Talk of the Towns

Producer/Hosts: Ron Beard and Liz Graves
Theme music for Talk of the Towns Theme music for Talk of the Towns is a medley from Coronach, on a Balnain House Highland Music recording.

Talk of the Towns: Local Community concerns and opportunities

This month:
Advocacy and Non-violent Direct Action: A conversation with George Lakey and Sue Inches.
How do we make change in the face of policies that seem wrong, either because they harm people or the earth? Some situations call for building relationships with policy makers and using the art of persuasion. But if persuasion doesn’t work, a backup plan might include non-violent direct action, confronting those in power and stirring the public as a result of media attention. Our conversation with two activists and authors help us understand these choices and how they fit into today’s landscape of change.

Topics include:
What is the connection between advocacy and non-violent direct action, with one or two examples and lessons learned along the way?
In your writing, you have both illuminated the need for vision that leads to strategy that leads to the hard slog of change… talk more about the importance of vision and strategy in any campaign for change.
You have also written about the importance of community, as a grounding force, as a source of support… say more about the ways in which you see “community building” as part of your work.
How do you understand our present moment and what has brought us here? Are there some key events or trends in our history that help us understand where we have come to?
Each of you have been energized by engagement with young people, in your classrooms and in your campaigns. Are there attributes of the rising generation that are particularly inspiring?

Guest/s:

George Lakey author of Dancing with History: A life for peace and justice, Seven Stories Press, 2022. See also: www.georgelakeyfilm.com
Sue Inches, author of Advocating for the Environment, North Atlantic Books, 2021. See also sueinches.com

About the hosts:

Ron Beard is producer and host of Talk of the Towns, which first aired on WERU in 1993 as part of his community building work as an Extension professor with University of Maine Cooperative Extension and Sea Grant. He took all the journalism courses he could fit in while an undergraduate student in wildlife management and served as an intern with Maine Public Television nightly newscast in the early 1970s. Ron is an adjunct faculty member at College of the Atlantic, teaching courses on community development. Ron served on the Bar Harbor Town Council for six years and is currently board chair for the Jesup Memorial Library in Bar Harbor, where he has lived since 1975. Look for him on the Allagash River in June, and whenever he can get away, in the highlands of Scotland where he was fortunate to spend two sabbaticals.

Liz Graves joined Talk of the Towns as co-producer and co-host in July 2022, having long admired public affairs programming on WERU and dreamed of getting involved in community radio. She works as the Town Clerk for the Town of Bar Harbor, and is a former editor of the Mount Desert Islander weekly newspaper. Liz grew up in California and came to Maine as a schooner sailor.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Producer/Hosts: Ron Beard and Liz Graves
Theme music for Talk of the Towns Theme music for Talk of the Towns is a medley from Coronach, on a Balnain House Highland Music recording.

Talk of the Towns: Local Community concerns and opportunities

This month:

While many individual organizations have cultural heritage as part of their mission, the new Cultural Alliance of Maine, begun in 2020, is highlighting the many aspects of culture in our state, including the celebration of Cultural Heritage Week in Maine, March 15-22.
-What is culture? And what are some of the more easily understood elements of culture in Maine? What elements are now coming into focus in our state, or those overlooked?
-What led to the creation of the Cultural Alliance of Maine?
-Who are the constituents of the Cultural Alliance of Maine?
-What is the work of the Cultural Alliance of Maine?
-Why is this work important, both to your constituents, and to the state as whole?
-How does culture intersect with business, health, community-building, education, quality of life?
-What is Cultural Heritage Week in Maine (March 15-22) and who/what will you showcase?

Guest/s:

Molly Cashwell, Co- Director, Cultural Alliance of Maine, prior work with cultural organizations internationally and in the US, board member of MDI Historical Society and Jesup Library, Lamoine

Ekhlas Ahmed, Co-Director, Cultural Alliance of Maine, former educator, human rights activist, resettled to Maine in 2005, a refugee from Sudan, board member for Portland Public Library and Mayo Street Arts, Windham

Stu Kestenbaum, Steering Committee and co-founder, Cultural Alliance of Maine
Senior Advisor, Monson Arts, former Poet Laureate, former director of Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, Deer Isle

About the hosts:

Ron Beard is producer and host of Talk of the Towns, which first aired on WERU in 1993 as part of his community building work as an Extension professor with University of Maine Cooperative Extension and Sea Grant. He took all the journalism courses he could fit in while an undergraduate student in wildlife management and served as an intern with Maine Public Television nightly newscast in the early 1970s. Ron is an adjunct faculty member at College of the Atlantic, teaching courses on community development. Ron served on the Bar Harbor Town Council for six years and is currently board chair for the Jesup Memorial Library in Bar Harbor, where he has lived since 1975. Look for him on the Allagash River in June, and whenever he can get away, in the highlands of Scotland where he was fortunate to spend two sabbaticals.

Liz Graves joined Talk of the Towns as co-producer and co-host in July 2022, having long admired public affairs programming on WERU and dreamed of getting involved in community radio. She works as the Town Clerk for the Town of Bar Harbor, and is a former editor of the Mount Desert Islander weekly newspaper. Liz grew up in California and came to Maine as a schooner sailor.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Producer/Hosts: Ron Beard and Liz Graves
Theme music for Talk of the Towns Theme music for Talk of the Towns is a medley from Coronach, on a Balnain House Highland Music recording.

Talk of the Towns: Local Community concerns and opportunities

This month:
Using current examples from Jonesport, Blue Hill and Bar Harbor, our guests discuss the importance of comprehensive planning to set out goals for the future, including where growth will be encouraged and where citizens hope to discourage sprawl in more rural areas. We learn how they have engaged community members in the process of creating or updating their town comprehensive plans, and how comprehensive plans also provide a foundation for land use zoning ordinances, economic development and capital investments.
What is a comprehensive plan is and how does it relate to elements of town governance (planning and zoning, infrastructure and capital investment, economic development, etc?
What is the relationship between elected officials and the planning board and the comprehensive planning process? How is comprehensive planning different from routine Planning Board work?
What are the various stages in creating a comprehensive plan?
How are community members engaged in the process?
What have you learned (or had confirmed) so far about your town?
What advice would you have for other communities as they contemplate creating or updating comprehensive plan?

Guest/s:
Harry Fish, Selectman, Jonesport
Diane Smith, Planning Board Member, Jonesport
Michele Gagnon, Town Planner, Bar Harbor
Sarah King, Comprehensive Plan Committee, Blue Hill

About the hosts:

Ron Beard is producer and host of Talk of the Towns, which first aired on WERU in 1993 as part of his community building work as an Extension professor with University of Maine Cooperative Extension and Sea Grant. He took all the journalism courses he could fit in while an undergraduate student in wildlife management and served as an intern with Maine Public Television nightly newscast in the early 1970s. Ron is an adjunct faculty member at College of the Atlantic, teaching courses on community development. Ron served on the Bar Harbor Town Council for six years and is currently board chair for the Jesup Memorial Library in Bar Harbor, where he has lived since 1975. Look for him on the Allagash River in June, and whenever he can get away, in the highlands of Scotland where he was fortunate to spend two sabbaticals.

Liz Graves joined Talk of the Towns as co-producer and co-host in July 2022, having long admired public affairs programming on WERU and dreamed of getting involved in community radio. She works as the Town Clerk for the Town of Bar Harbor, and is a former editor of the Mount Desert Islander weekly newspaper. Liz grew up in California and came to Maine as a schooner sailor.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Producer/Hosts: Ron Beard and Liz Graves
Theme music for Talk of the Towns Theme music for Talk of the Towns is a medley from Coronach, on a Balnain House Highland Music recording.

Talk of the Towns: Local Community concerns and opportunities

This month:
We look at the recent “forever wild” protection of 3200 acres of land near the Whalesback, along Route 9 in Aurora, featuring Aaron Dority, Executive Director, Frenchman Bay Conservancy, Malcolm Hunter, donor, for-ever wild conservation easement, Aurora, and Sophie Ehrhardt, coordinator of the Wildlands Partnership Program. This protection also helps with climate change by allowing the forest to store carbon as the forest continues to grow and change naturally.

-What is the (brief) history of land conservation in Maine?
-What do we (society) gain from protecting or conserving land? What are “environmental services” how are they promoted in “forever wild protection”? What benefits do wildlife derive from large land tract protection/corridors? What other tangible and intangible benefits do humans derive from conserved land?
-What led to the protection of the Whalesback in Aurora? How did this partnership develop? What were some of the steps in the process? Who are the other significant partners and what were their roles?
-What do we know about the 3223 acres of land that are protected by these new conservation easements? Where is it located? Why is it significant? How does this fit into overall resource conservation for the region?
-Not envisioned as a benefit in early land conservation, mitigation of climate change is now a part of this and other land conservation strategies… what are those benefits and how Northeast Wilderness Trust’s carbon offset program work?

Guest/s:
Aaron Dority, Executive Director, Frenchman Bay Conservancy
Malcolm Hunter, donor, for-ever wild conservation easement, Aurora
Sophie Ehrhardt, coordinator of the Wildlands Partnership Program of Northeast Wilderness Trust

About the hosts:

Ron Beard is producer and host of Talk of the Towns, which first aired on WERU in 1993 as part of his community building work as an Extension professor with University of Maine Cooperative Extension and Sea Grant. He took all the journalism courses he could fit in while an undergraduate student in wildlife management and served as an intern with Maine Public Television nightly newscast in the early 1970s. Ron is an adjunct faculty member at College of the Atlantic, teaching courses on community development. Ron served on the Bar Harbor Town Council for six years and is currently board chair for the Jesup Memorial Library in Bar Harbor, where he has lived since 1975. Look for him on the Allagash River in June, and whenever he can get away, in the highlands of Scotland where he was fortunate to spend two sabbaticals.

Liz Graves joined Talk of the Towns as co-producer and co-host in July 2022, having long admired public affairs programming on WERU and dreamed of getting involved in community radio. She works as the Town Clerk for the Town of Bar Harbor, and is a former editor of the Mount Desert Islander weekly newspaper. Liz grew up in California and came to Maine as a schooner sailor.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Producer/Hosts: Ron Beard and Liz Graves
Theme music for Talk of the Towns Theme music for Talk of the Towns is a medley from Coronach, on a Balnain House Highland Music recording.

Talk of the Towns: Local Community concerns and opportunities

This month:
We ask two experienced teachers about their experience of teaching history and what they want students to take away from their studies of history and social studies.
What is history… what makes it different than reporting the news and current events? How are history and social studies related?
What is the role of textbooks in your history classes? How do you connect students to history and historians outside of textbooks?
What are the roles of the state legislature (law), state Department of Education (state policy and standards), and local school boards (local policy) in shaping what will be taught and how? What does a curriculum coordinator do?
How do State Standards approach the teaching of history and social studies? Students should be able to “distinguish between primary and secondary sources,” “evaluate and verify the credibility of the information found in print and non-print sources.” and “Equally important is that students use additional sources to resolve contradictory information.”
How do you think about what students will use their knowledge and abilities in history and social studies? What do you want them to know and be able to do?
What should citizens and policymakers to keep in mind when it comes to the teaching of history in public schools?

Guest/s:
Mark Puglisi, History Teacher, MDI High School
Julie Keblinsky, Director of Teaching and Learning, MDI Regional School System

About the hosts:

Ron Beard is producer and host of Talk of the Towns, which first aired on WERU in 1993 as part of his community building work as an Extension professor with University of Maine Cooperative Extension and Sea Grant. He took all the journalism courses he could fit in while an undergraduate student in wildlife management and served as an intern with Maine Public Television nightly newscast in the early 1970s. Ron is an adjunct faculty member at College of the Atlantic, teaching courses on community development. Ron served on the Bar Harbor Town Council for six years and is currently board chair for the Jesup Memorial Library in Bar Harbor, where he has lived since 1975. Look for him on the Allagash River in June, and whenever he can get away, in the highlands of Scotland where he was fortunate to spend two sabbaticals.

Liz Graves joined Talk of the Towns as co-producer and co-host in July 2022, having long admired public affairs programming on WERU and dreamed of getting involved in community radio. She works as the Town Clerk for the Town of Bar Harbor, and is a former editor of the Mount Desert Islander weekly newspaper. Liz grew up in California and came to Maine as a schooner sailor.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Producer/Hosts: Ron Beard and Liz Graves
Theme music for Talk of the Towns Theme music for Talk of the Towns is a medley from Coronach, on a Balnain House Highland Music recording.

Talk of the Towns: Local Community concerns and opportunities

This month:
A conversation about Breaking Bread, Essays from New England about Food, Hunger and Family, published in 2022 by Beacon Press, to benefit Blue Angel, a food bank in Hancock County, Maine
How do our stories about food connect us to our families and our heritage?
How was Blue Angel food bank, created?
How did the book, Breaking Bread, come about?
What has been the response, both from those who contributed essays, and from those who have come to book talks or who have read the book?

Guest/s:
Deborah Joy Corey, Novelist, co-Editor of Breaking Bread, founder of Blue Angel, Castine
Stuart Kestenbaum, Maine Poet Laureate, author of several books of poetry, including Things Seemed to be Breaking, Deerbrook Editions, Deer Isle
Kim Ridley, science writer, children’s book author, including Wild Design & The Secret Pool, Brooklin
Margery Irvine, lecturer in English at UMaine, Scholar/Facilitator for the Maine Humanities Council, Brooklin
Carl Little, poet, author of William Irvine: A Painter’s Journey, and other books, Mount Desert, Maine

About the hosts:

Ron Beard is producer and host of Talk of the Towns, which first aired on WERU in 1993 as part of his community building work as an Extension professor with University of Maine Cooperative Extension and Sea Grant. He took all the journalism courses he could fit in while an undergraduate student in wildlife management and served as an intern with Maine Public Television nightly newscast in the early 1970s. Ron is an adjunct faculty member at College of the Atlantic, teaching courses on community development. Ron served on the Bar Harbor Town Council for six years and is currently board chair for the Jesup Memorial Library in Bar Harbor, where he has lived since 1975. Look for him on the Allagash River in June, and whenever he can get away, in the highlands of Scotland where he was fortunate to spend two sabbaticals.

Liz Graves joined Talk of the Towns as co-producer and co-host in July 2022, having long admired public affairs programming on WERU and dreamed of getting involved in community radio. She works as the Town Clerk for the Town of Bar Harbor, and is a former editor of the Mount Desert Islander weekly newspaper. Liz grew up in California and came to Maine as a schooner sailor.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Producer/Hosts: Ron Beard and Liz Graves
Theme music for Talk of the Towns Theme music for Talk of the Towns is a medley from Coronach, on a Balnain House Highland Music recording.

Talk of the Towns: Local Community concerns and opportunities

This month:
We talk with child care providers, and the leader of a program to support new child care businesses, about the essential elements of good child care. The wide-ranging conversation includes early childhood learning and socialization; fees, subsidies, and regulations; and family and employer perspectives.

What child care options are there for parents to consider in Downeast Maine?
What challenges do child care providers face?
How do state subsidies help families pay for care?
What role can employers play in helping their employees find child care?

Guest/s:
Courtney Wood, Beechland Road Early Learning Center, Downeast Family YMCA
Sarah Hinckley, Mount Desert Nursery School
Cynthia Murphy, CEI Maine Child Care Business Lab

About the hosts:

Ron Beard is producer and host of Talk of the Towns, which first aired on WERU in 1993 as part of his community building work as an Extension professor with University of Maine Cooperative Extension and Sea Grant. He took all the journalism courses he could fit in while an undergraduate student in wildlife management and served as an intern with Maine Public Television nightly newscast in the early 1970s. Ron is an adjunct faculty member at College of the Atlantic, teaching courses on community development. Ron served on the Bar Harbor Town Council for six years and is currently board chair for the Jesup Memorial Library in Bar Harbor, where he has lived since 1975. Look for him on the Allagash River in June, and whenever he can get away, in the highlands of Scotland where he was fortunate to spend two sabbaticals.

Liz Graves joined Talk of the Towns as co-producer and co-host in July 2022, having long admired public affairs programming on WERU and dreamed of getting involved in community radio. She works as the Town Clerk for the Town of Bar Harbor, and is a former editor of the Mount Desert Islander weekly newspaper. Liz grew up in California and came to Maine as a schooner sailor.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Producer/Host: Ron Beard
Theme music for Talk of the Towns Theme music for Talk of the Towns is a medley from Coronach, on a Balnain House Highland Music recording.

Talk of the Towns: Local Community concerns and opportunities

This month:

We profile Esperanza Stancioff, Emeritus Professor, University of Maine Cooperative Extension and Sea Grant, about her work to expand community science in aid of better policies and practices for water quality and adaptation to climate change.

What were some of the key elements in your career with University of Maine?
Where did you develop your love of the sea?
Describe the intersecting space between the science developed in the academy, those charged with protecting the environment, and citizens, who might appreciate the benefits of our ecosystem in their personal lives or in pursuing their livelihoods.
How did you discover the importance of engaging citizens to to contribute to scientific knowledge.
What did you learn from bringing together citizens, scientists, historians, policy makers and people making their living on the water to celebrate Penobscot Bay as a place, and to identify the gaps in our knowledge that might help us better protect and manage our shared ecological resources.
More recently, you have worked with citizens and networks of people to respond to growing threats of climate change. Talk about what motivated you to take up this work and some of the
results.

Guest/s:
Esperanza Stancioff, Emeritus Professor, University of Maine Cooperative Extension and Sea Grant

About the host:
Ron Beard is producer and host of Talk of the Towns, which first aired on WERU in 1993 as part of his community building work as an Extension professor with University of Maine Cooperative Extension and Sea Grant. He took all the journalism courses he could fit in while an undergraduate student in wildlife management and served as an intern with Maine Public Television nightly newscast in the early 1970s. Ron is an adjunct faculty member at College of the Atlantic, teaching courses on community development. Ron served on the Bar Harbor Town Council for six years and is currently board chair for the Jesup Memorial Library in Bar Harbor, where he has lived since 1975. Look for him on the Allagash River in June, and whenever he can get away, in the highlands of Scotland where he was fortunate to spend two sabbaticals.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download