Maine Currents

Producer/Host: Amy Browne

This month:

Segment 1: An interview with Ridgely Fuller, Tom Mikulka, and Chuck Spranger of Third Act’s new Maine working group They are holding a day of action in Portland and Belfast on 3/21/23 FMI: email [email protected] or [email protected]

Segment 2: Bucksport residents have teamed up with neighbors upriver who have been dealing with Juniper Ridge, and will hold an informational forum as the town considers a proposal to reopen a problematic landfill. Organizer Don White joins us with details of event, which will be held at 6:30 pm, 3/7, at Brown Hall (corner of Elm & Franklin Streets, Bucksport)

Segment 3: Naomi Albert of A Climate to Thrive on their Climate Ambassador program

Guests:
see above

FMI
see above

About the host:

Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices and Maine Currents, she also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and the First Place 2017 Radio News Award from the Maine Association of Broadcasters.

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Producer/Host: Amy Browne

This month:

Last fall, a representative of American Iron & Metal (AIM), the multinational scrap metal company that owns part of the former mill site in Bucksport, raised the possibility of partnering with the town to reopen the mill’s old landfill to accept construction and demolition debris. Though they own the property, as a private company they are required under Maine law to partner with a municipality or the state. Since they floated the idea verbally in October, no official written proposal has been received, but the as town officials and concerned residents have explored the issue, new issues have come to light — not only about reopening the old landfill, but about the condition of that existing site, which it as it turns out, has been out of DEP compliance for years.

In January we spoke with several concerned residents and Town Manager Susan Lessard.

NOTE: The January public meeting at Brown Hall has been postponed

Guests:
Tracey Hair, Ralph Chapman, Don White, Bill Tymoczko, Hans Krichels, Susan Lessard

FMI
Bucksport Town Council
Bucksport Town Council Agendas

About the host:

Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices and Maine Currents, she also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and the First Place 2017 Radio News Award from the Maine Association of Broadcasters.

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Producer/Host: Amy Browne

This month: We’re kicking off 2023 with a topic that I suspect we may be spending a lot of time on this year, the pending decision on where to build a staging facility for off-shore wind power turbines in this area. Theoretically, 3 different sites are being considered: Eastport, Sears Island or Mack Point in Searsport, but some of those close to the project suspect that developing Sears Island is the real goal of the ME DOT.

Guests:
Steve Miller, Islesboro Islands Trust
Rolf Olsen, Friends of Sears Island
Becky Bartovics, Sierra Club Maine

FMI
Islesboro Islands Trust
Maine Chapter of the Sierra ClubFriends of Sears Island Offshore Wind Project Resources page
Study of Searsport to Support and Develop Offshore Wind, State of Maine, Governor’s Energy Office
Maine DOT Offshore Wind Port Advisory Group (OSWPAG)
Governor Mills Announces Assessment of Mack Point Terminal in Searsport to Support Growth of Renewable Energy Industry in Maine, Office of Governor Janet Mills, March 2020
SEARS ISLAND WETLAND ENFORCEMENT CASE SETTLED, EPA, 11/13/1996

About the host:

Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices and Maine Currents, she also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and the First Place 2017 Radio News Award from the Maine Association of Broadcasters.

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Producer/Host: Amy Browne

Sears Island, located near Searsport, is a 940 acre island connected to the mainland since the late 80s by a causeway. Though it is near industrialized areas, it is mostly undeveloped and currently uninhabited by humans. Many people use the island recreationally, year ’round.
Over the decades, people who care about the island have protected it from one proposed development after another- and the island may be under threat again.
Today we’ll hear about the latest development proposed for the island- from some of the folks who have been involved over the years.

Guests:
Steve Miller of Islesboro Islands Trust
Susan White & Rolf Olsen of Friends of Sears Island
Becky Bartovics & Matthew Cannon of Sierra Club Maine

FMI (including reports referenced on the show)
Friends of Sears Island Offshore Wind Project Resources page

About the host:

Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices and Maine Currents, she also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and the First Place 2017 Radio News Award from the Maine Association of Broadcasters.

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Producer/Host: Amy Browne

On this month’s edition of Maine Currents, we bring you to the Word Festival in Blue Hill in October 2021. Reading from their website: “Every October, Word brings together readers, writers, and tellers of tales to celebrate the written and spoken word—fiction and non-fiction, children’s literature, poetry, drama, nonfiction, storytelling and more. The festival takes place in Blue Hill, Maine where a literary tradition of great thinkers and artists extends over two hundred years and includes Jonathan Fisher, Mary Ellen Chase, and E.B. White to name a few. Many writers continue to call the Blue Hill peninsula home as does a large community of passionate readers. To celebrate this rich heritage, Word presents three days of author readings, a poetry crawl, writing workshops, panel discussions, school events, and spoken word performances to sold out crowds.”

One of the events this year was an interview with Bob Keyes, author of the new book, Isolation Artist: Scandal, Deception, and the Last Days of Robert Indiana, conducted by Paul Sacaridiz, Executive Director of Haystack Mountain School of Crafts. The talk was recorded via zoom by festival organizers, and we thank them for making it available to our listeners.

About the host:

Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices and Maine Currents, she also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and the First Place 2017 Radio News Award from the Maine Association of Broadcasters.

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Producer/Editor/Host: Amy Browne

Our guests today are artist Robert Shetterly, the creator of the “Americans Who Tell the Truth” portrait series. His latest book is called Portraits of Racial Justice: Americans Who Tell the Truth, and filmmaker / documentarian Richard Kane, of Kane Lewis Productions. They have just released a new film called Truth Tellers, about Robert Shetterly’s work. Cameo by co-producer Melody Lewis-Kane

Tune in to hear some clips from the new film, which debuted at the recent Camden International Film Festival, as well as a discussion of Shetterly’s latest book.

About the host:

Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices and Maine Currents, she also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and the First Place 2017 Radio News Award from the Maine Association of Broadcasters.

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Producer/Editor/Host: Amy Browne
Some of the historic segments on today’s show were coproduced with Meredith DeFrancesco

NOTE: The time of the 9/11 vigil in Bucksport has been changed to 9:30

The 20th anniversary of the 9/11 tragedy is this coming Saturday, so this week we take a listen back at how the WERU community responded, what was happening behind the scenes at the station in the hours and days that followed, and how our news coverage was impacted—and we’ll hear from David Weeda, one of the organizers of an event in Bucksport this coming September 11th.

We start with a chat with WERU’s General Manager Matt Murphy and Program Director Joel Mann

About the host:

Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices and Maine Currents, she also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and the First Place 2017 Radio News Award from the Maine Association of Broadcasters.

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Producer/Editor/Host: Amy Browne
Recorded by: Matt Murphy

Maine-based New York Times best-selling author Colin Woodard speaking in Blue Hill on June 24th, 2021, about his latest book, Union: The Struggle to Forge the Story of United States Nationhood FMI: www.colinwoodard.com

About the host:

Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices and Maine Currents, she also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and the First Place 2017 Radio News Award from the Maine Association of Broadcasters.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download