Maine Insights

Welcome to Maine Initiatives.

As Executive Director of Maine Initiatives, I am fortunate to be able to spend time meeting with community organizers, activists, and donors— people actively engaged in making our communities more just and equitable. So often I find myself in a conversation about values: what motivates someone to support progressive action in Maine; what drives them–and us–to dedicate so much personal and professional energy to social change?

These conversations are generative: connection, capacity, and power are all created when you hear someone else articulate a deeply held conviction of your own. This Maine Insights report is a testament to that phenomenon, and we are pleased to share it with you.

Maine Insights brought together Mainers in twelve meetings throughout the state. This report—what we heard and what we learned through this process—is a clarion call for collective action around a shared vision for Maine that reflects greater justice, equity, opportunity, and community.

This is the essential work of Maine Initiatives. We bring people together around shared values; we identify, mobilize, and leverage the resources and assets of our community in support of those values; and we build capacity for independent and collective action advancing greater justice and equity in Maine.

In this spirit, I want to express my deep gratitude to all of the Mainers who shared their homes, offices, and community spaces with us so that we could convene these conversations. And to our Insights participants—thank you for your generosity with your time, talent, expertise, wisdom, vision, and values. You, as members of the Maine Initiatives community, embody our capacity for advancing social, economic and environmental justice in Maine.

Thank you, Phil Walsh

FINDINGS

ECONOMIC JUSTICE

RACIAL JUSTICE CLIMATE CHANGE

CROSS-CUTTING ISSUES SHIFTS IN THE MODEL

LOOKING FORWARD TRANSFORMATIVE COMMUNITY PHILANTHROPY IN MAINE

RACIAL JUSTICE AND EQUITY

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

When working toward justice there is a temptation to think that there are two teams—us, and them. However, justice is something that is for all of us. We’re in this together.

We are pleased to share this report on Maine Insights, a project undertaken by Maine Initiatives beginning in June of 2015.

As a progressive community-based foundation, we convened Mainers across the state for conversations about our shared vision of social, economic, and environmental justice. We invited our community members to engage in a dialogue around the issues they hold most dear. Through twelve conversations across the state we guided over 175 participants through facilitated discussions and documented what we heard.

We met community leaders, activists, advocates, nonprofit executives, organizers, students, entrepreneurs, retirees, small business owners, elected officials, and citizens from all walks of life. We were inspired by the range, depth, and clarity of vision and voice we heard in each conversation, and by the passion for Maine we heard articulated in living rooms, conference rooms, and church halls.

This report outlines the major themes that emerged from the Maine Insights process. You’ll hear what participants had to say, in their own words, and the themes that emerged as consensus priorities as we traveled across the state.

We present this report not as the conclusion or culmination of a process, but as a beginning. This process—and the report you hold in your hands—will inform our work together going forward as we contemplate our grantmaking, our work convening and engaging the community, and our broader role of fostering informed, intentional, and collective progressive philanthropy in Maine.

“Every step forward is a step in the right direction. We’ve been resistant to change, and of not doing things perfectly. Choosing to act in spite of our fears allows us to do the right thing now.”

It is a powerful, compelling experience to hear a deeply held belief or value of yours articulated by someone else, and in particular by someone you don’t know. When that statement comes from a neighbor or a community member they can be even more inspiring. With that frame, let’s walk through the Maine Insights process.

FIRST: Connect

“Who are you in the community?”

We started each Maine Insights conversation by asking participants to share one word that describes who they are in the community. The words we heard were thought provoking. Organizer. Activist. Listener. Learner. Even Curmudgeon.

“The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

We jumped into the conversation by asking people to reflect on this quote from abolitionist Theodore Parker, brought to our contemporary discourse by Dr. Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., and, more recently, President Barack Obama, and to ask where are we on this arc today in Maine?

THEN:

NEXT: Engage Reflect Analyze

What is one insight you have about social, economic, and environmental justice in Maine today?

As you look around, in your community or across Maine, what are the most pressing justice and equity opportunities or issues you perceive?

“I love the idea of a progressive philanthropic organization hosting intimate, relevant, and stimulating community conversations around the state. We need more of these conversations to occur.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

Aspire

What is one thing we must do to advance justice and equity in Maine in the next 12 to 24 months?

Rooted in the notion that we, individually and collectively, are the agents of the change we seek in our communities, the Maine Insights process engaged and connected people around the state through facilitated conversations about our shared vision for advancing social, economic, and environmental justice in Maine.

It was part listening tour. It is central to our success that we understand and address the concerns of our stakeholders. Through Maine Insights, we set out to identify the justice and equity themes, opportunities, and challenges that are most resonant across our state.

It was also a community conversation. Maine Insights brought people together around shared values, fostering new connections and relationships that increase our individual and collective capacity to advance justice and equity in Maine.

Throughout this process we listened to a diverse range of voices. We heard from children as young as nine who are worried about pollution and access to clean water. We listened as retirees told us about intergenerational poverty. We heard moving testimonies from recent immigrants sharing their dreams and aspirations for their lives as Mainers. As we traveled across the state we found that, although each conversation was unique in its articulation of distinct ideas and concerns, we were able to identify overarching themes and messages that clearly resonate across differences in age, social class, race, gender, and other seeming divides.

Across all conversations we heard a desire and demand for collective action around our shared values and concerns. Despite our reputation as a state of rugged individualists, we heard a consistent call for unity, inclusiveness, opportunity,

and progress. Participants expressed profound concern that our state is becoming increasingly fragmented across many fault lines: geography, class, politics, identity, demographics, etc.

As participants shared concerns about systemic inequality in every sector: healthcare, education, criminal justice, housing, and employment, and broader concerns about entrenched racism, sexism, and homophobia, they also affirmed that ours is a community of practical, compassionate, and altruistic individuals eager for connections to others that can advance social change.

While the problems are complex, the solutions proposed by our participants are ultimately simple: we must come together to act on our shared values.

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

“There is a lot of divide-and-conquer rhetoric in Maine. It needs to be transformed to WAITT dialogue: We’re All In This Together.”

Three issues, in particular, emerged as defining themes:

ECONOMIC INEQUALITY RACIAL JUSTICE

“Maine seems to be following the rest of the nation into deeper division along socio-economic lines.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

“Maine’s reputation as the most racially homogenous state makes some people think racism needn’t be addressed here. As we know, the state is changing and racism must be addressed in Maine.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

CLIMATE CHANGE

“Our shared vulnerability in the face of climate change may bring out our worst selves in the name of self-protection, without strong, capable, wise leadership and highly-skilled community organizers and spaces to build connections.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

Social, economic, and environmental justice are connected: we can’t have one without the other two.

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

of Mainers live in poverty including 1 in every 5 children 1

Across the state, economic justice emerged as a predominant theme in every Maine Insights conversation. Economic disparities, economic dislocation, and uneven access to economic opportunity were the most common issues and concerns.

and education, gentrification, and the need for more affordable housing.

One of every two black and African American Mainers and one-third of Maine’s Native Americans live in poverty. The poverty rate for these groups topped 50% in 2013, the highest in the nation. The national average rate is 27.6%.2

Participants highlighted economic justice challenges that they viewed as particularly pertinent to Maine’s communities: intergenerational and rural poverty, food insecurity, the isolation of elders, persistent income disparities for women, and the unique economic opportunities and challenges facing recent immigrants. They advocated for fair wages and paid family leave, expressing concerns about unemployment, the cost of healthcare

Participants recognized that in the face of rising economic inequality, it is becoming ever more difficult to effectively address these issues—a reality that is both financial and relational. Concern was raised that Maine’s public agencies and programs dedicated to supporting the poor have been hindered by policy and politics, driving those who are struggling economically to increasingly look to the nonprofit sector for support. At the same time, participants worried about an increased demonization of the poor and a fraying of the social and political fabric that permits us to support our neighbors in need.

The increasing gap between the wealthy and the poor makes progress toward justice increasingly elusive, but not impossible.

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

We heard deep concern about economic justice in Maine and a clear commitment to making our communities more just and equitable. In the face of grim statistics about the challenges of poverty and economic uncertainty, we also heard from participants stories of hope and inspiration:

Poverty Action Coalition: Citizens of Waterville are confronting poverty with an abundance mentality: coming together through the Community Investors initiative to identify and meet critical financial needs of neighbors experiencing financial hardship

through an inspiring combination of individual and collective action.

Food AND Medicine: In a victory for individuals and families in poverty, Food AND Medicine has created a fund that permits SNAP recipients in Bangor and Brewer to receive a 50% discount at local farmers markets, dramatically increasing access to healthy food while supporting the local agriculture movement.

In addition, we heard strong support for organizations that are organizing and

advocating for economic justice and equity for all Mainers.

In these examples, communities have come together to identify and mobilize their existing resources to create collaborative solutions. In so doing they demonstrate that we have the collective capacity to work together, end poverty and hunger, and build bridges to economic opportunity. Maine Initiatives remains committed to supporting projects like these.

“Economic inequality means taxes increasingly vilified, our safety net shrunk, increasingly concentrated wealth and income, increasing barriers to education, and debt rather than equitable pay.”

Maine’s communities of color grew by 80% between 2000 and 2010, and every single county in the state saw double-digit growth in populations of color. Cumberland, Androscoggin, and Oxford Counties increased by 99% or more.3

Our communities are only as just and equitable as we demand that they be, as we make them. And in every one of our conversations, Maine Insights participants expressed concern that our communities fall short of our shared vision of racial justice and racial equity.

We heard about persistent and pernicious racism: implicit, explicit, institutional, structural, and systemic. We learned about disparities in access to healthcare, education, and justice, and unequal opportunities for communities of color.

some quarters about the New Mainer communities: immigrants, refugees, and asylees. Others highlighted the daily experience of African American communities with generational legacies in Maine who are still perceived and treated as outsiders. Still others placed the conversation about racial justice firmly in the context of the long arc of history in acknowledging the primacy of the tribal communities in any conversation about race, justice, and equity in Maine.

Several Maine cities have alarming arrest rate disparities for people of color: in South Portland, black and African Americans are 3.5 times more likely to be arrested than whites; in Bangor, 3.2 times; in Lewiston, 2.8 times; and in Portland, 2.6 times.4

Some participants raised questions of racial justice in the context of the changing face of Maine and recent criticism from

Participants also expressed concern that Maine, as the state with the largest majority white population in the nation, is under-prepared to confront and address these issues.

Maine’s present and future is blocked by our inability to talk and discuss race and racism truthfully and openly.

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

The call to confront racism, xenophobia, and discrimination in Maine is clear, but the path ahead is less well lighted.

It is clear that many individuals and organizations in our communities recognize the urgency of addressing racial inequity as a root cause of injustice, though the complexity of these questions and the conversations required to address them represent a challenge. The organizational and financial infrastructure for addressing issues of racial inequity are less robust than those available for other justice and equity

priorities. We heard this from individuals, nonprofit leaders, and even funders, unsure as to how to support progress and change on these issues.

At the same time, as we see an emerging consciousness of the importance of engaging on questions of racial justice nationally, we see more energy emerging in Maine around these issues. Organizations and individuals working in Maine to build cross-class and cross-cultural coalitions for advancing racial justice indicate a shift. Another powerful trend is the rapid growth

of organizations and funders working together on immigrant, refugee, and asylee rights. At the community level, we observe an inspiring breadth of creativity—through performing and visual arts groups, youthled organizations and initiatives, legal assistance programs—as Mainers embrace nontraditional approaches to address racial inequity.

The consensus among our participants was that we must act to ensure that our communities reflect the values of diversity, inclusion, equity, and opportunity for all.

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

“Maine as a collective used to be more compassionate to poor people, until the face of poverty changed.”

CHANGE

Our state’s snowfall – an important part of our winter tourist economy – has declined by 15% since the late 1800’s.5

Researchers forecast that stresses on the natural environment will change 44% of Maine’s landscape to a different kind of habitat. This is the highest percentage of any state.6

Among the three predominant themes that emerged from the Maine Insights process, climate change was unique. Although it was not as frequently mentioned as economic inequality and racial justice, the participants raising the issue of climate change were consistently among the most fervent advocates for any single issue. Environmental justice advocates also emphasized that climate-related problems suffer from the misperception that they are less urgent. One participant from Blue Hill summed it up this way: “I see our community as a boat. And while social and economic issues are concerns on the boat, climate change is a hole in the boat!”

Conversations about climate change focused both on specific environmental

implications of a changing climate and the social and economic dislocation likely to result from those changes.

Concerns cited by participants included sea-level rise, shifts in farming zone boundaries, declining forest health and ecosystem impacts, ocean acidification and acid rain, and unpredictable impacts on public health.

Many participants described climate change as being intersectional, acknowledging a significant relationship between economic, social, and environmental justice and expressing growing alarm that the negative effects of climate change will disproportionately affect the most vulnerable communities.

Participants noted that, while climate change is a global concern, Maine has been and has the potential to be a leader in environmental activism. The state’s longstanding history of conservationism and environmental stewardship is a proud and important legacy, and Mainers have demonstrated their individual and collective commitment to a better climate future.

This commitment has been reflected by recent environmental victories in places like South Portland and Searsport and in coordinated inter-sectoral efforts to tackle these issues head-on, like the recent Summit on Maine’s Economy and Climate Change, which brought together representatives from the state’s Chambers of Commerce, nonprofit organizations, business sector, and farms and fisheries.7

From cleaning up hazardous waste sites that are stifling low income communities to passing pesticide-free ordinances that support Maine’s flourishing local and sustainable food movement, the work of Maine’s environmental advocacy groups fit increasingly in the realm of economic and social justice. This strategic placement signals an exciting opportunity for even more coordinated justice and equity initiatives.

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

ORGANIZATIONS SERVING THE ENVIRONMENT IN MAINE

Climate change and its extremes will impact those least able to adapt to it.

More than 6 in 10 low-wage workers in Maine are women, and 62% of those women over the age of 25 are single heads of household. 8

As is the case in any wide-ranging conversation, Maine Insights participants brought many justice and equity issues, insights, and concerns to the table. In each community conversation, we asked

participants to rank the issues that were perceived to be of greatest opportunity and urgency. The following represents the themes that we heard emerge as top priorities.

WOMEN AND GENDER EQUALITY

“Poverty is a women’s issue. 58% of Maine women who are single heads of household with children under five live in poverty, versus 47% nationally. This means that their children live in poverty, and the effects are widespread, deep, and long-lasting.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

It is clear that a consistent and intentional

focus on equity, opportunity, and success for Maine’s women and girls is a critical concern for our stakeholders. The Maine Women’s Policy Center recently published a report8 that identifies four priority areas for women and girls in Maine: economic security, civil rights, freedom from violence, and access to healthcare and reproductive rights. All of these issues were raised as high priorities in the Maine Insights process.

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

GOOD GOVERNANCE AND CLEAN ELECTIONS LGBTQ AND TRANSGENDER CIVIL RIGHTS

ACCESS TO HEALTHCARE, MENTAL HEALTH AND ADDICTION SERVICES

“We must strategize together for a long-term vision for Maine. It should be connected to solid electoral policy, education, and civic participation.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

When the Maine Insights process kicked off in 2015, many participants were engaged in a ballot initiative to increase transparency in campaign finance and strengthen our state’s landmark Clean Election Act. On Election Day, the grassroots work of Maine Citizens for Clean Elections (MCCE) paid off. Over 1,000 volunteers collected signatures in support of Question 1, which passed by a double-digit margin.

Even after this decisive victory—the act became law in late December of 2015—we heard strong support from participants for increased transparency and accountability in politics and government. We also heard admiration for MCCE, their approach to organizing, and support for similar citizenempowering grassroots ballot initiatives.

“As a young queer woman in Maine, I wonder how we can make every part of Maine—not just Portland—a safe and welcoming home for LGBTQ folks.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

LGBTQ issues in Maine were among the most interesting and complex. Many participants cited the successful passage of marriage equality in 2012—and Maine’s distinction as the first state to affirm marriage equality through the popular vote, led by Equality Maine—as a major victory for justice and equity. Perhaps as a result, some participants ranked general LGBTQ issues as low justice and equity priorities.

In contrast, specific concerns were raised about rural, youth, and elderly LGBTQ populations and the importance of transgender equity across the state. Indeed, twice participants identified “Transgender Rights” as a stand-alone issue and placed it at the top of the priority list. “This is the fight we’re in now,” the groups explained.

“A lot of our public health issues are tied to other questions, including the disconnectedness and isolation a lot of people feel. I’m interested in how we rebuild our social fabric and confront mental health and addiction from that position of strength.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

Maine’s vulnerable populations die at significantly higher-than-average rates from preventable chronic illnesses such as heart disease, asthma, and diabetes. Deep cuts to public programs, especially services for the mentally ill, laid heavy on many minds. In particular, many participants expressed concern about Maine’s heroin epidemic, including record numbers of overdose deaths in 2015.9

Participants agreed: It doesn’t have to be this way. We heard a call for programs and opportunities that address public health crises and focus on education and prevention.

True justice can only be achieved when everyone works together.

There is no guarantee that the moral arc of the universe will bend toward justice. It is our job to make it so. We have to pay attention, stay connected in our communities and find our common values.

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORM EDUCATION

“As the national conversation about mass incarceration gains momentum, Maine is ripe to name and implement alternatives that achieve true justice, and to be a model for the nation.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

We were not surprised to hear from our stakeholders that criminal justice reform is central to a just and equal society. Participants spoke out about mass incarceration, the privatization of “Supermax” prisons, reducing solitary confinement, preventing the school-toprison pipeline and the revolving door for young offenders, reducing mandatory minimums, increasing safety and guaranteeing basic rights for prisoners, and eliminating racism and bias in arrests and court trials.

Participants noted connections between criminal justice reform and other justice and equity issues, including racial justice, economic justice, women’s equality, LGBTQ equality, mental health and addiction, and more. We heard a compassionate call for human-centered programs, such as the Restorative Justice Institute of Maine and the Restorative Justice Project, and alternatives to incarceration that work, including rehabilitation, education, and community building.

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

Education was frequently cited as a critical building block for many of the justice and equity challenges we face in Maine. Participants expressed support for well-funded, high-quality early care and education, K-12, higher education, and career training programs across the board. Parents shared their concerns about achievement and attainment gaps, funding disparities and quality differentials across Maine’s many school districts; participants talked about their desire to keep more qualified young people in the state for college and after graduation.

We heard participants loud and clear: education is a cornerstone of progress.

26%

of transgender adults have lost a job due to bias, 50% have experienced harassment while working, and 20% have been evicted or denied housing. Trans women see their incomes decrease by 30% on average, post-transition. 10

$27B

In 2015, Maine’s Department of Justice spent nearly a third of its $27 billion budget on prisons.11

10

Center

Transgender Equality and

National

Force:

“We must increase access to quality education throughout the state.”

SHIFTS IN THE MODEL

YOUTH ENGAGEMENT

“There is great hope and possibility within our youth to take the reins of leadership. They are energetic, courageous, fearless and they are our future.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

Twenty-three years after the founding of Maine Initiatives, we can attest to the eagerness within our community to embrace a new generation of leaders in the progressive movement in Maine. We heard a clear call for organizations and causerelated efforts to make room for youth not only to participate, but to take leadership roles in creating real and meaningful change. New trends in intergenerational organizing, and preparing young activists to take the reins permeated every conversation.

SCARCITY VS ABUNDANCE COMMUNITY FRAGMENTATION

“We are collectively limiting our ability to move towards a just and fair society by our shared agreement to believe in the mythology of scarcity.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

While there wasn’t universal agreement on this point, a small but vocal subset of participants felt strongly that we need to reject the narrative of scarcity and deficiency that is often used to characterize our communities. They asserted that politicians create false dichotomies to pit groups against each other, and that a narrative of scarcity is used more generally to impede social progress. Other participants noted our communities’ own inaction in the face of opportunities, citing deficiency and scarcity while overlooking available resources and untapped potential within their own communities.

“We have to destroy the concept of ‘from away.’ It fuels the concept of other and divides our community.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

It is clear that while we strive to talk about “one Maine”, we are increasingly pitted against each other through geographical, demographic, and ideological divides: “from away” vs. Mainer, Greater Portland vs. the rest of Maine, minority vs. majority, etc. Opportunity arose in our conversations around a systemic breakdown of these divisive dichotomies—if the progressive community can model a conversation and movement around shared values and coalition, perhaps we can piece back together one united Maine.

Throughout all of our conversations we heard threads addressing topics beyond the scope of any one justice or equity priority, including:

There are many visionary young people in Maine who care deeply about justice and need more meaningful opportunities to develop their leadership and critical thinking about justice and equity.

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

Looking Forward

A VISION OF TRANSFORMATIVE COMMUNITY PHILANTHROPY IN MAINE

“We must build a platform for the voices of those who are currently under- or un-represented to speak for themselves on issues of economic, racial, and social justice.” –INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

We may not share the same opinions, but we have the same fundamental values. I want my kids to be healthy and safe, and for them to know justice. We have to work together for that to happen.”

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

Transformative Community Philanthropy in Maine

Throughout the Maine Insights process we heard a clarion call for greater collective action in support of shared values. People across Maine expressed concern that we are becoming increasingly polarized: in our discourse, our politics, who we talk to, who we hear from, who we value. In many arenas we see increasingly stark lines being drawn between who is “us” and who is “them.”

Amidst these feelings of polarization and division came a powerful clamor for greater community; affirmation that we can still come together around shared values and act – independently and collectively – in support of those values.

This is our work.

Maine Initiatives is a fund for change. But more than a fund, we are a network of individuals – donors, activists, citizens –supporting greater social, economic, and environmental justice in Maine through informed, intentional, and collective action. Together, we identify, mobilize, and leverage the resources of our community in support of greater justice and equity for all Mainers.

On one hand, this means money: since 1993 we have made over $3.5 million in grants to grassroots community organizations that have achieved lasting, measurable victories for justice and equity in our state. While money mobilized is one measure of our success, our vision of transformative community philanthropy goes beyond money.

It is fundamentally about people: bringing to bear our collective values, vision, and resources on issues of justice and equity in our state.

In this context, the Maine Insights process is a cornerstone of our work moving forward. This process of community outreach and engagement affirms that there exists in our community great untapped and unrealized potential. Potential for:

Individuals to bring about positive change in their communities;

Communities to embody greater social, economic, and environmental justice; and

All Mainers to be agents of change in our communities, to be progressive community philanthropists.

It is our charge and our commitment to unleash this potential:

Through a practice of community philanthropy that is not merely about money, but about people –their knowledge, experience, relationships, resources, values, and time;

By engaging and connecting people on the issues that matter to them and to their communities with intention, with information, and with others.

This is our vision of transformative community philanthropy.

As we pursue this vision, we do so within the context of the themes that have emerged through the Maine Insights process. While all of the themes raised through this process fit within the broad scope of Maine Initiatives’ mission, we will prioritize an emphasis on racial justice and equity.

Why Racial Justice and Equity?

Racial injustice is woven into the fabric of our nation. It is historical and contemporary. It has social, economic, and environmental expressions. And it is something that can only be effectively addressed through a combination of individual and collective action.

While there is a great deal of collective concern about racial justice and equity, we also observe a sense of intractability about the problem. People feel limited individual capacity to have an impact on issues of racial justice. Organizations, coalitions, and even funders are often reluctant or ill equipped to directly engage with the topic.

Maine Initiatives seeks to address this collective hesitancy, using our grantmaking, programming, communications, and convening power to build opportunities for greater action on racial justice in Maine. We will create space for individuals and organizations to actively engage with these issues and will highlight unheralded and underfunded work already occurring in our state that is having important impacts on this cause.

We are inspired and informed by organizations whose work across many different sectors—women’s equality, tribal rights, immigrant issues, economic empowerment, health, criminal justice, youth activism and leadership—is increasing racial justice in Maine. Our efforts will highlight these success stories and make room for deepening our understanding of, and our commitment to, racial justice and equity.

We need to nurture connectedness, shared experience and value all Mainers.

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

Three Challenges to Addressing Racial Justice and Equity:

As we address the issues of racial justice and equity through this lens, we also recognize the intricacy of these topics. The Maine Insights conversations highlighted three challenges related to a communitarian approach to addressing racial justice and racial equity:

OWNERSHIP AGENCY OPPORTUNITY

Even within the progressive community, there exists a sense that racism and racial injustice are primarily problems of a few bad apples: racists. As such, the solution to the problem is to “fix” the racists. This notion presents a problem of ownership in that it limits the role “non-racists” have in fostering and advancing racial justice in our communities, beyond rooting out racism.

Even for those individuals committed to advancing racial justice, the issues of racial justice and racial equity are often perceived as “original sins” of our nation, far beyond the ability of one individual to address. Faced with a seemingly immovable part of our social, economic, and historic fabric, the question becomes “what is one person to do?” For many, there appears to be no clear place of purchase for engaging on the issues of racial justice and equity.

Finally, even for a person committed to playing an activist role on racial justice in his or her community, there is not a clear path to engagement and effectiveness. For many other topics discussed, there is robust scaffolding and infrastructure: organizations, coalitions, and funders for whom the issue is central to their mission. However, the multi-sectoral nature of racial justice and equity pursuits makes the development of structural support networks an unwieldy endeavor.

We must ask:

Who speaks for issues of racial justice? Who supports those voices? Who convenes individuals and organizations advancing racial equity? Who coordinates strategy? Who funds this work? Who celebrates the victories?

Maine Initiatives is in a unique position to create the space to ask and seek answers to these questions. And we are committed to doing so.

While we propose to address racial inequity, we do recognize that it is one of the most complicated justice issues facing our communities, our state, and indeed our nation. As such, we don’t expect to solve the issues of racial injustice. Instead, we expect to increase collective ownership of this issue: engaging our full community in the search for and support of the solutions here in Maine.

This will be a complex process, one in which we will need to address our discomfort with risk taking, embrace the ideas of others, and unify around a shared vision for Maine and its people.

Will you join us?

There are many people in our communities and our state who are hungry for change and eager to take collective action to move us toward social, economic, and environmental justice.

–INSIGHTS PARTICIPANT

Authors

Philip Walsh, Caitlin Gilmet, and Andrea Berry

Polychrome Collective

Thanks to Maine Inside Out, Resident Owned Neighborhood Associations of Maine, and the Somali Bantu Community

Design & Photography Acknowledgments

We are grateful to our Maine Insights hosts: Charity West; Meri and Lee Lowry; Waterfall Arts Center; Betsy Smith and Jennifer Hoopes; First Parish Church in Portland; Tom and Cindy Longstaff; Drew Christopher Joy and the Southern Maine Workers’ Center; Pious Ali, Susan Roche and the Immigrant Legal Advocacy Project; Larry Dansinger and the Peace & Justice Center of Eastern Maine; Jennifer Goldman and Sarah Lewis; Rebecca Darr Lichtfield, Jeremy

About Maine Initiatives

Maine Initiatives is a community of more than 2,000 individual donors and activists supporting greater social, economic, and environmental justice in Maine through informed, intentional, and collective philanthropy.

We are a progressive foundation. We make grants to fund and strengthen nonprofit organizations that are advancing social, economic, and

Association of Lewiston and Auburn for offering their community gatherings as subjects for our report photography.

Lichtfield, and Coastal Enterprises, Inc.; and Leslie Goode and the Blue Hill Public Library.

Generous support from the Broad Reach Fund and individual donors to Maine Initiatives made this report possible.

And to our Maine Insights participants, individually and collectively: Thank you.

environmental justice from the grassroots up.

We are a public foundation. We make grants with the money we raise from the community, pooling large and small donations from many supporters.

We are the people’s foundation. We are a community of individuals engaging and expressing their progressive values with intention, with information, and with each other.

Maine Insights

CONVERSATIONS ABOUT JUSTICE AND EQUITY IN MAINE