Support the $5 Million Bond for Sustainable Riverfront Community Development this November (download Word Doc - hi-bandwidth.)
This November, Maine voters will have a unique opportunity to support investment in our state’s great rivers and our many riverfront communities by approving funding for the Riverfront Community Development Bond, which will be part of the same Bond Question as renewed funding for Land for Maine’s Future, Working Waterfront, and State Parks and Lands. Cities and towns across the state and the nation are tapping into the extensive opportunities offered by clean and healthy rivers. With more than 30,000 miles of rivers in the state, and nearly three-quarters of Maine citizens living in riverfront communities, the potential economic, environmental and community benefits of investment in our rivers are enormous. |
 The Riverfront Community Development Bond will create a competitive grants program to support community-driven projects.
The goal of the Riverfront Bond is to enhance local quality of place and to promote environmentally sustainable economic activity along our rivers. By requiring a 2:1 match, funding from the bond will leverage other public resources and private investment. Funding from the bond can go to support a wide-variety of projects, including:
- Restoration and improvement of habitat for fish and wildlife.
- Development and establishment of public access points for boating and fishing.
- Development and establishment of public access points for boating and fishing.
- Rehabilitation of run-down or abandoned buildings.
- For thousands of years, Native Americans used Maine’s rivers for travel, food, and commerce. European colonists first settled at the mouths of our rivers and then moved upriver.
- In the 1800’s rivers like the Penobscot, Kennebec, Saco, Androscoggin, and St. Croix yielded tremendous catches of river herring, rainbow smelt, striped bass, sturgeon, and salmon, and later powered the saw mills, tanneries, and textile mills that led Maine into the industrial era.
- As rivers underwent industrial and commercial development, they became valued mainly as a destination for pollution or as a cheap source of energy. This notion of a “working river” led to severe water quality degradation and the collapse of our sea-run fisheries.
To learn more about the Riverfront Community Development Bond, please contact Bill MacDonald at Maine Rivers at (207) 623-2157 or bmac@mainerivers.org or John Burrows at the Atlantic Salmon Federation at asfjb@blazenetme.net or (207) 725-2833. |
In recent years, it is as if Maine citizens are seeing our rivers anew.
Due in large part to the Clean Water Act, people can once again swim, fish, and canoe in their local rivers without fear of becoming ill. Habitat restoration projects on rivers across the state have begun to bring back long-diminished runs of sea-run fish and have helped to make our river ecosystems healthier and more vibrant.
People have rediscovered their rivers and are viewing them from a vastly different perspective than that of only a generation ago. Now, across the state, communities are also waking up to the immense economic potential of their rivers.
There is growing recognition across Maine that riverfronts can provide a whole range of important economic, cultural and recreational amenities. From a multi-day or afternoon paddling excursion and world-class angling for native trout, salmon, shad, and striped bass to riverfront festivals that attract tens of thousands or an afternoon walk on a local riverside trail – Maine’s rivers offer something for everyone.
It is now time to put Maine’s rivers to work in a new way.
For too long, the tremendous economic and natural resource values of Maine’s rivers have gone unrealized. The Riverfront Community Development Bond will help ensure our rivers remain healthy while promoting community revitalization and environmentally-compatible economic development, bringing economic returns year after year, and improving the quality of life for all Maine citizens.
You now have a chance to help further revitalize your community and your river.
Please support the $5 Million Riverfront Community Development Bond along with funding for LMF, Working Waterfront, and State Parks this November.
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