PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • August 26, 2022
Maine has emerged as a leader on climate change, with the current administration in Augusta launching a unified climate action plan in 2020. We are running out of time to go through alternating election cycles of climate response while a better future slips away. The elections this fall will be critical to solidify strong, cost-effective climate action in Maine and in Washington, D.C. While indicators of climate change are accelerating, so, too, will solutions if we elect political leadership committed to this work. Particularly for youth facing many times more extreme weather events in their future, their vote is incredibly powerful. Of Maine’s over 1 million eligible voters, in 2018 only 29 percent of those 18 to 24 years old exercised their right to vote. In our 50-50 political world, these votes matter. I urge all of us, and particularly Maine’s youth, to vote for leaders in Maine that will build on what Maine has started, because the climate crisis will not wait. ~ Ivan Fernandez, Climate Change Institute, UMaine