LD 204, a bill that seems specifically targeted at keeping Town Manager Gary Brown off the MRRA Board.

I received this in my email urging people to contact the people listed below to defeat what seems to be an attempt to exclude the Brunswick Town Manager from the Board of the Mid_coast Regional Development Association.

Brunswick Republican Town Committee

Minutes of the MAR 2011 Meeting

Mar. 3, 2011

Brunswick Business Center

18 Pleasant St. Brunswick

MINUTES:

1. Meeting was called to order at 6:00 PM.

2. Chair’s Report:

            A. - Discussed LD 204, a bill that seems specifically targeted at keeping Town Manager Gary Brown off the MRRA Board.  This is strange, as a review of the makeup of redevelopment boards in other towns, most particularly the Loring and Pease base redevelopment boards, shows that the town councils where the bases were sited invariably had a permanent elected representative sitting on their respective boards.

            This bill is being held up temporarily, by Rep. Kerri Prescott, but will come up for a vote soon, possible Tuesday, the 8th of March. We urge all hands to immediately contact the following persons and urge them to defeat this bill:

            Senate Leadership

            Honorable Kevin L. Raye

            President of the Senate

            Phone: (207) 287-1500

            senator@kevinraye.com

           

            Majority Floor Leader: Senator Jon Courtney, joncourtney@metrocast.net , testified in favor of this bill and the question to his boss, Kevin Raye, is why was he allowed to do this?

             

            Assistant Majority Floor Leader: Senator Debra D. Plowman, SenDebra.Plowman@legislature.maine.gov

            House Leadership

            Honorable Robert W. Nutting

            Speaker of the House

            tel: (207) 287-1300

            e-mail: RepRobert.Nutting@legislature.maine.gov

            Majority Floor Leader: Philip A. Curtis <http://www.maine.gov/legis/house/hsebios/curtpa.htm>  (R-Madison), tel: (207) 287-1440

            RepPhilip.Curtis@legislature.maine.gov

             

            Assistant Majority Floor Leader: Andre E. Cushing III <http://www.maine.gov/legis/house/hsebios/cushae.htm>  (R-Hampden), tel: (207) 287-1440

            RepAndre.Cushing@legislature.maine.gov

Governor’s Office

            Tel. 207-287-3531

            John McGough: Chief of Staff è he is from Brunswick

            Kathleen Newman: Deputy Chief of Staff

TALKING POINTS

            --The Brunswick Town Council is unanimous in desiring to have Town Manager Gary Brown represent their interests on the MRRA board (the authority overseeing the re-development of the base.

            --A survey of re-development authorities across America, including Pease and Loring after which the MRRA board was based, shows EVERY host communities has permanent representation on such a board selected by them, not the Governor

            --Currently the host community of Topsham has NO representation on this board.  Brunswick has two, a private citizen and a resident who happens to be the Freeport Economic Development Officer. We would like stronger local representation. Let us control our own destiny.

  

A Letter Of Evasion

To date this is the only response that I have received from my letter addressed to Governor LePage with a copy sent to Attorney General Schneider.

The only instances in which the response shows evidence that my letter was actually read is in the mention of the name of the Brunswick Landing Maine's Center for Innovation. in the first paragraph - and- in acknowledging that I am addressing a constitutional matter.

However the grammatical structure of the first sentence  gives credence to the speculation that the letter is a form letter used as a response to multiple letters.

 The letter says "Thank You for your letter requesting the "constitutionality of the Brunswick Landing  Maine's center for Innovation '" as though "constitutionality of the Brunswick Landing Maine's center for Innovation"  is imported content  in a mail merge process. More correctly I wrote a letter requesting that the Attorney General challenge the constitutionality of The Brunswick Landing Maine's Center for Innovation. It seems telling that the action requested of the Attorney General is left out of the structural syntax of the sentence. This is the first evidence of evasion, which is carried through in the remainder of the response.

The next sentence suggests that I wrote to the Attorney General requesting private legal advice, when in fact it was Governor LePage to whom my letter is addressed and only a copy sent to the Attorney General. Nor did I ask for private legal advice. I do not need to consult an attorney to know that as a private citizen I do not have standing to challenge the constitutionality of The Brunswick Landing Maine's Center For Innovation unless I can show direct personal harm. Since I do not own property abutting the Center and since I am not an inhabitant of the municipality, I cannot show direct personal harm and thus I wrote a letter to Governor LePage suggesting that the Attorney General challenge the constitutionality of the Center. I thought the Attorney General has the power to represent the people of the state of Maine. Silly me.

In fact my letter does not ask for legal advice, it requests legal action. In fact I audaciously offered my own legal opinion.

The next sentence says that Maine Statute requires the Attorney General to represent the state and the state agencies. I can see where this becomes a conflict of interest if the Attorney General were to represent the people of Maine, which is one interpretation of "the state" against an action taken by a branch of the state government, which can be interpreted as a "state agency". Statutes are written by the legislature so we can blame them for this "conflation of " as opposed to "separation of"  the powers of the branches of government.

The Attorney General himself was once a member of the legislature during years that some of the legislation that I, as a member of the public, have requested that our current administration constitutionally challenge. So is it a surprise that - given the conflict of interest written into the statute by the legislature, the Attorney General decides it is his role to represent the state agency and not the people of the state, who happen to be the ones footing the bills mandated by the legislature.

The letter pretends that I am not writing as a member of the public but as a private citizen with private interests, that makes it easy for the Attorney General to dismiss the role of representing the people of the state, that is , if the Attorney General actually had a hand in writing the letter..

There is a very large question raised by the letter.When the word "state" is used, what is intended? The people and the land of the state- or just the state government ?- which is a faction of the state.

The letter actually says that the Attorney General provides opinions on the matter of law to the Governor, but this letter fails to recognize that this is the function of the Attorney General that my letter intended to engage on the behalf of the people. The Governor has asked the business community to engage and I have engaged, but not in the pre-determined box, it seems- and so the form letter that (speculatively) was assigned to merge with my imported information was not a very good fit. Was it?

Governor LePage Addresses Mountainf of Taxation Unapproved by Maine Voters.

In mid- February Maine's Governor LePage gave a radio address explaining why he declined to approve bonds promise by quasi governmental agencies These are a few quotes from LePage's Radio Address

 $19,448! If you are one of Maine’s 653,000 tax filers, this is your share of the Maine’s $12.7 billion in public debt. If you do not remember approving nearly $13 billion in bonds, you did not necessarily miss an election. More than 95% of Maine’s debt was never approved by voters as required by our Constitution!

As a voter and taxpayer you have only had a say on about $500 million in general obligation bond questions on the ballot. The remainder of our taxpayer-backed obligations is the result of promises made, but never paid for and decisions made by quasi-governmental authorities you have never heard of.

 ....Most of the remaining obligations backed up by Maine’s taxpayers were issued by boards or authorities you probably have never heard of. The debt was issued without your approval and passed onto other entities who we hope will repay the money.....

....Article IX, Section 14 of Maine’s Constitution is clear. With very rare exceptions, the credit of the state shall not be directly or indirectly loaned without a two-thirds vote of the Legislature and a majority vote of electors.

In an article for The Bangor Daily News, Matt Wickenheiser said:

“AUGUSTA, Maine — A $31 million bond package sponsored by a little-known quasi-state government body has stalled after Gov. Paul LePage’s decision not to approve it.


The decision highlights a fundamental shift in how the executive branch views debt in the state and has implications for agencies that issue bonds to help fund such things as college loans, low-income housing, and hospital and school expansions.


The Maine Health and Higher Educational Facilities Authority, or MHHEFA, is the government entity in the state that educational and health care nonprofit groups must go through under federal law to sell tax-exempt bonds, borrowing money for capital expenditures at low rates of interest.


Maine residents have not been asked to vote on such quasi-governmental agency bonds in the past, but that appears to be changing under the LePage administration.”

The bond issue discussed in the Bangor Daily News article is just the tip of a huge mountain of wheeling and dealing that has created a favored class that benefits and an unfavored class that pays. We will hear many voices trying to make LePage guilty by claiming that it is LePage’s actions which are bad for the economy. Although every one wants to see hospitals built and other worthy causes funded, it is outrageous that there are quasi public companies funding bonds at the taxpayers expense without taxpayer knowledge or consent.

One voice, in the above article, tries to make LePage the guilty party for stopping the funding of a hospital construction project and attempts to belittle LePage's actions with the words  that his reasons are "only a philosophical principle"- yes it is a philosophical principle- a political philosophical principle which is recorded and preserved in the Maine state constitution !. LePage gets credit for referencing the actual Article of the Maine state constitution which the issuing of bonds by quasi public corporations violates.

Over the years, the plethora  the wheeling and dealing by quasi government agencies has been justified by claims that it is for "the social benefit" and indeed some of it is, but what starts as a cause to benefit of the impoverished and struggling classes has been twisted time and time again to benefit the well to do. Such is the case with the recent statewide expansion of the Pine tree Zone, an economic zone which was originally conceived of as an act to benefit areas with low income and high unemployment to become, with the state wide expansion, aggressive corporate welfare, in which the favored private economic sector has tax breaks that non-profit organizations would envy, while avoiding an equal level of transparency as a non-profit organization must maintain by having publicly accessible annual reports.

Once the government starts manipulating, there is no end to it, and what starts out as seemingly reasonable cause is co-opted by the power elite to use for their own ends. This has become a massive practice in Maine, which LePage has only hinted at, but he is the first politician to do that.

Along with the manipulations comes the hidden and expanding expense of a bureaucracy needed to manage the transference of wealth to the chosen ones, whoever they happen to be. Just the bureaucratic expense, alone, wipes out part or all of the alleged benefit to the larger society. There is no way to even keep track of who the real beneficiaries are - given the combination of increased bureaucratic expenses and increased lack of transparency.

The other side of it is that it creates an artificial world in which some businesses and organizations are worthier than others. This is a mechanical and atheistic "philosophy", one in which the ruling elite takes the place of God.

In a state in which one discovers a new government chartered corporation or regulations designed to benefit the favored sector, every week, this is the best news I have heard in a very long time.

Imagine what resources might be suddenly freed up, if we could eliminate all special interest benefits with the swoop of a wand. It would be like the sudden rushing of a frozen river in the early spring.

Letter to Lepage Requesting State Attorney General Challenge the Constitutionality of The Brunswick Landing Maine's Center For Innovation

INTRODUCTION: This letter was submitted twice on line. After receiving no response, I sent it certified mail and cc'd it to Attorney General William J. Schneide on March 23, 2011, also by certified mail.

Dear Governor Lepage,

Second Submission to make sure that it was received.

Re: Challenging the constitutionality of corporations chartered by special act of legislation.

Source: Maine State Constitution, Article IV, Part Third,Section 14

Dear Governor Le Page,

You have asked the business community for input concerning regulations that inhibit business growth but there is gorilla in the room that no one talks about, which is the escalating structure of corporations chartered by special act of legislation, which have increased dramatically since 1990.

As you know, having taken an oath to uphold the Maine State Constitution, Article IV, Part Third Section 14 of the Maine State constitution prohibits the charter of corporations by special act of legislation, with two exceptions. Although language used in some of the legislation attempts to suggest that the corporation being chartered satisfies either one of these exemptions, it is unlikely that the plethora of corporations chartered by our legislature could all satisfy one or the other of the exemptions. In my opinion, none satisfy the exemptions.

I am writing to request an investigation into the government chartered corporations, be they non-profit, quasi-public, or entirely state controlled corporations and whether they are called “the fund”, “the fund of funds” “trusts, or non-profit corporations. A corporation by any other name is still a corporation.

 A few years ago I encountered the Small Enterprise Growth Fund at the Juice Conference. It was there that I learned that the taxpayer invest 10% of the total amount of “the fund’s” assets in a “roll over fund” meaning a fund that keeps rolling over to re-invest in “the fund”. Conversely, the other 90% of investments from private “high growth” investors demand an “exit strategy” (typically selling the business) as part of the terms of agreement, in order that the high growth investor can make a profit.

Small business owners are well aware of “roll over investments”- this is a primary source of capitalization in the private micro-economy sector- it just means that self-generated profits are re-invested in the business as on-going operating capital. When the Small Enterprise Growth Fund uses tax payer money to underwrite its investments, it does by extracting capital investment funds from the entire economy.

What private sector corporation can use taxpayer funds as “roll-over” investment capitalization? When the legislature charters a corporation and in so doing assigns the use of taxpayer funds to be used as investments or as promissory notes to back up private investor losses (as in the case of last year’s “Fund of Funds” (LD1), they create an unequal competitive edge for the government sector over the private sector. Is not this a reason why, in the 19^th century, our legislature added Article IV, Part Third, Section 14 to the Maine State constitution prohibiting corporations from being chartered by special acts of legislation?

The Small Enterprise Growth Fund is but one building block in a steadily escalating network of corporations chartered by special acts of legislation. These corporations are aimed at underwriting a favored sector of the economy, which is composed of the high tech sector, the academic sector, the green energy sector, the health care industry, and data centers. Government chartered corporations are partially or completely controlled by the state and are granted a competitive edge over private sector competitors through the use of taxpayer dollars. All that the taxpayer gets in return for the use of our capital is a claim that the government is creating jobs in the private sector. When did it become the government’s role to manage the Maine economy?

The legislature has also devised ways for government chartered corporations to accumulate capital from foundations grants and private gifts, whether they be non profit corporations or merely “municipal corporations which are an instrumentality of the state” as in the newly chartered Brunswick Landing Maine’s Center for Innovation. This recently chartered corporation is authorized to seize private property by eminent domain. What do you find across the street from this newly chartered corporate state, complete with an airport, a campus for the University of Maine, and housing for the workers”- you find long standing micro businesses that are in the government’s un-favored economic sector! This expresses openly and clearly the attitude with which our legislature regards that part of the economy, excluded from its favored sector- The legislature would bulldoze it over so the land can be claimed for the ever expanding corporate state.

The charter for the Brunswick Landing Maine’s Center for Innovation is full of contradictions which have no other explanation than that they exist as a blatant attempt by our legislature to get around Maine’s constitution. “A municipal corporation” which is simultaneously an “instrumentality of the state” is a contradiction of terms. When, in the 19^th century, the legislature made an exception for municipal corporations, they did so because they had no other choice. Towns are municipal corporations but cannot exist until they are chartered. There for it is necessary that there be an outside authority which charters the town. This authority was granted to the state but the legislature wisely granted unto the “inhabitants of the municipality” the authority to amend the charter created by the legislature. The intent seems clear: a municipal corporation is self-governing. The state is not a municipal corporation and does not have governing authority within municipaliti

Whereas real estate deeds and towns have specific boundaries defined by longitudes and latitudes, the geographical location of the municipal corporation known as The Mid-coast Regional Redevelopment Corporation is identified as “within the geographic boundaries of Brunswick Naval Air Station” and also includes other geographically separate property that the authority determines should be part of the base .

Quoting from the legislation chartering this corporate state:

• "Brunswick Naval Air Station" or "base" means those properties and Facilities within the geographic boundaries of the United States Department of Defense naval air station at Brunswick existing on the effective date of this section "Base" also includes other geographically separate property that the authority determines should be part of the base if the municipality in which the property is located has chosen not to accept the property and use it for other purposes” (emphasis mine)

• "Real or personal property" means those properties and assets transferred by the United States Government or the United States Navy after the closure of Brunswick Naval Air Station.”

Since the above does not identify to whom the property was transferred, I am assuming it was the state. The state can constitutionally create a municipal corporation but I argue that municipal corporations are intended by the 19^th century authors of our constitution to have a geographical location, while the website for The Brunswick Landing Maine’s Center For Innovation describes it as a “non-local unit of government” 

The bylaws that the legislature created when they chartered said “municipal corporation” call it a “public municipal corporation”. What is the meaning of the additional term, “public”? Is it to mean that this is a town collectively owned by the people of Maine- i.e. the state? 

By what constitutional authority can the legislature create a state owned municipal corporation? The legislature inserted the word “public” into the bylaws of this corporation in an attempt to pull the wool over our eyes. The constitution clearly states that “the inhabitants of the municipality” have the power to amend the charter of a municipal corporation, but the legislature is attempting to alter this by including in the bylaws that the charter can only be amended in ways that are “consistent” with its own charter. This is a usurpation of the powers of “the inhabitants of the municipality”- which is not “the general public” but specific individuals and business which inhabit the vaguely defined territory of Maine’s new mini-corporate state.

The charter for this “municipal corporation” and “instrumentality of the state” has granted unto itself the power of eminent domain to seize adjacent property – Is this what is meant by the charter’s claim that “The authority is entrusted with acquiring and managing the properties within the geographic boundaries of Brunswick Naval Air Station’?

Given that our legislature has claimed in a vague and provisional manner that the geographical territory includes territory which it intends to acquire, then do the current “inhabitants of the municipality” include those small businesses and other private property that are the target of the Mid-coast Regional Redevelopment Authority’s self-claimed authority of eminent domain?

Is it not a mockery of the Maine State Constitution to include in a charter that it can only be amended in a way that is consistent with the states’ charter- which is arguably inconsistent with the intended meaning of Article IV, Part Third, Section 14 of the Maine State Constitution.

Governor LePage, you campaigned on the concept that it is not the government’s role to manage the economy- but the only justification that our legislature has given the public for the massive structure of corporations chartered by special acts of legislation over the last fifteen or more years is that the government is “creating jobs in the private sector”. This is also the way in which our media reports on Maine’s entrenched state capitalism. Note that “creating jobs” is not one of the two exceptions that the constitution grants to its prohibition against corporations chartered by special acts of legislati

I request that the Attorney general’s office challenge the constitutionality of the charter for The MIDCOAST REGIONAL REDEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY’ and that an investigation be initiated into the constitutionality of the entire network of government chartered corporations, to include making known the private investors who are the beneficiaries of our government’s wheeling and dealing.

I understand that the media has painted a picture of this scheme as seen through rose-colored glasses. If you believed the media, it is about creating jobs- end of story. There is much more to it than that. We are told it is only about “creating jobs for Maine”- but how are these investors being attracted? It is reasonable to speculate that they are being offered deals that they cannot refuse-paid for by the taxpayers of Maine.

 Cleansing Maine of unconstitutional state capitalism is a national media story. We may lose the “high growth investor” attracted by the get rich quick deals offered by our government but we may attract a new breed of entrepreneurs hungry for an honest, free and equitable environment in which to conduct business.

If we don’t do this now, in ten years our state may be taken over by mini corporate sates like the Brunswick Landing Maine Center For Innovation armed with the power of eminent domain to seize private property which is not “consistent” with its vision - that is if a Chinese embargo on rare earth minerals hasn’t caused its collapse- at the taxpayer’s expense.

Wealth Creation VS Wealth Redistribution

In 2007 I was browsing the Internet, when much to my surprise I found a database for New England Arts, about which I had not previously been aware. I thought that I had already entered our business information in all the Maine and New England directories. I proceeded to add our information but soon found out that this database was different from all the others, it required agreeing to terms created by The New England Foundation For The Arts. Upon reading the terms, I found them completely unacceptable as it virtually required giving the New England Foundations For the Arts unlimited rights over any information submitted to the database or “deep linked” to the data base- with the term “deep link” left undefined.

In 2011 I am growing our business through another arts database, which is popularly known as Etsy. It is for all things handcrafted including paintings and other art works. The work that one can find in this database runs the gambit form the young artisan starting out and creating an original product in their living room to artists who have won national awards and been in many museum shows.

Etsy is so far a well known secret, a marketing venue designed for the micro economy that exists beneath the radar of public and private management of the economy which targets concentrated wealth and concentrated job creation. Etsy is a database, of sorts, but it is a visual storefront database, global in scope and conceived from the outset to be affordable to anyone, priced as a marketing venue collecting minimalist fees from those that partake of it. In the publishing world it is a highly recognized resource for ideas and talent, and so for the vendors of Etsy, Etsy is more than a way to sell their handcrafted art, it is also a means of exposure to magazines and blogs- a central piece of the social networking marketing, which is touted as the wave of the future for micro, small, and medium sized businesses.

Contrast this to that other database- The New England Foundation For the Arts that enjoys as its partners all the government art bureaucracies in New England. This is not surprising since the birth of extended government art bureaucracies coincides with the institutionalization of the National Endowments For the Arts. State government art agencies were created as conduits for the flow of capital re-distributed by the federal government through the NEA. The function of state art agencies as channels for redistributed capital has continued ever since. Today it is sometimes hard to distinguish a separation between government, foundations, and non-profit organizations. Just last summer the Maine legislature incorporated a new business classification into the statute governing the LLC. The new classification is known as the L3C designed to (allegedly) make it easier for foundations to give money to private enterprises without violating federal tax codes. One of the requirements for a business to procure L3C status is that it must not “intend” to make an “income”.

In order to have any information listed in the New England Foundation for the Arts Database, one must sign the terms of agreement, which allots onto NEFA unlimited rights over any thing in their database. The language of the agreement has similarities to language used by large private sector businesses such as Google and Adobe, but upon reading those private sector agreements one finds that there are limitations applied to Google and Adobe assuring the user that the company is only asking for rights that are necessary to conduct their businesses and no more. Over the years since 2007 I have written NEFA in objection to the terms of agreement. The phone is answered by voices sounding both young and naïve who explain it away by saying that the legal department just wanted to cover as broad a range a possible (for NEFA). They have certainly done that!

Why would anyone agree to the terms? – First and foremost because they don’t read them, and then because NEFA ties agreement to the terms with access to the inner networks of grants funding. The Maine Arts Commission is now using the New England Foundation For the Arts database to process its grants, which requires applicants to agree to the NEFA terms of agreement if they apply online.

The other night I heard The National Endowment For the Arts mentioned as a possible place to cut to reduce the national deficit. Can we as a nation exist without the National Endowment for the Arts? I don’t know about our government art bureaucracies, NEFA, and the vast network of non-profit arts funding – But Etsy can.

AFTER NOTE: This is an interesting Article on developments in Etsy. When third parties started developing new API's by reversing the Etsy API, rather that suing them, Etsy embraced and welcomed them in a win-win approach to innovative and creative marketing

Maine Marxism Takes a great New Leap Forward with The Brunswick Landing Maine Center For Innovation

 THE JOINT STANDING COMMITTEE ON BUSINESS, RESEARCH AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT if not the most of the Maine legislature have been following a Marxist course for decades, First it was just using tax payer funds as playing card in a game with high growth investors but now the legislature has transformed itself into the investor- acquiring land and property and setting up "funds" composed of every imaginable source of redistributed wealth to channel as much as possible into the hands of the state.

They call crown themselves as "the innovative" or “creative economy"- In the Baldacci administration it began with promoting the template created by Richard Florida who set standard rules for measuring "the creative class" and cities, state and municipal governments across the nation flocked to conform to the Florida template by segregating society and economies into “the creative and innovative classes" and everyone else.

With flowery language packaging, the socialists ran into little resistance and so they grew bolder. No where is this more evident than in the corporate state that is the Brunswick Landing Maine Center for Innovation – which is envisioned as a walled community  where the favored class will work play and live isolated from the rest of society.

The Marxists in our state government have created a “fund” for at least the airport of their brand new corporate state, which will be funded by all means possible including those that are usually associated with non profit organizations.

The constitution of Maine prohibits the charter of corporations by special acts of legislation, with two exceptions- one being for municipal purposes. There had to be an  exception for municipal corporations because towns are municipal corporations. A town does not exist until chartered and so an outside agency must charter the town – but wisely the legislature assigned the authority to amend the charter to the inhabitants of the municipality.

Thus in creating their corporate state with its walled community, the Marxist in the finance committee declared the corporate state to be “a municipal corporation” and “an instrumentality of the state”- On the website for the corporation it is called a “non-local unit of government” in complete defiance of what a municipality traditionally is. Since it is impossible to determine who the inhabitants of “a non local unit” are- the legislature, in chartering said municipal corporation forgot to provide for a process where by the inhabitants of the municipality can initiate the process of amending the charter.

The legislature did however think to include the right of eminent domain over abutting properties, which happen to be micro business, many of whom have been at that location for decades. They also happen to be “the inhabitants of the municipality”

So when the “Innovative economy" talks about “community’ bear in mind that this means walled communities for the favored classes, which includes the academic sector, and it means doing everything in its means to wipe out instances of the “uncreative” and “non-innovative classes” that stand in the way of its aggressive and rapid advancement.

In the case of the newly chartered “municipal corporation” this means forgetting to set up bylaws for a process by which the inhabitants of the municipality can exercise their constitutional right to amend the charter, and then providing that charter with the authority of eminent domain to seize the property of the inhabitants of the municipality.

I submit the the Maine people who care about the original founding political philosophy need to mobilize for a constitutional amendment that states that by definition a municipality or a municipal corporation is local, has a physical territory and  inhabitants of the territory governed by the municipality.This should be retro active.

Can a Municipal Corporation be an Instrumentality of the State?

 This is a letter sent to numerous local newspapers.

Dear Editor,

I am writing to make a public suggestion that when proposed bonds are on the election ballot, that information be included about the current liabilities the taxpayer owes. Also I hope that those who vote in favor of such allocations of the taxpayer’s money will take care to carefully inform themselves about what they are really getting.

A bond was passed last summer that allowed 8 million for redevelopment of the Brunswick Naval Air Station to become “Maine’s Innovative Center” a high tech training facility. Leveraging $32,500,000 in federal funds.

I am sure those in proximity to the facility looked upon this as something that would raise the property value in the surrounding area.

However that fantasy was dashed by the legislation that chartered the Maine center For Innovation Corporation and when the management published a press release purportedly to announce their incredibly original name, but additionally announcing that the new “Innovative Center” included in its bylaws the “ the power of eminent domain – the ability to acquire property from abutters.” But not to worry because press release also says the Maine Center of Innovation does not foresee using the right.

Does the management of Maine’s New Innovative center foresee the effect such an announcement is likely to have on abutting real estate values- quite possibly reducing potential buyers of abutting property to one- and that of course is The Maine Innovative Center?

This is just yet another example of the usurpation and abuses of power that is going on under the name of a government managed economy. In order to get around the constitutional prohibition against legislative chartered corporations the legislature is calling the Maine Center for Innovation a "municiple corporation" that is the instrumentality of the state". This is the height of creativity and innovation from our legislature as used to get around  Article IV, Part Third, Section 14 of the Maine State Constitution says:
Corporations shall be formd under general laws, and shall not be created by special Acts of the Legislature, except for municipal purposes, and in cases where the objects of the corporation cannot otherwise be attained, and, however formed , they shall feorever be subject of the general laws of the state 

if the Maine Center for Innovation is “an instrumentality of the state”, then can it also be “used for municipal purposes”? Doesn’t “instrumentality of the state” imply that it is used for the purposes of the state ? - Even the name - The Maine Center for Innovation, implies that it is not a municipal corporation but a state corporation.  I would think that a corporation that was used for municipal purposes would be something along the lines a corporation formed to perform public services related and restricted to the municipality. The municipalities are supposed to have sovereignty but where is such sovereignty when the municipal corporation is an “instrumentality of the state?

So the next time you are at the polls- think twice- those bonds may not be what you are bargaining for- especially if you are next door to a muncipal corporation that is the instrumentality of the state, for which the legislature, in chartering said corporation, grants it the right of eminent domain.

Sincerely,

Mackenzie Andersen, East Boothbay, Maine