A Word in Edgewise 8/12/24: Of Attendant Kayakers, Perseids, & Zorro, the Gay Blade . . .

Producer/Host: R.W. Estela

Hi, I’m RW Estela: Since 1991, I’ve been presenting A Word in Edgewise, WERU’s longest-running short feature, a veritable almanac of worldly and heavenly happenings, a confluence of 21st-century life in its myriad manifestations, international and domestic, cosmopolitan and rural, often revealing, as the French say, the more things change, the more they stay the same — though not always! Sometimes in addressing issues affecting our day-to-day lives, in this age of vagary and ambiguity, when chronological time is punctuated elliptically, things can quickly turn edgy and controversial, as we search for understanding amid our dialectic. Tune in Monday mornings at 7:30 a.m. for an exciting journey through space and time with a few notable birthdays thrown in for good measure during A Word in Edgewise . . .

About the host:
RW Estela was raised as a first-generation American in Colorado by a German mother and a Corsican-Basque father who would become a three-war veteran for the US Army, so RW was naturally a military brat and later engaged in various Vietnam-era civil-service adventures before paying his way through college by skiing for the University of Colorado, playing Boulder coffeehouses, and teaching. He has climbed all of Colorado’s Fourteeners; found work as an FAA-certificated commercial pilot, a California-licensed building contractor, a publishing editor, a practitioner of Aikido, and a college professor of English; among his many interdisciplinary pursuits are the design and building of Terrell Residence Library (recently renamed the Terrell House Permaculture Living & Learning Center at the University of Maine), writing Building It In Two Languages (a bilingual dictionary of construction terminology), aerial photo documentation of two dam removals (Great Works and Veazie) on the Penobscot River, and once a week since 1991 drafting an installment of A Word In Edgewise, his essay series addressing issues affecting our day-to-day lives — and WERU’s oldest continuous short feature. When pandemics do not interfere, he does the Triple Crown of Maine open-water ocean swims (Peaks to Portland, Islesboro Crossing, and Nubble Light Challenge) and the Whitewater Downriver Point Series of the Maine Canoe and Kayak Racing Organization. RW is the father of two and the grandfather of three and lives with his partner Kathleen of 37 years and their two Maine Coons in Orono.

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The Cosmic Curator 8/10/24: The Force of Opposition

Good Morning, People! This is your cosmic curator, Tom Yaroschuk, with a look at the stars for the week of August 10 and the days ahead…

About the Host:
Tom Yaroschuk is a Vedic Astrologer. His intention is to help people understand their karma and the issues they may confront to cultivate more fulfilling lives. Tom is writing a memoir of the spiritual lessons derived from his work in a Homeless Day Center in between a career as an award winning television and documentary producer.

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Let’s Talk About It 8/9/24

Producer/Host: Patrisha McLean
Production Assistance: Tammy Oropesa
Music: Jackie Lee McLean

Let’s Talk About It: Conversations with Survivors of Domestic Abuse

The devastation of financial abuse, as experienced by Lora, a Maine nurse, and explained by Jeannine, a domestic abuse survivor/victim’s advocate with Finding Our Voices.

Topics:
1. Financial Abuse
2.Sexual Abuse
3. Manipulation of Abusers

Guest:
Lora and Jeannine. Jeannine is a survivor from Southern Maine who led the passage of LD 947: An Act to Address the Long-Term Impact of Economic Abuse by a Spouse. findingourvoices.net/jeannine-archive
static1.squarespace.com/static/5ea1c13f9388622c75e02f04/t/5ea71229440a354e415493ea/1588007466061/Jeannine+Bill+.pdf

About the host:
Patrisha McLean is the founder/president of Finding Our Voices, the grass roots survivor-powered non profit organization breaking the silence of domestic abuse one conversation and community at a time all across Maine.

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Around Town 8/9/24: Local News, Culture and Events

Host/Producer: Amy Browne

Upcoming events.

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, Maine Currents and Maine: The Way Life Could Be, Amy 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 Maine Association of Broadcasters awards for her work in 2017 and 2021.

Theme music: BreakBeat Chemists I, 2015
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 International License

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Justice Radio 8/8/24: Behind the Door

Host/s: Catherine Besteman
Production Coordinator: Daria Cullen
Other credits: TECHNICAL SUPPORT – Lucas Brown and Sarah Johnson | MUSIC – Samuel James
Justice Radio is a WMPG production

Justice Radio: Tackling the hard questions about our criminal legal system in Maine.

This week: Don’t miss Catherine’s interview with podcasters Brandon Brown and Jeremy Hiltz, as they talk about their show Behind the Door which shines a light on the humanity of people on the inside and the brokenness of our carceral and recovery systems.

Guests:
Podcasters Brandon Brown and Jeremy Hiltz

About the hosts:
The Justice Radio team includes:

Leo Hylton is currently incarcerated at Maine State Prison, yet is a recent Master’s graduate, a columnist with The Bollard, a restorative and transformative justice advocate and activist, a prison abolitionist, and a Visiting Instructor at Colby College’s Anthropology Department, co-teaching AY346 – Carcerality and Abolition.

Catherine Besteman is an abolitionist educator at Colby College. Her research and practice engage the public humanities to explore abolitionist possibilities in Maine. In addition to coordinating Freedom & Captivity, she has researched and published on security, militarism, displacement, and community-based activism with a focus on Somalia, post-apartheid South Africa, and the U.S. She has published nine books, contributed to the International Panel on Exiting Violence, and received recent fellowships from the American Council of Learned Societies and the Guggenheim and Rockefeller Foundations.

MacKenzie Kelley is a formerly incarcerated woman in long term recovery. She is a teachers assistant for inside-out courses through MIT. MacKenzie works at the Maine Prisoner Reentry Center as a reentry specialist, peer support and recovery coach. She is the program director for Reentry Sisters, a program designed to assist women reentering the community from prison.

Zoe Brokos (she/her) is the executive director of the Church of Safe Injection, a comprehensive harm reduction program that operates in Southern and Central Maine. Zoe is a person who uses drugs, a mom, a wife, and has led harm reduction programs in Maine for 15 years. She is part of the Maine Drug Policy Coalition, sits on the board of Decriminalize Maine and joined Justice Radio to promote compassionate conversations and drug user-led advocacy efforts that focus on evidence-based, public health responses to the housing and overdose crises in Maine.

Marion Anderson: Before joining The National Council for Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women and Girls in January of 2022, Marion worked as a harm reductionist, housing navigator, certified intentional peer support specialist, CCAR recovery coach, and a re-entry coach for a diverse range of non-profit organizations.

Charlotte Warren is a former State Representative. She served on the Legislature’s Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee for eight years – six as the house chair. Warren previously served on the Judiciary Committee and as the house chair of Maine’s Mental Health Working Group and the house chair of the Commission to Examine Reestablishing Parole. Previous to her time in the legislature, Charlotte served as Mayor of the city of Hallowell.

Linda Small is the founder and executive director of Reentry Sisters, a reentry support organization specializing in a gender-responsive and trauma-informed approach for women, serving Maine and beyond. She is a Project Coordinator for the Maine Prisoner Advocacy Coalition. Linda serves on the Maine Prison Education Partnership board at UMA and the New England Commission for the Future of Higher Education in Prison through The Educational Justice Institute at MIT.

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Common Ground Radio 8/8/24: The Fight to Stop PFAS Contamination on Farmland

Host: Holli Cederholm
Editor: Clare Boland

Common Ground Radio is an hour-long discussion of local food and organic agriculture with people here in the state of Maine and beyond.

This month:
In this episode of Common Ground Radio, we discuss PFAS “forever chemical” contamination on farms and actions that are being taken on the state and federal level to protect farmers and eaters, including the recent lawsuit filed against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency calling for regulation of a primary source of PFAS contamination — sewage sludge applied to farmland as fertilizer — under the Clean Water Act. Due to the practice of land-applying sludge containing PFAS, farmers here in Maine and across the country have been unknowingly contaminating their land, and consequently the food we eat. Sarah Alexander, MOFGA’s executive director, and Laura Dumais, staff counsel with Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, talk about ways to mitigate contamination and reduce public health risks.

List of subjects:
-PFAS “forever chemicals”
-PFAS contamination on farmland
-PFAS in sewage sludge
-Impact of PFAS contamination on farmers
-PFAS legislation in Maine and at the federal level
-Lawsuit against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)

Guest/s:
Sarah Alexander, executive director of MOFGA (Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association)
Laura Dumais, staff counsel with PEER (Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility)

FMI:

About the hosts:
Holli Cederholm has been involved in organic agriculture since 2005 when she first apprenticed on a small farm. She has worked on organic farms in Maine, Vermont, Connecticut, Scotland and Italy and, in 2010, founded a small farm focused on celebrating open-pollinated and heirloom vegetables. As the former manager of a national nonprofit dedicated to organic seed growers, she authored a peer-reviewed handbook on GMO avoidance strategies for seed growers. Holli has also been a steward at Forest Farm, the iconic homestead of “The Good Life” authors Helen and Scott Nearing; a host of “The Farm Report” on Heritage Radio Network; and a lo0ng-time contributor for The Maine Organic Farmer & Gardener, which she now edits in her role as content creator and editor at MOFGA.

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Climate & Community 8/8/24: Bridging Energy Challenges on Unbridged Islands with College of the Atlantic’s Community Energy Center (Part 2)

Host: Brianna Cunliffe

Description: Climate & Community speaks with Director David Gibson and student workers Adler Garner and Uriel Orozco on their ongoing work through the College of the Atlantic’s Community Energy Center, supporting households on the Cranberry Isles with energy audits and upgrades this summer. In the second part of our conversation, we focus on the holistic approaches to energy audits, student experiences building skills in building science, and the importance of efficiency for our energy transition. Learn more about the project at www.MaineUP.org.

Johannah, Brianna, Tanvi, Gus, Corey, and Beth are the team at A Climate to Thrive, a nonprofit working to build a model of community-driven, solutions-focused climate action. Since its origins around a potluck table as concerned neighbors gathered to take action on climate change, A Climate to Thrive, or ACTT, has been supporting solutions on Mount Desert Island and beyond since 2016. Learn more at www.aclimatetothrive.org.

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