By Joshua Holland, AlterNet

When nonvoters are asked why they don’t participate in politics, the most common answer they give is that they don’t think they can have any impact. The system’s gamed, they say, broken, and lawmakers are only concerned about the interests of their cronies.

Thankfully, Andrew Bossie, a young grass-roots organizer, never came to believe that ordinary people are powerless. In 2005, Bossie, then a student at the University of Southern Maine, looked around and noticed that a generation of young people was having real problems affording the kind of education that most people see as vital to having a shot at the American dream.

“The skyrocketing costs of tuition, books and living expenses was taking its toll not only on me, but also on my siblings, friends and peers,” Bossie wrote in an e-mail exchange. “It was not uncommon to see a college dorm vacated mid-semester because a tuition bill couldn’t be paid, or to find a seat once occupied by an eager student empty, because they simply could not afford to continue.”

Nobody told Andrew Bossie that he couldn’t do anything about the bleak post-graduation prospects so many of his fellow students faced, so he decided he would.

“I had a crazy, hare-brained idea,” Bossie told me in a phone interview. “And I started to have conversations with people who were politically active, and when I did that I saw that it generated a lot of excitement.”

The idea was fairly simple: help students pay off their debts if they stay in Maine. Last week, two years later, Bossie’s work, along with those of other activists and groups, including the League of Independent Voters, bore fruit when Maine legislators passed the Opportunity Maine Initiative. The measure will give tax credits to help Maine residents pay off their student debt as long as they stay in the state. “Nontraditional” students returning to get their degrees would also be eligible for the credits, as would employers who pay off their workers’ student loans as a benefit.

After a two-year campaign, the measure had been on its way to voters in the form of a statewide referendum this November when Maine’s legislature stepped in and passed the bill by wide margins — 142-0 in the State House and 27-8 in the Senate.

It’s a small example of good governance in an era when an increasing number of Americans have learned the hard way how rare that is — it’s an example of legislating in the public interest; the antithesis of deals cut in Congress during the dark of night or the federal efforts to clean up after hurricane Katrina.

Young Bossie had been involved in student politics and had gotten a taste of grass-roots organizing when he worked on a campaign to beat back a referendum that would have repealed a state law outlawing discrimination on the basis of sexual preference.

“I realized, as we worked against a referendum process that would have allowed businesses to fire employees just for being gay — something I considered very negative — that it would be just as easy to use the referendum process to do something positive.”

Soon, Bossie found himself heading up a coalition of activists called Opportunity Maine. “The greatest challenge,” Bossie wrote last week, “was that the group that formed to spearhead this issue was made up almost entirely of novices, with little to no campaign experience, and, for the most part, young people — we were building the plane and flying it at the same time … None of us had really ever done anything like this, especially on this level before.”

The problem they set out to address is one faced by communities all across America. Maine’s once-thriving economy has taken hard hits as towns that relied on textiles, small manufactures and mills became hollowed out by the vaunted New Economy and its relentless pursuit of cheaper labor and ever-greater efficiencies.

With a shrinking number of decent-paying jobs, Maine’s college graduates faced daunting prospects. Writing in the Bangor Daily News, Rob Brown, Opportunity Maine’s Campaign Director, laid out the problem like this: “A generation ago, student debt was minimal or nonexistent. Today, the average graduate in Maine is starting off, or starting again, with $25,000 in debt, a mortgage on their future that has perverse effects on life and career choices. Rising education costs have dramatically outpaced inflation and, with mounting student debt and continued cuts in federal support, have effectively become a regressive tax for many.”

Maine’s problems are cyclical: Young graduates have to leave the state in order to find jobs that offer salaries that will allow them to pay off their debts, and, in turn, firms aren’t beating down the doors to create new jobs in Maine because it’s hard to find educated workers. According to a report by the Brookings Institution, roughly half of Maine’s recent college graduates leave the state to find work. According to Brown, the state has one of the highest high school graduation rates in the country, but its workers are a third less likely to have post-secondary degrees than workers in the rest of New England. John Fitzsimmons, president of the Maine Community College System told the New York Times that his office had identified more than 4,000 recent jobs that had gone unfilled or were taken by out-of-state recruits because Maine didn’t have enough workers with the required skills.

In stepped Bossie and the coalition he’d helped put together. “The biggest challenge that I personally faced,” he told me, “was the hours of standing out in the cold asking for signatures in December and January. Remember, we had to collect more than 70,000 of them in the middle of winter on the streets of Maine to ensure that we would be successful. I could barely hold a pen and clipboard.”

I asked Bossie where he got the nerve to think he could pull off something like this, and he paused before answering. “I feel like everyone complains about these systems we have,” he said, “but I try to reform them instead. I own them, as a citizen — they’re my systems in the end.”

This is a small story about a group of young people in one small state who are trying to sustain good local jobs in a rudderless global economy. It’s also a story of grass-roots activism and good governance; of ordinary citizens — not big-time campaign donors — who believed that it was possible to address the kinds of problems that causes most career politicians to throw up their hands and say it’s impossible for government to smooth the edges of the New Economy.

Joshua Holland is an AlterNet staff writer.

By Julie Bero

Gov. John Baldacci of Maine (D) will sign into law the Act to Allow a Tax Credit for College Loan Repayments on July 1. The law is commonly referred to as Opportunity Maine, which is also the name of the group that pushed the proposal. It provides a tax credit to reimburse educational loan payments for any Maine resident who earns an associate’s or bachelor’s degree in Maine and who lives, works, and pays taxes in Maine after earning that degree. Qualifying graduates will be reimbursed for up to $2,100 per year through tax credits.

The first law of its kind, Opportunity Maine is a “cutting edge, comprehensive program,” in the words of Tony Giampetruzzi, communications director of Opportunity Maine. In a state where brain drain is a major concern, the legislation is especially welcome. According to a report done by the School of Economics of the University of Maine, the state lags behind the New England average of earned bachelor’s degrees by 23 percent and the majority of students who attain a higher degree leave the state upon graduation.

The Opportunity Maine organization was created in reaction to campaigning against a referendum that would legalize discrimination based on sexuality. Andrew Bossie, former student body president of the University of Southern Maine was active in that campaign. He and his friends, who sacrificed their time and GPAs to defeat the bill, wished they could have spent that time building rather than merely maintaining basic rights in their state.

As students, the first idea that came to them had its basis in personal experience. It was not uncommon to find a seat empty that had once been occupied by an eager student because they simply could not afford to continue, according to Bossie.

“Some of us were working two or three jobs on top of our full-time class schedules just to make ends meet,” he told Campus Progress. Although standing outside during a Maine winter to collect signatures was demanding work, Bossie believes that it was worth the effort and encourages other young people to take action. “If there is something that you want to change, find those that also want to create change and just do it. Sure, it won’t be easy, but no serious change is.”

When word got out about Bossie’s idea, a coalition of some of the strongest progressive groups in Maine quickly formed to champion the law. The campaign received strategic guidance from The League of Young Voters, an organization that encourages young people to create positive change in their communities by becoming politically active. “Our whole generation is realizing we’re getting screwed,” said Billy Wimsatt, Executive Director of the organization. “We’re getting left with the bill, the debt, and the melting ice caps. And we’re not taking it. We’re seizing the moment and saying: ‘Hey, this is our future! We’re in the driver’s seat!’” The movement is already picking up steam: the university system of West Virginia has already contacted Opportunity Maine for guidance on how to create a similar law.

Many involved with the campaign hope that the law will become popular at a national level. Student debt has become a problem for the majority of students as many colleges increase tuition faster than the inflation rate every year. The campaign noted that perhaps representatives do not understand the high price of tuition because it has increased so dramatically over the past 20 years. “The federal government, and generations who went to school before ours, need to realize that gone are the halcyon days when a summer job and part-time work could pay for a year at school,” said Brian Hiatt, The Portland League’s communication director.

The campaign was entirely dependent on its volunteers, who collected more than 73,000 signatures. There was an especially pointed campaign on election day, during which the majority of signatures were collected. Many of the volunteers spoke of their excitement about Opportunity Maine and said that they felt they had really made difference in their state. One gatherer of signatures, 2007 Colby College graduate Jack Drury, said of the experience: “As a member of a progressive youth-led campaign, it was refreshing to see such overwhelming support from the community at large. The progressive movement is gasping for effective ways to improve the world, and Opportunity Maine is that breath of fresh air.”

The bill was passed unanimously by the Maine House and with an overwhelming majority by the Senate, signifying that this law is important not only to young people, but to voters of all ages. At the bill’s hearing, State Rep. Walter Wheeler compared Opportunity Maine to the chances awarded to him by the G.I. Bill. “It made my career, my family, and my future possible,” said the Navy veteran, as quoted in The Portland Press Herald. “Now it’s a new generation’s turn.”

Julie Bero is an American studies major at Colby College. She collected signatures for Opportunity Maine. She is a native of Brooklyn, NY.

By Anya Kamenetz

On Wednesday the students of Maine won an amazing victory. Opportunity Maine is a citizen ballot initiative that will provide a tax credit to all graduates of Maine colleges to offset their student loan repayment for each year they stay in the state. Employers can also take the tax credit to pay off their employees’ student loans.

The state currently experiences a bad brain drain. The “creative class” effects of having more college grads around will benefit Maine’s tax base by $14 million in 2018, more than paying for the measure, according to one economic analysis. 
What’s really cool is that this victory belongs to a very professional, focused and dedicated coalition of students and community members, both Opportunity Maine and the League of Young Voters. They worked over the Maine winter with hundreds of volunteers to gather 73,000 signatures to get the measure considered. Then instead of putting it to the voters, the Maine Legislature and Senate passed the bill outright. The Legislature voted unanimously – 142-0.

I was up in Augusta last month testifying before the Taxation Committee in support of this bill, so I’m pretty proud to see it passed. Even facing budget difficulties, Maine has chosen to take a step to help both students and its economy. Federal reforms are very important, but college costs also need to be dealt with on a community basis.

By GLENN ADAMS The Associated Press

AUGUSTA — The Maine Legislature’s lone World War II veteran, Rep. Walter Wheeler, said Tuesday that when his generation returned home from the war, the GI Bill was in effect and ready to be used.

“We used it, I used it,” said Wheeler, who went to trade school.

“It made my career, my family and my future possible,” said the Kittery Democrat, a Navy veteran. “Now it’s a new generation’s turn. Let’s keep our young people home.”

Soon after the 81-year-old lawmaker’s speech, the House voted 142-0 in support of a bill that would authorize tax credits to reimburse college loan payments for Maine students who earn degrees in accredited colleges in the state — provided they stay in Maine.

The “Opportunity Maine” bill’s overwhelming House approval put it a step away from enactment by the Senate, which supported it in earlier votes. Gov. John Baldacci supports the measure, spokesman David Farmer said.

At the very least, voters will get a chance to decide the issue in November because it was proposed through a citizen initiative.

The bill’s supporters say average debt for students who have loans will be $10,813 for those who receive associates’ degrees this year and $21,625 for bachelor’s degree recipients.

Besides helping those students pay off their loans, it will help Maine employers attract and retain employees, said Rep. Herbert Adams, D-Portland, a leading supporter of the bill. It would also slow a “brain drain” of educated Mainers who leave the state, supporters say.

The bill authorizes tax credits to reimburse educational loan payments for any Maine resident who earns associate’s or bachelor’s degrees in Maine, and then lives, works and pays taxes in the state afterwards.

The credit could be claimed only while a recipient lives and works in Maine. Their employers could agree to make the loan payments and claim the credit.

Tax credits would have a maximum of $2,100 per year or $8,400 total for a graduate who spent all four years in a Maine college, said Adams.

Critical to the bill is its price tag, about $160,000 for the two-year budget period starting in July. That decision was pending in the Appropriations Committee on Tuesday.

Tuesday’s vote was unusual because legislatures typically reject citizen initiatives in order to send them directly to voters.

Adams said this would be only the sixth time since Maine’s citizen initiative process was adopted nearly a century ago that a Legislature enacted an initiative without sending it to referendum.

The last instance was in 2000, when lawmakers repealed a state sales tax on snack food. A decade ago, the Legislature enacted a law to protect traditional marriage.

Copyright © 2007 Blethen Maine Newspapers