BREAKING NEWS: Founder Chris Korzen ‘quits’ Maine’s Majority #mepolitics

Published on thePhoenix.com

See the following email exchange (read up from the bottom). Not sure who's empowered to accept his resignation, but it's as clear as day: Chris Korzen is leaving the Maine's Majority group he founded. Further, he admits that does not understand the difference between requesting public records from the government to use in a publicity campaign to promote a political perspective and, well, requesting public records from the government to use in a publicity campaign to promote a political perspective. He's just sure that when he does it, it's good, and when Bruce Poliquin does it, it's bad.

Here's my last message to Chris:

You have made my exact point. Poliquin would likely say he is exposing abuse of the system, and that you're advertising. All I'm saying is that I don't want the government determining whether either, both, or neither of you is telling the truth. Open government and free speech can get messy, but the mess is better than the alternatives.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 2:17 PM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

Please. Print this, so the world can see how ridiculous my life has become. If you don't, I will. If exposing abuse of the system is now synonymous with advertising, then seriously, I quit.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 2:14 PM, Inglis, Jeff <JInglis@phx.com> wrote:

In your 12:21 pm message you finally boiled down your argument against Poliquin to this:

"He used public information to advertise himself for business/political/personal purposes."

You did too.

You used public information (the results of your FOAA request that included Poliquin's request for the email list) to advertise yourself (your point of view, your organization, your political cause) for business/political/personal purposes (to promote your perspective on both a potential candidate and an existing state law).

(Okay, I'll let you off the hook on "personal," but with the observation that I hear more about Poliquin from MM than I do from the man himself - which is damn hard to do.)

And you do this all the time - you make FOAA requests, receive the results, and do with them what you want to.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 2:08 PM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

I feel like I'm in the twilight zone here. How is what Poliquin did something that we do all the time?

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 2:07 PM, Inglis, Jeff <JInglis@phx.com> wrote:

Let me summarize:

-You put out a press release accusing Poliquin of doing something you do all the time, including the exact same thing you did in order to discover and publicize his action.

-You claim that what he did is "abuse" of FOAA.

-You claim what you did is not.

-You say that releasing the 10,000 email list would be "wrong" - though not illegal (and it's clearly legal).

-You admit that Poliquin did not release the email list.

So what message was I supposed to get from the press release? 

Right now I'm at:

Maine's Majority hates Poliquin so much it'll attack him for doing something MM does all the time, and is so out-of-its-head bothered by Poliquin's behavior that MM will attempt to take down Maine's open-government act in the process.

Somehow I think that's not the message you meant to send.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 1:59 PM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

That's right - he has not.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 1:45 PM, Inglis, Jeff <JInglis@phx.com> wrote:

That's a fair point, and worth having a decent argument over. It's just not even close to what you said in the press release, or in any of our correspondence up until this very message. You also haven't claimed that Poliquin released the 10,000 email records to the public.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 1:41 PM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

I do understand your point. I just think you're wrong. We released a public document consisting of an email from one public official to another. We did not release the 10,000 email records - which I do have in my possession. Releasing those records would have been wrong.

-------- Original message --------
From: "Inglis, Jeff" <JInglis@phx.com> 

Date: 03/26/2013 12:32 (GMT-05:00) 
To: Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> 
Subject: Re: PRESS RELEASE: Former Treasurer Poliquin abused Freedom of Access Act to obtain public list for personal use 

My point is that you're trying to object to his actions on a principle so broad it indicts your own actions. (And if the legislature agreed with you, we'd have no more open government at all - because the government would always retain control what's done with its information.)

It's extremely simple: You "used public information to advertise (yourself/your organization/your point of view/your cause) for business/political/personal purposes."

You object to what he did, but depend on doing the exact same thing to make your objection. I simply fail to see the difference, and you haven't made it any clearer.

I think it would be equally interesting to see if a broad segment of the public thinks we should shut down government transparency in an attempt to remedy spam.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 12:28 PM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

I don't know where you're going with this, Jeff, but I've already answered this question.

It's a good question, though, and I hope you're planning to write about it. It would be interesting to hear what a broad segment of the public thinks constitutes abuse of the FOAA.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 12:25 PM, Inglis, Jeff <JInglis@phx.com> wrote:

I'm not sure you did either of those things - given that responding to FOAA is hardly collusion.

But what you're suggesting is that people shouldn't be allowed to use public information for business/political/personal purposes. That's pretty broad. So what should they be allowed to use public information for?

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 12:21 PM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

Really? We exposed the government's abuse of the public trust and collusion with big-monied outside interests. That's exactly what FOAA is for.

He used public information to advertise himself for business/political/personal purposes.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 11:25 AM, Inglis, Jeff <JInglis@phx.com> wrote:

Perhaps more succinctly: What do you see as the difference between what he did and what you did?

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 11:16 AM, Inglis, Jeff <JInglis@phx.com> wrote:

And so the legislature has. FOAA stands as it does, making both your actions and Poliquins perfectly legal and procedurally and morally defensible. (Private contracts with private companies aside.)

Your complaining about it fails my logic, as follows:

1. It has been for years - and is likely never to change - legal to get voter registration information from the government, and send to those addresses mailings for political purposes - whether from a campaign or a political-action committee, or even an elected official doing constituent mailings. (I'm pretty sure Maine's Majority has used this process, too.)

2. It is a long-standing principle of open government that requests must be granted without regard to the requester's purpose. Example 1: If you ask for your neighbor's property-tax record from town hall, you must get it, whether you intend to take out a newspaper ad claiming your neighbor is a freeloading crony of local politicos who gets a break on his taxes, or whether you are going to contest your own property-tax assessment based on information relating to your neighbor's property, or if you want to frame it and put it on your living-room wall. Example 2: If you ask for correspondence with a state agency or official, you must get it, regardless of whether you are going to publish it in print, post it online, issue a press release, or keep it in a safe-deposit box.

3. Poliquin asked for an email list, which is public record under FOAA. The government had to give it to him, and can place no restrictions on what he does now.

4. You asked for correspondence, which is public record under FOAA. The government had to give it to you, and could place no restrictions on what you do with it now.

5. You imply that the government should be unable to prevent you from doing what you did, but definitely claim that the government ought to stop him from doing what he did.

6. You fail to make a distinction between these two acts, which are, again, utterly identical in procedural, legal, and moral terms.

7. When offered a suggestion of a more nuanced problem you might use to refine your argument, you not only reject that argument - which is an issue of public debate - but reiterate your insistence that the government should somehow control information that is in the hands of the public (or perhaps condition release of public information on the intent of the requester).

8. When asked for a means by which that could happen, you defer to the body that created the provisions you object to.

What am I missing?

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 11:06 AM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

I'll let the Legislature write the laws.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 10:59 AM, Inglis, Jeff <JInglis@phx.com> wrote:

Okay, so what do you think should or shouldn't be allowed? And how would that be enforced?

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 10:55 AM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

I don't have a problem with the public having access to personal information. I have a problem with the notion that it's OK for the public to do whatever they want with that information.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 10:38 AM, Inglis, Jeff <JInglis@phx.com> wrote:

What you seem to be saying suggests that my guess was right - your concern is not about abuse of FOAA, but rather about public access to personally identifying information, some of which has for many years been available through FOAA, with no problems.

Unless I'm terribly mistaken, you want to be able to continue to do what you did - ask a government agency for correspondence (including with private citizens), get that information unredacted, and announce to the public that a specific person, whose name you use, has done something or other.

That's exactly what you did. But the way you constructed your release suggested that you want to outlaw doing that exact thing - because you claimed that taking a government response to an FOAA request and using it for whatever you wanted should be prosecuted. Contrary to the language of your release, I think you and I agree that it's simply not an abuse of FOAA to use public information for your own gains.

If your concern is that Poliquin can get people's email addresses in bulk from the state, that's something very different than saying the government should have control over what the public does with public records that have been released.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 10:30 AM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

Maybe we just live in different worlds, or maybe we just disagree. A lot of people I talk with are furious that the BDN tried to publish the names of concealed weapons permit holders. It doesn't matter that the BDN expressly said it wouldn't do this; the fact is that they could have, and that was enough for people. So, in that respect, at least part of FOAA now has a bad name. We're now likely going to lose the ability to verify that there aren't any felons running around out there with concealed handguns, because the public is afraid that information will be misused.

It seems that your point is that it's a necessary consequence of open government that your name can wind up in the paper or on an ex-treasurer's email list. It's a fair point. I simply disagree. I think we can make a distinction between legitimate and illegitimate use of FOAA data, and that they way to strengthen the legitimate uses is to denounce the illegitimate uses.

It's the same thing with SPAM. The law allows you to buy lists, harvest email addresses from web sites, etc. You can send these folks an individual email or compare them with your own list. But as soon as you send them a bulk email asking them to buy something you're on the hook for big penalties. That's a legal distinction between a legitimate and in illegitimate use of information. We can do the same with the FOAA.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 10:04 AM, Inglis, Jeff <JInglis@phx.com> wrote:

Since when does open government have a bad name? People give themselves bad names. Open government is an admirable concept. And almost never are open-government rules given criminal penalties - they're civil violations at best.

But where I'm really running into confusion is with your apparent idea that the government should (or even can) control what members of the public do with information they have in their possession.

The whole point of open government is so people can get information about their government. What they do with it, and why they ask for it, is not in the purview of open-government principles. In fact, it's counter to the ideal. If the government is going to prevent someone from disseminating, analyzing, or otherwise using the results of open-government requests, then how exactly is government open? ("We'll tell you how many people we're abusing in prison, but you can't tell anyone else?" That's the opposite of the point.)

I can't believe you're intentionally advocating that the government exercise prior restraint on use of public information. It strikes me as against your goals, and your group's goals, as well as being mutually exclusive. 

What if, for example, a person or group were allowed to ask for FOAA requests made by others, and the government says "We have to give it to you, but you are forbidden from telling others. They all have to ask individually for exactly the same thing." Your press release would vaporize, as a violation of the law. What you're claiming to want to outlaw is something you did in getting this information, something you do all the time, something news organizations and members of the public do constantly, and is in fact the reality of open government: Once information it out of government's hands, its dissemination and use is no longer under government control.

If I try to imagine what you might actually mean, I wonder if you are somehow trying to argue for protecting some types of personal information when it's in the government's hands - but that's a very different thing than suggesting someone who asks for information from the government should be restricted in how they use it.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 9:43 AM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

They exist so the public can ensure that government is doing its job, not so aspiring piblic officials can build their email lists. I would love to see the law changed so we can prosecute people who do what Poliquin did. He gives open government a bad name.

-------- Original message --------
From: "Inglis, Jeff" <JInglis@phx.com> 
Date: 03/26/2013 09:35 (GMT-05:00) 
To: Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> 
Subject: Re: PRESS RELEASE: Former Treasurer Poliquin abused Freedom of Access Act to obtain public list for personal use 

He may well have violated terms of a private agreement with a private company. That's not my beef - and it doesn't seem to be yours, either, from the release.

You're claiming it's an "abuse" of open-government laws for a requester to get information from the government and use it for whatever the requester wants. 

Problem is, there's no other purpose of open-government laws - they exist so that people can ask questions of their government and get answers, and then publicize those answers, for whatever purpose the requester has.

Go ahead and shout about him breaking the rules of Constant Contact. Nobody cares, and you know that - which is why you made the release sound like he had misused open-government laws, when he used them exactly properly. And so did you, in announcing to people that he did this. The issue comes when you call both of those things - which are procedurally, legally, and morally identical - "abuse."

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 9:31 AM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

He's going to lose his Constant Contact account over this. I'll take my chances with the court of public opinion.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 9:27 AM, Inglis, Jeff <JInglis@phx.com> wrote:

If it's "abuse" to make FOAA requests and use the resulting information for whatever your private purposes are, you're as guilty as Poliquin. Which, by the way, is not guilty of anything at all.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 9:23 AM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

And your job? Pretending that abuse doesn't happen because you're afraid of the consequences? The only reason why we know he did this is that we were obtained his request through another FOAA request. The system works. Go write that story.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 9:16 AM, Inglis, Jeff <JInglis@phx.com> wrote:

Sucks that your job is weakening open government.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 9:13 AM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

Jeff, Jeff, Jeff... I really don't care. This is my job.

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 9:10 AM, Inglis, Jeff <JInglis@phx.com> wrote:

Chris, Chris, Chris, Chris, Chris - 

It's a VERY slippery and dangerous slope to try to start dictating what can and can't be done with public records after they're released to the public. Please don't weaken Maine's existing open-government laws further by pursuing this.

Jeff

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 9:07 AM, Chris Korzen <chris@mainesmajority.org> wrote:

For Immediate Release
March 26, 2013


Contact:
Chris Korzen

207-358-9731

chris@mainesmajority.org

Former Treasurer Bruce Poliquin abused Freedom of Access Act to obtain public list for personal use

Portland – In February 2013, mass emails from a personal account of former state treasurer and U.S. Senate candidate Bruce Poliquin began inexplicably turning up in some Mainers' inboxes. A Maine's Majority investigation has determined that Poliquin obtained the emails through a Freedom of Access Act (FOAA) request, and subsequently used this public information for his own personal gain.

In the early hours of December 9, 2012, Poliquin submitted an FOAA request to the Treasurer's office for “a copy of all email and other addresses used in the Office of the State Treasurer's Outreach Program.” In response, he received 10,742 email addresses. Five days earlier, the legislature had confirmed Neria Douglass to succeed Poliquin, effectively ending his tenure as treasurer.

Some two months later, Mr. Poliquin began sending bulk emails to the owners of those addresses through a Constant Contact email marketing system. The emails are political in nature (titled, for example, "How to Fix Maine's Ongoing Budget Crisis”) and point recipients toward a brucepoliquin.net web site.

“Although Mr. Poliquin legally obtained his former office's email records, his personal use of this public information constitutes a blatant abuse of the Freedom of Access Act,” said Maine's Majority executive director Chris Korzen. “Poliquin is clearly trying to set himself up for a future election bid, and he's now using state resources to build his communications infrastructure. He should stop using this publicly-owned email list immediately.”

Ironically, at least one influential Maine Republican appears to agree. Earlier this month, Sportsman's Alliance of Maine director and former state representative David Trahan told the Maine Heritage Policy Center's Maine Wire blog, “FOAA was designed for citizens to keep government in line, not for political targeting.”

While Poliquin does not appear to have broken any laws, he has likely violated Constant Contact's Anti-Spam policy, which requires users to obtain informed consent from recipients before sending bulk email.

###

Underground downtown: Looking beneath the streets

Published in the Portland Phoenix

For years, many people have heard rumors about secret spaces beneath our feet on the Portland peninsula. Now the Portland Phoenix can reveal the truth about several of these. We have three categories: places I've been and seen myself; places that exist as confirmed by historical records or accounts of people I've spoken with; and places whose existence is third-hand at best (even if the details are startlingly specific) and must therefore remain somehow in question. This is obviously in addition to the tunnels, such as those related to liquor-smuggling during Prohibition or helping slaves escape to Canada, that once existed in Portland, but whose locations have been lost to time, development, or Commercial Street's construction.

"There are a lot of tunnels in Portland's history," says local historian Michelle Souliere. "The question is how many of those still exist in some form or another." If you have any information about any of these things, please send me an email at jinglis@phx.com and let me know!

PLACES I'VE BEEN

The first place I've actually been is also the most commonly known, and least interesting: the TUNNEL UNDER CONGRESS STREET built in 1966 between the former Portland Press Herald building at 390 Congress Street and the paper's former printing plant across the street, next to City Hall. I've been in it, as have many Press Herald staffers over the years. It looks exactly like the hallways in your junior high school classroom, and is about as exciting. The tunnel allowed workers to go from one building to the other without going outside or dodging traffic; also, a conveyor belt carried heavy lead printing plates from the stereotype room in the main building to the printing plant across the street. As built, it was 154 feet long, 13 feet wide, and 10 feet high, according to a Press Heraldreport of its construction. "The tunnel, with its average five to seven feet of gravel, the concrete slab and the paving overhead, makes an ideal bomb shelter," says the report, now available on the Press Herald's website (see above). It will be sealed off, according to plans for renovating the main building into a hotel.

I have also been to the SPACE UNDERNEATH THE PORTLAND STAR MATCH BUILDING on West Commercial Street; formerly the bunkers for the sulfur and other chemicals used to make the matches (and you thought Waterville had the monopoly on making trees into tiny bits of wood!), the cellars are very tunnel-like, and have several caves with thick brick walls, and a climate that might be excellent for storing wine.

LOCATIONS THAT EXIST (OR DID)

The old BOWLODROME BOWLING ALLEY underneath the Forest Avenue parking lot next to Portland Stage Company and behind the old Strand Theater building on Congress Street. Vin Veroneau, president of JB Brown and Company, a major downtown property owner, recalls bowling there as a child. Harold Pachios, one of the owners of the building, believes something is still there: "I understand that there's the remains of a bowling alley," though he was unsure what might be left after more than 50 years of disuse. (Gerv says the bowling alley is "real and quite beautiful.")

ANOTHER BOWLING ALLEY, also on Forest Avenue, in the basement of a building across from the Portland Stage Company building, as shown in a map of the city's downtown from 1954.

A THIRD BOWLING ALLEY, this in the basement of the Portland YMCA on Forest Avenue (yes, indeed!) and reported by the Evening Express as one of several activities at a 1965 Y "family night." Michelle Souliere, owner of the Green Hand Bookshop and curator/publisher of the Strange Maine blog and its associated Gazette zine, recalls taking gymnastics lessons down there in the '80s: "We did pommel horse stuff on the lanes."

A FOURTH BOWLING ALLEY, the Bowlaway, on the site of the Portland Museum of Art. Though it's very clearly on 1948 and 1954 maps of Portland, museum spokeswoman Kristen Levesque says she had never heard of such a thing.

The ARCADE/MALL ON THE GROUND FLOOR OF THE TIME AND TEMP BUILDING extends downstairs, with old long-abandoned shops and bathrooms with marble countertops; Veroneau says the space hearkens back to the Dick Tracy era.

UNDERGROUND BRICK ARCHWAYS near the corner of India and Commercial streets. Perhaps the source of the persistent "unfinished subway system" rumors — which remain unsubstantiated — they were the remains of an old "interim train station that served the Atlantic and St. Lawrence Railroad back in the 1840s," former Portland transportation director Jeff Monroe told PortlandMagazine in 2008.

Sets of SLIDING DOORS IN THE BASEMENT of the Maine College of Art that connect it with two neighboring buildings to the east. (Though several downtown buildings have connecting basements, a rumored tunnel connecting the Oak Street student housing with the old Porteous building does not exist, according to MECA president Don Tuski.)

SPACES DIRECTLY BENEATH THE SIDEWALKS on several areas of Congress Street. According to Veroneau and Tuski, the State Theatre, the old Porteous building, and the Mechanics Hall all have basements that extend beyond their buildings, reaching underneath the sidewalks but stopping around the point the actual street begins. It's not unreasonable to think other buildings are similarly equipped, but those are the three I have specifics on.

A TUNNEL BETWEEN THE OLD PORTLAND HALL BUILDING AND GENO'S Rock Club. Christian Matzke, a former Portland Hall resident assistant has spent time in both buildings' basements, and says "without a doubt there's a tunnel," though it's blocked off by rubble at both ends. There also appears to have been a tunnel heading across the street, Matzke says, though that's also filled in.

A TUNNEL IN BAYSIDE underneath the a building at the corner of Oxford and Preble streets that once housed an office of Congressman Tom Allen. Matzke, who once worked as an intern for Allen, recalls finding a door locked from the outside that served as storage, but also contained something else: "There's a hole in the floor larger than a manhole cover, with a large piece of metal put across it." With another intern, Matzke removed the metal and descended to a chamber that had a mattress in one corner, and was obviously an intersection of several tunnels coming from other locations.

RUMOR-ONLY

Tunnels connected to the foundation of the MASONIC HALL.

A tunnel CONNECTING THE MCLELLAN HOUSE TO THE CUMBERLAND CLUB; its existence was simultaneously posited and denied by PMA spokeswoman Kristen Levesque.

An entrance to the tunnels in one of the buildings off MONUMENT SQUARE.

The LEN'S MARKET TUNNEL. "The story went that there was a tunnel that connected Len's Market to the Eastland" hotel, Matzke says. Souliere has also heard tell of this tunnel, from a descendant of the original Len; a parking lot is now on the site, leading her to expect that the tunnel has been filled or collapsed.

Which leads us to the most-rumored tale: the TUNNELS STARTING AT THE EASTLAND PARK HOTEL that "used to run out into different points in the city," says Souliere. After initially being very responsive to an inquiry and inviting me to an in-person meeting a few days away, Jeff Cappellieri of the Westin Portland Harborview called to cancel just three hours before the interview was to happen, and was not able to reschedule before deadline. We'll have to leave that in the "rumors" column — for now.

Fuel Price Watch: Chavez dies; will poor be cold?

Published in the Portland Phoenix

Last week, a man whose determination to embarrass the American government extended to helping US citizens when their own government wouldn't died, reportedly suffering a heart attack.

In 2006, Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez made a laughingstock of George W. Bush by taking advantage of climbing oil prices to do something Bush would not. At a time when Bush was refusing to release supplies from the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve and Congress was resisting granting additional funds to help poor people with heating costs, Chavez stepped in.

Through Citgo, whose owner is the Venezuelan government, Chavez ordered discounted heating oil supplied to needy Americans. At the time, Maine Governor John Baldacci hailed the offer — of a 40-percent discount for 8 million gallons of heating oil to low-income Mainers, Native American tribes, and homeless shelters — as filling a gap left by the federal government's inaction.

According to Citizens Energy, the non-profit led by Joseph P. Kennedy II that has been a US coordinator for Venezuelan oil subsidies to this country, Maine has received more than $30 million over the past eight years, including $27 million in heating aid directly to 60,000 households (an amount that is still growing because the heating-season-long assistance program is still running). Maine shelters have received more than $300,000 in help, and Maine tribes have gotten more than $3 million in assistance.

Kennedy issued a statement after Chavez's death that should have caught more attention in Washington DC than it actually did:

"President Chavez cared deeply about the poor of Venezuela and other nations around the world and their abject lack of even basic necessities, while some of the wealthiest people on our planet have more money than they can ever reasonably expect to spend. There are close to two million people in the United States who received free heating assistance, thanks to President Chavez's leadership. Our prayers go out to President Chavez's family, the people of Venezuela, and all who were warmed by his generosity."

Whether the program will carry on in the future will depend on the Venezuelan government. It seems likely, though, that American citizens will continue to require this sort of direct foreign aid — unless Congress suddenly finds the ability to provide for the American people, as opposed to multinational corporations.

• In related news, if you want CHEAP GAS, mark your calendar for April 20. And no, this isn't a US government program; Citgo's involved again, as is a somewhat higher authority.

Next Level Church, an ecumenical Christian church with branches across the country (including at 1053 Forest Avenue), is bringing gas prices down below $3 per gallon on that day, at one gas station: the Citgo Xtra Mart at 865 Brighton Avenue in Portland. It'll only be for 2500 gallons, but that's enough to make a big difference.

Apparently, starting at 11 am and running until the 2500 gallons are gone, the price at the pump will drop to $2.99, with donations from the church making up the difference between that amount and whatever the current market price is. A similar effort last month in Epping, New Hampshire, resulted in nearly 300 people getting discounted gas.

Press Releases: Drinking games

Published in the Portland Phoenix

It's February, and time to cut loose on a ranting bender. Here is a media-themed drinking game you can play now that football season is over. All you need is a copy of each of the state's major daily newspapers: the Bangor Daily News, the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram, and the Lewiston Sun Journal. (For added difficulty — both in the game and with supply acquisition — also include the Morning Sentinel, the Kennebec Journal, the Journal Tribune, the Times Record.) Each person will need a bottle of whiskey and a shot glass. A designated driver is also suggested, but optional if you're playing at home. With your buddies all gathered around a table, each grab a paper and start reading.

BASIC RULES Drink every time you encounter any of the following:

• A story in one paper that's credited to another paper (the Sun Journal does this most, so give that one to the strongest liver in the room)

• A story that's credited to the Associated Press, Reuters, or any other wire service (drink twice if that story is based in Maine and the paper was too lazy to send its own reporter)

• A story that's credited to "staff" without using an actual staff member's name

• Information you read on the Internet in the past 48 hours (including on that newspaper's website)

• Information you read days ago in a weekly newspaper, or on a weekly's website, but that the daily publishes without crediting the newspaper that actually broke the story (drink twice if that paper is the Portland Phoenix, and triple if that item was in the Phoenix more than a year ago and the daily's just figuring it out)

ADVANCED RULES Drink for these items too, which may require closer scrutiny:

• A story you heard on the Maine Public Broadcasting Network before it was in the newspaper (skip the drink if MPBN highlighted the story after the paper published it)

• A story the reporter did (or, based on its quality and detail, could have done) without leaving the newsroom

• A story for which the image or photograph is drawn from the newspaper's files, as opposed to something new

WHO WINS Whomever thinks the amount paid for their paper was well-spent. (Warning: this is likely to be the person who has drunk the most.)

BONUS ROUND In case you end up staring blankly at a TV that lacks any compelling sports programming, tune in to any local TV station's evening-news broadcast. Drink every time you see any of the following:

• A horrendous pun in on-screen text or scripted newsreading

• A mugshot or video of someone wearing an orange jumpsuit

• An emergency vehicle with its lights on

• A people-on-the-street series of interviews

• People attending a press conference (skip the drink if a reporter's question, and its answer from the speaker, is actually broadcast)

• A weather report that tells you less useful information than you'd learn by looking out the window

• A reporter standing outside struggling to remain upright and/or dry in inclement weather

• An awkward segue between radically different stories, like when your grandfather starts talking about "the gays" at Thanksgiving and your mother changes the topic to her new gravy recipe

• A sports story about a Boston-based team in which the reporter actually went to Boston (skip if preceded or followed by a story about a local team in which the reporter went to the nearby town)

Now, if there's any whiskey left in any of the bottles, you'll probably want to just drink it too.

Maine and Antarctica

Aired on the Maine Public Broadcasting Network's Maine Calling radio show

The turning of souls: USM prof: Teaching is about spirit, not data

Published in the Portland Phoenix

Making an impassioned plea for humanistic considerations to remain paramount in our societal discussion about education and its continual improvement, University of Southern Maine philosophy professor Jeremiah Conway follows his own advice. He seeds his book, The Alchemy of Teaching (forthcoming in March from Sentient Publications), with stories of classroom encounters between students and ideas that remind us of an important, but oft-neglected, truth about education: It is no good if it merely teaches the young facts and tasks to be accomplished in the workforce. Rather, education must deeply and fully engage both students and teachers in the quest for understanding and connection.

Conway begins and ends with aspects of the Greek myth of Daedalus and Icarus — and the Breugel painting depicting that myth's climactic moment. He inquires thoroughly into what the story might mean (see excerpt in sidebar) Conway gently, calmly, and unrelentingly shreds the data-driven mantras of the modern industrial-style education system.

His heartfelt tales of students young and very old transforming themselves — and their teacher — get to the heart of a distinctly European, even Renaissance tradition of education: that its aim is not to indoctrinate nor to cause memorization, but rather to excite, to enthrall, and, above all, to spark the human potential within each of us.

In constructing his subtle argument — for this is among the least argumentative examples of a persuasive essay — Conway marshals some unexpected forces. Among those making significant, and sympathetic, appearances here are a religious fundamentalist, a smartypants overachiever, a reclusive-silent type, and an elderly woman.

But there is more. A particularly impassioned section takes the interpretation of Nietzsche's nihilism in a direction even philosophy students might be surprised at. While the 19th-century German thinker thought the rise of lamentable decadence was the first step toward its subsequent dissolution, he wrote movingly inThus Spoke Zarathustra of feeling and thinking and sensing and processing deep within the body — "in the blood," as he put it. Conway's professorial but not at all dry explication of this section of the text leads to an account of how a particular class of his engaged with this idea; the deep soulful examinations that discussion entails augur well for Nietzsche's forlorn hopes.

Certainly more a work of thought and exploration than of diagnosis or prescription, The Alchemy of Teaching asks its readers to remember that those ancients who sought to transform base metals into valuable treasure didn't know exactly how it might occur, but retained their sense of wonder and certainty at the potential of the universe to deliver riches beyond measure. We, and all students of any age or era, should be so lucky as to in herit not only the scientific determinism of the alchemists, but also their mystic faith in the ultimate possibility: that all leaden pupils might, with care, attention, and not a little bit of liberty, transform themselves — and, perhaps, their equally lucky teachers — into golden pioneers simultaneously finding and creating new worlds.

Building a hub for food: Behind the scenes with a community project to feed bellies and souls

Published in the Portland Phoenix

Exploding out of the mind of Portland idea-man Eli Cayer, 39, and with financial backing from his Urban Farm Fermentory, is the conversion of a former East Bayside taxi garage into a home for food processors and preparers right on the Portland peninsula.

With his eye ever fixed on the Next Big Thing for the Forest City (he's had his hand in everything from public transit to community engagement to booze), Cayer is not only projecting the February 1 opening of the yet-to-be-named new space, which will house an expanded space for Bomb Diggity Bakery and an all-natural fruit-popsicle maker — he has also offered the Portland Phoenix a behind-the-scenes look at how ideas like this one arise, develop, change, adapt, get wrecked, get salvaged, and ultimately, if the stars align, actually happen.

It's a peek at what goes into bringing great new businesses and ideas to Portland. More often, as Cayer observes, "you see what worked" — at a grand opening or community open house. "Sometimes it doesn't work," he says wryly, and with personal experience.

Cayer has started businesses in Portland for many years. There was a DIY bicycle-repair shop called the Hub, which led to cycle-rickshaws (predating by a decade the ones we saw this summer), and then an unfruitful plan to install a downtown refueling location for biodiesel vehicles. He founded the community group MENSK to bring together like-minded creative people in hopes of cross-pollinating great ideas. He co-founded Maine Mead Works, and then left to help start the Urban Farm Fermentory, which makes mead, hard cider, and a rapidly expanding line of kombucha drinks. Not all of these endeavors have worked out as planned, and others ran their course, after which Cayer moved on.

Now, with the UFF growing strong, another Cayer notion is taking shape.

"I've been dreaming about this space for a while now," he says, standing in the vast open cavern that used to be the garage home to ABC Taxi. It's another part of the same 200 Anderson Street building that houses the UFF, which is how Cayer heard, last June, that the taxi company was moving to a new space off the peninsula.

He signed a lease in August, based on commitments from a couple of prospective tenants, and started submitting permitting applications to the city for different uses as well as renovations.

When he did, Cayer admits, "I unfortunately worded it in a way that scared" city officials scrutinizing how the building would be divided for various tenants. An initial potential tenant was a man who would be making countertops; also interested was Bomb Diggity, seeking to expand both its bakery business as well as the social mission of its nonprofit parent Momentum (which works with people who have intellectual disabilities) out of the space it presently shares with Local Sprouts on Congress Street. Cayer soon found out that city rules governing spaces with multiple uses (like manufacturing and food preparation) meant different permitting and building requirements than Cayer was used to from his experience with single-use spaces, like the UFF.

That led to delays, which meant the countertop-maker dropped out, but ultimately that change made life easier; he found a beginning cheesemaker who wanted to rent some space — which put the entire building back into just one use (food prep) and on familiar regulatory ground.

But even that confusion wasn't as bad as the mess Cayer found in the space itself. "I pressure-washed the floors like six times," he says with a grimace, recalling a six-inch-deep mess of grime, oil, and other disgustingness piled up in the back corner after the first round of pressure-washing. After all, it had been a taxi garage. "Cars parked here for a decade," Cayer notes, pointing to areas of the concrete floor that have been worn down by traffic and eaten away by chemicals. "It was gross."

After the second pressure-wash, it was time for a degreaser. And then, yes, more pressure-washing. It was not the only work needing doing: the roof needed some repairs and a paint job; old electrical and phone wires snaked through the open rafters overhead (Cayer got $200 from a scrap-metal yard when he'd finished yanking it all out).

Nevertheless, by September Cayer had the bakery and cheesemaker tenants committed and permitting under way. "Then it was sort of figuring out the layout and trying to find contractors" to build out the space.

SECOND CATCH

In October, another snafu arose. The cheesemaker, Rachel Lauriat, learned she couldn't actually work in the new space. A creamery needs intensive plumbing (you'd be surprised at how much liquid is involved in making tasty solids), and those requirements were more than was available on site. Adding the pipes would come at a huge cost Lauriat was hoping to avoid.

And then there was the ventilation. Beyond working with huge kettles and steam systems that require good air flow, the product itself can be picky. The final step in cheese-making is ripening, working with live cultures that require specific ranges of humidity, temperature, and air circulation speeds. Not surprisingly, advanced ventilation control like that wasn't already installed and waiting in the former industrial warehouse and loading dock (along a disused railroad bed) — and the situation was complicated by the potential for other live organisms to be in the air from the bakery (live bread yeasts) and fermentory (fermenting yeasts and related bacteria).

Without direct access to a window, and without the landlord's permission to ventilate through the roof, Lauriat was out of luck. She calls the decision "quite disappointing," and is still looking for a workable space in Portland. The bakery, and the popsicle-maker who would eventually come in to take her place, she says, "need way less plumbing and ventilation than I do." And even though she won't be an immediate neighbor, Lauriat is still working with Momentum to plan some cheese-making workshops for that agency's clients.

With Lauriat out, Bomb Diggity decided to revamp its floor plan to save some money, which delayed construction some more. And Cayer had to network like crazy to find someone to fill the empty spot.

That person, found after a couple weeks of searching, was Tanya Rosenberg, a bartender and commercial painter whom Cayer had known for more than a decade. Last July she had started a company that would become Pure Pops, making organic, all-natural popsicles in two-dozen crazy flavors like Apple Cranberry Crisp, Avocado Lime, and Pumpkin Pie.

She has been based near her home at Sugarloaf and selling them in sports/outdoors businesses from Scarborough to the Forks (and, obviously, Carrabassett Valley). But with a new contract bringing her pops onto the Bowdoin College campus later this month, and a mobile vending license from the city of Portland, she's moving the operation to town.

By the end of November, with yet another plumbing reconfiguration, "things really started to kick into gear," as Cayer puts it.

'LOTS OF SWEAT EQUITY'

After dealing with "old dead pipes that led nowhere," the rough plumbing was laid in the floors. The plumbing was done by pros, but the less-skilled labor (concrete work and epoxying) were handled by Cayer and other volunteers. Rosenberg brought her spray-painting equipment in so that she, Cayer, and others could repaint the ceiling of the space, which has great all-day light and lots of windows.

Between Christmas and New Year's, wood was dropped off and framing began, finishing in the first week of this year. As a volunteer work party began Saturday morning, Momentum executive director Dennis Strout was on his knees spreading cement across a pockmarked section of floor near the entrance to Bomb Diggity's space.

Other folks scraped old paint off a huge brick wall and primed it, before lugging in most of the baking equipment Bomb Diggity has purchased for use in the new space. Workers included Jonah Fertig and Abby Huckel from Local Sprouts, who are keeping ties between the two community-minded organizations strong, while looking forward to expanding the Local Sprouts catering business with the space being vacated by the bakery.

Next will come some more electrical work, sheetrocking of new walls, and finishing the epoxying of the floor. "Every day something more is happening," Cayer says eagerly, his eyes lighting up with excitement that this idea is ultimately coming to fruition.

The bakery is certainly the anchor tenant, and sees great opportunity to grow in this new space, says Lindsay deCsipkes, Momentum's program administrator. Beyond supplying several small local markets with baked goods, Bomb Diggity also provides Hannaford and Whole Foods Market with English muffins. Capitalizing on more square-footage, the company plans to expand its wholesale accounts, and will also work toward having a separate, certified gluten-free kitchen.

While commercial baking will occupy the mornings (starting early, as bakers do) the larger area will also be more conducive to afternoon workshops for Momentum clients learning culinary skills, deCsipkes says.

WORKING TOGETHER

"We're psyched about what can happen here," she says, talking not just about the business and learning potential but also community collaboration. Bomb Diggity will still retail its baked goods at Local Sprouts, and keep its art program there, where "our participants feel so at home," says deCsipkes.

But with the new space, the Bomb Diggity may try to piggyback on the Fermentory's existing distribution network to also carry its products. And deCsipkes is already talking with local artists, including some Momentum clients, about making murals to decorate the walls inside the industrial-looking exterior.

It's that sort of synergistic potential that gets Cayer truly excited. Whether there are more classes (which the UFF used to hold until production demands required more space), or partnerships with renewable-energy companies, or opportunities for collaboration with food-truck owners as that business type develops in Portland, Cayer has no shortage of ideas about how to use the space inside the building, as well as the 5000-square-foot parking lot outside it. (In fact, he overflows with such ideas, many of which are not yet ready for publication; watch this space.)

Not to mention that the warehouse bay between the former garage and the existing Fermentory is now available for rent. Though nothing is finalized, Cayer definitely has his eye on that, both as a connection between the UFF and these other businesses, but also to help with a much-needed expansion of his own production and storage space.

It's all part of his effort to grow community throughout Portland, even in a place like East Bayside, which is a place Portlanders are just starting to think of as an exciting neighborhood. "People are coming down here now" Cayer says, pointing to the little drink-related cluster of Rising Tide and Bunker brewing companies and Tandem Coffee. That's not to leave out other parts of the East Bayside revival, which includes eco-businesses like Washboard Eco-Laundry's Greener Cleaner dry-cleaning and Freeman's Bicycle Service, community groups like the Maine Muslim Community Center and the Compass Project youth-building non-profit, and arts groups Running With Scissors and Zero Station.

People are already attracted to the area. "We just need to create more reason for them to come a little further," he says. He hopes that's where this new food hub will come in.

YOU CAN HELP• Volunteer work parties will happen on Saturdays from 10 am to 2 pm through the end of January — so show up and contribute your sweat and equity too!

Press Releases: Gov-speak

Published in the Portland Phoenix

Governor Paul LePage famously (and perhaps in jest) threatened to punch MPBN reporter AJ Higgins in the face, back during the 2010 gubernatorial campaign. He probably wants to do it again this week, since Higgins was first to report on the simulated interview LePage did last week with his own employee, Adrienne Bennett, about the changes in Maine's tax code that took effect January 1.

But the brief flurry of publicity about the five-minute clip missed the takeaway. Yes, it was filled with questions both softball and obviously partisan. ("How is it that now you're getting pushback from Democrats in particular about putting more money back into the pockets of Mainers?" is not only the lead-off question but the setup of the entire farcical premise.)

And Bennett, a former TV broadcaster, is not identified by her title (Director of Communications for the Governor's Office) in the actual video — though she is in the text accompanying the video's posting on LePage's official YouTube page; she gives the famously bullying and belligerent governor a calm, friendly reception. She clearly reads from a prepared script of pre-approved questions, and parrots long-disgraced Republican talking points: "A tax cut can stimulate an economy. We know that," she claims, when that's basically never true, and certainly not when the tax cut is in the wealthy-and-corporate-welfare form proposed by LePage and his GOP buddies.

But most importantly, the structure of the piece is so clearly edited, with cuts in both video and audio that would never have passed muster in an actual journalistic interview, that we begin to see LePage's serious tendency toward blundering, even in the most coddling of surroundings (with not only a patsy asking questions but filmed by state Department of Transportation employees, Higgins reports).

We've known since his campaign that LePage is a loose cannon, lurching about the decks of state government, firing (and misfiring) indiscriminately. Now we begin to get a glimpse behind the curtain — things appear to be so bad he can't hold a simple, friendly, five-minute conversation with someone whose career he controls, without going off-message in unproductive ways.

• For contrast this weekend we were offered a roughly similar amount of time watching FORMER GOVERNOR ANGUS KING, now an independent US senator, on an actual journalistic television program, NBC's Meet the Press.

King appeared in a debt-ceiling roundtable with some heavy hitters: former GOP House speaker Newt Gingrich; current House Democratic Caucus leader Xavier Becerra (D-California); the Washington Post's EJ Dionne; and Carly Fiorina, a business executive and vice-chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

Moderator David Gregory handed King the first question, and it set the stage for what may become King's m.o. both publicly and privately. First, he answered with a universal, nonpartisan truth: "People have lost confidence in the ability of our government to do anything." Then he turned the conflict itself into the problem at issue, rather than the debt ceiling or other budgetary details: "It's the inability of our government to work in a way to solve these problems that itself, I think, is a drag on the economy." He finished with a statement of principle that's both hard to argue with and rarely found in Washington: "The solutions are more important than the parties."

He found agreement from Gingrich (who described the current DC climate as "exactly the opposite of healthy self-government"), Becerra ("This is no way to run government"), and Fiorina (who urged talking real facts, not political infighting). Then King stayed quiet for most of the rest of the 20-minute segment, adding a short interjection about the facts of the debt ceiling (it's not about future spending, but the past), and finally answering another Gregory question about his independent status: "I could have frank discussions with both sides without being viewed as a member of the enemy camp."

For a non-career politician whose experience is in the executive and not the legislative branch, it was an impressive national debut, and all the stronger for its contrast with LePage's charade.