilities within the classroom is to build an educational partnership between our school districts, communities and state to provide more funding for our schools. We begin this November by voting yes on Question 2 to provide approximately $157 million to help schools fund more school nurses and social workers. Our schools need more social workers, nurses and educational support staff to help recognize and address the behavioral and mental health challenges in our classrooms.
School nurses and social workers are the keys of support for our children, and education is a key to ending the cycle of violence.
Terri Lynn Pulley
Executive board president
Maine Educational Connections for Children and Adults
Gardiner
Ban the bag
All of us are familiar with the ubiquitous single-use plastic bag that we get at check-outs at supermarkets and chain stores. Maine residents use 600 million of these single-use bags each year, according to the Natural Resources Council of Maine. Of those, only a small percentage get recycled.
The idea that we are helping the environment by reusing these bags for trash and dog waste, as many of us do, overlooks the fact that they may end up in a landfill, where they will never degrade. Others that find their way into the waterways will become unsightly litter, a threat to marine animals or degrade into microplastics that likely will be consumed by marine life, working their way up the food chain to humans.
Inconveniently, the answer is not in biodegradable bags. True biodegradables will either turn into microplastics at sea or will break down only in a commercial composting facility, few of which exist in Maine. The heat generated in a home composter would not be sufficient, so biodegradable bags that go to a landfill will degrade no more than the polyethylene bags, which for all intents and purposes means never.
The answer is in eliminating these bags. It’s a small step in the right direction. As a member of Ban the Bag in Belfast, I hope Belfast will join the six communities in Maine that have enacted ordinances to tax or prohibit their use. My hope is that this will promote use of reusable bags, increase awareness of our wasteful use of plastics and begin the conversation about how to limit their use.
Eden Buron
Belfast
Jackson for Senate District 1
Democrat Troy Jackson of Allagash has been a loyal advocate of working families in Senate District 1. He understands that in northern Maine the forestry economy and farming industries are the foundation of our natural resource economy and key to the success of related businesses.
Jackson showed leadership and courage in supporting the interests of Maine loggers who were losing their livelihoods as companies replaced them with cheap Canadian labor at wages that would bankrupt an American worker. He has been a staunch supporter of sustainable agriculture. He worked with the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association for the passage of LD 718 to protect Mainers’ right to know if there are GMOs in their food.
Jackson understands how difficult it can be to find jobs in our rural areas and that many families struggle to make ends meet. He is committed to addressing the issues of rising property taxes. He believes in protecting our seniors and others dealing with enormous medical costs. He has received key endorsements by the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine, the Maine Credit Union League and the Maine Education Association.
Jackson introduced Sen. Bernie Sanders at the Maine Democratic State Convention. He spoke about the impact of college costs, student debt, funding social security and campaign finance reform. Maine should be a place where workers can earn a living wage and pay fair taxes. Jackson is a straight-talking, respectful and authentic Mainer. He’s never afraid to speak truth to power on behalf of all Maine’s residents. I would encourage others to vote for Jackson this November.
JoAnne Putnam
Chapman
Trump not a fiscal conservative
Last month, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan group that advocates debt reduction, examined the fiscal proposals of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. It found that Clinton’s policy proposals would increase the national debt by $200 billion over the next 10 years, while Trump’s proposals would increase the debt by $5.3 trillion over the same period.
One difference in the two plans that contributes to the high cost for Trump’s plan is his insistence on lowering the tax rate for billionaires and millionaires. Clinton’s plan increases the tax rate on that group while giving a tax cut to the middle class. In addition to all of his other issues, Trump doesn’t sound like much of a conservative Republican.
Fred Egan
York Harbor
Election notice
The BDN will stop accepting letters and OpEds related to the Nov. 8 election on Oct. 28. Not all submissions can be published.