U.S. Sen. Angus King and members of the Maine House spoke during a virtual panel Tuesday night about the importance of unrigging the tax code, championing policies that would ensure corporations and the wealthy can’t continue to dodge paying their fair share. The panel was hosted by Mainers for Tax Fairness and featured King along…
A proposal by Gov. Janet Mills that would strip $82 million from this year’s budget to pay for a new tax break for profitable businesses would be better spent on education, health care and other state services, say economists, labor groups and Mainers struggling to recover from the pandemic. Republicans and corporate lobbyists including those…
The Maine People’s Alliance’s 2019 legislative scorecard launched online Tuesday, with 38 legislators earning perfect scores for advancing progressive values with votes they made during the first session of the 129th legislature. In an email announcing the scorecard’s launch, MPA co-director Amy Halsted said it is a “chance to make clear how our state lawmakers voted on some…
Democrats and Republicans on the Maine legislature’s Taxation Committee came together Wednesday to move forward a proposal to increase the size of and eligibility for a refundable tax break specifically designed to put more money into the pockets of low-income Mainers. Committee members hope that the bipartisan support behind significantly boosting the state’s existing…
This week on the Beacon Podcast (your only Mueller-free media outlet*) Taryn interviews Rep. Chloe Maxmin about her Green New Deal bill and Rep. Mo Terry about her Maine Work Credit. Also: Taryn, Mike and Ben break down the amended paid sick days proposal, as the bill gets a bipartisan committee vote and heads toward…
A legislative proposal to expand the earned income tax credit (EITC) to include those who forgo paid work to care for a loved could put money in the hands of thousands of Maine family caregivers who often struggle to pay their bills. Rep. Maureen “Mo” Terry (D-Gorham) has introduced a bill that would include full-time…
For many Mainers struggling to make ends meet, tax day can actually be a welcome relief. Low-income Mainers this year can again expect to see a more than $200 million boost in the form of the earned income tax credit (EITC). While much of the tax code is regressive and can often operate for the…
In 2017, University of Southern Maine student Emma Donnelly approached her school’s administration with a proposal to put emergency contraception in campus vending machines, as students have done in California and Massachusetts. Donnelly, a member of Huskies for Reproductive Health, a campus chapter of the Maine Planned Parenthood Action Fund, was interested in making sure…
A bill sponsored by Rep. Maureen Terry, a Democrat from Gorham, aims to make Maine the 29th state in the union to explicitly ban the use of physical force against students by school officials. Though no law expressly condones the practice here, and the use of corporal punishment for disciplinary purposes was banned in 1975,…