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| 📷 Govs. Spencer Cox of Utah (from left), Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas and Phil Murphy of New Jersey talk in a hotel hallway at the conclusion of the National Governors Association meeting in Portland on July 15, 2022. (BDN photo by Troy R. Bennett) |
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🏣 Maine lawmakers may try to follow Utah's lead on homelessness.
◉ The Legislature's new housing panel is hearing from Wayne Niederhauser, Utah's homeless coordinator under Republican Gov. Spencer Cox, on the "Housing First" initiative the led the state to be looked at as a national model. The panel meets at 9 a.m. Watch it.
◉ Under Housing First policies, homeless people are provided supportive housing with no preconditions such as sobriety. Substance use disorder and mental health counseling is available, and the model has drawn praise across the country and in Portland, which has three such complexes.
◉ Mills wants to take the model statewide, building hundreds of units dispersed throughout Maine. The housing committee is considering the design of that program right now, and it could have bipartisan support.
◉ Utah's experience on homelessness is complex. While it was hailed nationally for a massive reduction in the homeless population in 2015, it struggled with an uptick a few years later that advocates blamed on the state letting up on the construction of new units. Cox's latest budget proposal seeks $150 million for new housing initiatives, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.
🎥 A legislative report criticizes Maine's modest film tax credits.
◉ Maine's film tax credits have been used infrequently and are neither adequately administered nor targeted to economic development goals, according to a report released Friday by the Legislature's watchdog arm.
◉ The state has lacked a major presence in the national film industry in part because other states offer more generous benefits. In Maine, production companies are are eligible for 5 percent of non-wage expenses and 12 percent of production wages for Maine residents or 10 percent for out-of-staters.
◉ The existing credits date back to 2006, but there have only been nine tax credit claims totaling $38,000 and 95 wage reimbursements totaling $2.2 million. The number of productions per year has generally been in the single digits, though the report notes national findings that even large incentives do not always support major job growth.
◉ "In the case of the state’s [visual media] incentives, there is little use of the incentives which naturally limits the accompanying economic impacts one might expect to flow from productions participating in the program," the report concludes. |
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What we're reading
🧾 Oxford County is missing receipts for its gun transactions.
🤐 An Aroostook school board is tight-lipped on the superintendent's arrest.
🌐 Charter Communications launched an $82 million broadband expansion.
☪️ A Bangor official opens her home for Ramadan to demystify Islam.
🚧 Gunshots fired near a Fort Kent school led to canceled classes. |
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