Maine Currents 9/14/16

Producer/Host: Amy Browne
Studio Engineer: Joel Mann

Today on “Maine Currents” we focus on ways local people are plugging into larger movements to create positive change. Guests Tracey Hair and Larry Dansinger report back from their trip to the World Social Forum in Canada this summer, we talk about the “End Violence Together” rally and march and events marking the anniversary of the Occupy movement in Bangor this coming weekend, as well as last weekend’s Wabanaki Solidarity with Standing Rock rally, and we invite listeners to call in with question and with their own stories of working to create positive change.

Guests:
Tracey Hair started working at HOME Inc in 12 years ago. For a brief time she worked in partnership with HOME at a homeless charity located in Harlem. She lived and worked in Harlem doing street outreach, handing out sandwiches and serving food from a pop up food pantry. In addition to street outreach, Tracey taught basic computer skills to undocumented and low-income women in the Bronx. She have since returned to HOME Inc here in Orland where she currently serves as Acting Director. In addition to working with homeless people, Tracey has spent time advocating for Immigration Rights for same sex couples and is also a member of the Board of St Francis Community / Mandala Farm where she lived and worked for two years. Mandala Farm is a homeless shelter where homeless people live and work together in community. FMI: www.homemmausa.org/

Larry Dansinger used to work with Resources for Organizing and Social Change and still volunteers with the group. Besides attending the most recent World Social Forum this summer in Montreal, Larry helped to organize a Social Forum here in Maine in 2006 and hopes there will be another in Maine soon. Larry was also active in the Occupy Bangor’s camp next to the Bangor Public Library in 2011 and is helping to plan a 5th anniversary event there on Saturday 9/17/16, 10-11:30 am (followed by a potluck) at the park next to the Bangor Public Library.
FMI: www.facebook.com/OccupyBangor/?fref=ts

Mary Ellen Quinn is the Co-coordinator of Pax Christi Maine and one of the organizers of the “End Violence Together” rally and march that will be taking place in Bangor on Saturday, 9/17/16 from 1-4pm at West Market Square (rain location: Columbia Street Church). FMI: www.facebook.com/events/1031435066943636/

Coastal Conversations in Acadia 9/12/16

Producer: Natalie Springuel

Today’s topic: We talk with Carrie Graham, the manager of the Dorr Museum of Natural History at College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, about a new exhibit called “Exploring Acadia, Our Best Classroom.”

Two-thousand sixteen is the 100th anniversary of Acadia National Park and America’s National Park System. In honor of this centennial, the University of Maine Sea Grant Program and WERU-FM, both official Centennial Partners, present an occasional series based on the monthly public affairs program, Coastal Conversations.

The ocean surrounds Acadia National Park, which includes 47,000 acres of protected land on Mount Desert Island, Isle au Haut, Schoodic Peninsula, and their archipelago of islands in the Gulf of Maine. Acadia’s rocky shoreline, teeming tide pools, and lush salt marshes have attracted mariners, fisher folk, and people in search of natural beauty for thousands of years. In more recent centuries, many have come to study the unique and diverse assembly of flora and fauna of the region where science, conservation, and community work together for a vibrant future.

Throughout the summer and fall of 2016, on Monday’s at noon, “Coastal Conversations in Acadia” will feature short stories from Acadia on WERU-FM

FMI: www.seagrant.umaine.edu/coastalconversations/acadia

Wabanaki Windows Special Report 9/12/16

Producer/Host: Donna Loring
Studio Engineers: Amy Browne & Matt Murphy

Issue: North Dakota Access Pipeline– Largest gathering of Tribes in 100 years

Key Discussion Points:
a) Corporate Oil and it’s destruction of Native Land?
b) Attempt to cover up its use of force against Native people at site
c) What can we do to support the Human and Civil Rights of the Tribes?

Guests:
Sherri Mitchell, Esq., Director of the Land Peace Foundation. she is a Native Rights and Environmental Activist and a Penobscot Nation Tribal Member
Dr. Rebecca Sockbeson University of Alberta, Penobscot Nation Tribal Member
Chief Kirk Francis, Chief of the Penobscot Nation

FMI:
www.seveneaglesmedia.org/
www.democracynow.org/
www.honorearth.org/
www.btlonline.org/2016/seg/160916bf-btl-hall.html
bsnorrell.blogspot.com/
www.facebook.com/RedWarriorCamp