Greetings!
Spring has arrived—at least by the calendar, and we can feel new energy entering the State House.
Every day we welcome hundreds of visitors – student groups learning how government works, citizens being honored by our Legislature, community members here to testify at public hearings and more. It means so much to me to meet and hear from these individuals. Whether I see you in Augusta, or on the Peninsula, it reminds me, again and again, how lucky I am to serve as your state representative.
I am proud to report that the Legislature is working cohesively and collaboratively. We’ve already moved about half of our 2,000 bills into committees, where they are being thoroughly discussed, re-worked, and considered.
In
my committee,
State and Local Government, we have worked on a number of bills that received a fair amount press. Interestingly, two bills—the question of which chickadee is our state bird and whether we should revert to the original Maine flag—were thoroughly discussed with lots of testimony given. Ultimately the committee decided to leave the state bird designation of chickadee as is and to retain the current Maine flag, while asking Secretary of State Matt Dunlap to designate an official bicentennial flag for the 2020 celebrations.
