Maine Summer with a Mission
Pick One or Two Things to Do While the Blueberries Ripen
Third Act Maine’s Mission
We are a group of elders in Maine committed to stopping all new fossil fuel investment and development. Our mission is accomplished through the joyful practice of nonviolence, uplifting youth, and developing community.
The Third Act Maine Steering Committee has written the above mission statement to guide us in our work going forward. We are aligned with Third Act (national), but we also have the flexibility to take on a few other initiatives from time to time, as local circumstances warrant. We welcome comments about the mission! Feel free to email us at ThirdActMaine@gmail.com
The Steering Committee has also endorsed the call for a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty, spearheaded by Pacific nations in 2019 and already endorsed by 6 nation states, 84 cities and subgovernment entities—soon to include California— and over half a million individuals. Its three pillars are outlined below, and all of them align perfectly with our mission. We encourage Third Act Mainers to sign as individuals—and to bring it to your own town or city, church, or civic organization so these entities can sign on as well. Here’s the easy-to-use website: fossilfueltreaty.org
Members are Stepping Up
Twenty (out of over 500!) Third Maine actors responded to the member survey, and many of them are stepping into more active roles. We’d like to hear from YOU, too! Please take two minutes and tell us how we might tap your time, talents, and interests!
Legislative Action
In 2021, Maine passed LD 99, An Act To Require The State To Divest Itself Of Assets In The Fossil Fuel Industry. This legislation requires Maine Public Employees Retirement System (MainePERS) to divest the 1.2 billion of pension funds that are currently tied up in industries which directly fuel the climate crisis.
MainePERS has not listened. They are taking an overly cautious approach to divestment that conflicts with the timeline science and justice require. To make matters worse, they are using vague language and not explicitly committing to forgoing new fossil fuel investments.
Please contact MainePERS CEO, Dr. Rebecca Wyke, by Friday June 9th over email or the phone to let MainePERS know this is unacceptable. You can use the email template and talking points linked here. If you are short on time, you can quickly fill out this Action Network letter writing campaign and an email will be generated and sent to MainePERS on your behalf. If you have time, you could even write a letter to the editor of your local newspaper— And let us know if you take action! (ThirdActMaine@gmail.com)
Midcoast Maine Action
We are keeping the pressure on Bank of America for its expanded fossil fuel investments by protesting in front of its call center along Route 3 in Belfast each month. These standouts will also serve to inform weekend tourists of BofA's grave complicity in our worsening climate crisis.
Friday, June 16 at 1 pm for 45 minutes. We need at least 12 participants for the Bank of America protest. If you are able to join us, please email Kathy (isabmuzzy@gmail.com) and write Third Act Maine in the subject line.
Third Act Midcoast Maine stationed itself in this gorgeous spot at the annual Belfast Garden Club’s plant sale to collect signatures in support of a call for the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty (FFNPT). Third Act Midcoast Mainers will soon present a petition to the Belfast City Council, asking for its endorsement.
Greater Portland Action
Banks: Stop Funding Fossil Fuels! We’re not stopping. Let’s keep raising awareness among our fellow citizens by standing in well-trafficked places with our signs. We’ll have extra signs for you.
Tuesday lunchtimes, June 6, 13, 20, and 27: 12-12:30 pm in Portland at Monument Square. (We’re in proximity of Chase Bank and Bank of America, so we can raise our voices, too!)
Friday, July 7: It’s First Friday, with lots of people milling about. We’ll be protesting and tabling from 4-6 pm at Congress Square Park (across from the Portland Museum of Art).
TAM founders Chuck Spanger and Tom Mikulka are joined by other Third Maine Actors in Lobsterman’s Park in Portland.
Characteristics of Life
Camille T. Dungy- 1972-
A fifth of animals without backbones could be at risk of extinction, say scientists.
—BBC Nature News
Ask me if I speak for the snail and I will tell you
I speak for the snail.
Speak of underneathedness
and the welcome of mosses,
of life that springs up,
little lives that pull back and wait for a moment.
I speak for the damselfly, water skeet, mollusk,
the caterpillar, the beetle, the spider, the ant.
I speak
from the time before spinelessness was frowned upon.
Ask me if I speak for the moon jelly. I will tell you
one thing today and another tomorrow
and I will be as consistent as anything alive
on this earth.
I move as the currents move, with the breezes.
What part of your nature drives you? You, in your cubicle
ought to understand me. I filter and filter and filter all day.
Ask me if I speak for the nautilus and I will be silent
as the nautilus shell on a shelf. I can be beautiful
and useless if that’s all you know to ask of me.
Ask me what I know of longing and I will speak of distances
between meadows of night-blooming flowers.
I will speak
the impossible hope of the firefly.
You with the candle
burning and only one chair at your table must understand
such wordless desire.
To say it is mindless is missing the point.
Reprinted with permission. From Trophic Cascade. Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 2017.
I love Characteristics of Life! Thank you for including that. I will plan to be at the table/protest on June 13 in Portland and can keep you posted on if I will attend the next two scheduled.
Another informative and well laid-out newsletter! The calls to action were beautifully augmented by Camille Dungy's thoughtful meditation, "Characteristics of Life". To speak of all that precedes us is surely to recognize that we're but one strand of the web of life, yet we're rendering that web/ourselves both by the actions we take and the actions we don't take. We must act for all of life.