It should not be a mystery why Gov. Paul LePage is opposed to wind power. Since the early days of his campaign, his politics and policies have been aligned with the Maine Heritage Policy Center. Tarren Bragdon, the policy center’s CEO, was co-chairman of LePage’s transition team. Stephen Bowen, the policy center’s head of education initiatives, was LePage’s education commissioner. Those are just two examples of the governor’s close ties to this group.
The Maine Heritage Policy Center is a part of the national right-wing State Policy Network, which in turn is a member of the American Legislative Exchange Council. ALEC is the group that writes model bills favorable to large corporate interests and hands them to state legislators. And who funds and directs ALEC? None other than the Koch brothers, who are fossil fuel magnates. It’s easy to connect the dots.
During the last 10 years, the wind power industry has invested more than $1 billion in Maine, putting more than 700 local Maine businesses and their employees to work. Billions more would be invested if we keep the state’s goal of 3,000 megawatts of wind power by 2020. LePage would scrap that plan.
How much investment has the governor brought into Maine since he has been in office?
Christopher BryanFairfield
Send questions/comments to the editors.
Success. Please wait for the page to reload. If the page does not reload within 5 seconds, please refresh the page.
Enter your email and password to access comments.
Hi, to comment on stories you must . This profile is in addition to your subscription and website login.
Already have a commenting profile? .
Invalid username/password.
Please check your email to confirm and complete your registration.
Only subscribers are eligible to post comments. Please subscribe or login first for digital access. Here’s why.
Use the form below to reset your password. When you've submitted your account email, we will send an email with a reset code.