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My husband has taken up a cause. He’s printing fliers, setting up forums and talking to any one who will listen.

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It’s an initiative that’s going to be on our state ballot come November and is in direct response to our electric company literally doubling their rates at the beginning of this year.

In January our monthly power bill went from $160 to $310. And we weren’t the only ones. The man who owns the local store saw his increase from $2,500 a month to nearly $6,000. It’s been crazy. Central Maine Power has the monopoly in this area and they’re choking us.

If this was a Maine owned company it would be bad enough, but this corporation is owned by an entity in Spain with its major stockholder being Qatar. Why is a middle eastern oil rich country interested in little old Maine? Because we’re a cash cow.

Enter an ex state representative who’s been working tirelessly to oust foreign investment in our power grid and turn it over to the people.

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The man is also a neighbor which is how my other half got involved. We attended a presentation he gave last weekend on consumer owned utilities and it was eye opening.

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There are currently 10 consumer owned utilities (COU’s) in our state. They’re non profit and provide more reliable power at a lower rate. Hard to argue with that.

The ballot in November will question if we should oust CMP completely, take over the grid and start our own cooperative called Pine Tree Power.

Sadly in this era of partisan politics it’s become a sticking point for a lot of voters because a Democrat is leading the charge. But COU’s are most prevalent in red states and actually originated in the farm belt at the turn of the last century.

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CMP has deep pockets so they’re flooding the airwaves and our mailboxes with millions of dollars in false advertising to sway the vote. Our side? It’s run by donations.

David vs a multi nation conglomerate.

Maine has the 7th highest rates in the nation and are number 1 in outages. It’s time for a change.

Wish us luck.

If you’re interested how this all works….

https://ourpowermaine.org/

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