WERU 89.9 FM Blue Hill, Maine Audio Archives

Host/Producer: Amy Browne Jane Blum with all the details on the Belfast Pride parade, celebration and film festival coming up on Saturday, and headlines from Maine newspapers 100 years ago today. About the host: Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices, Maine Currents and Maine: The Way Life Could Be, Amy also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and Maine Association of Broadcasters awards for her work in 2017 and 2021. Theme music: BreakBeat Chemists I, 2015 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 International License

The post Around Town 6/6/24: Local News, Culture and Events first appeared on WERU 89.9 FM Blue Hill, Maine Local News and Public Affairs Archives.

Host/Producer: Rhonda Feiman Co-Producer: Petra Hall Technical assistance: Joel Mann & Amy Browne Healthy Options: For Well-being & Being Well This month: – What is aging? Why is having a positive view of aging good for our health? – How can we stay healthy while aging? – What are “normal” or usual, stages of aging as we get older? – What is brain plasticity? How does the brain create new pathways and why is that important? – How are ageism and age-based stereotypes harmful? – How would we define elder vs. elderly? What is the difference between being an “elder” and being seen as “elderly”? – Is frailty inevitable? – What role does attitude and positivity play in staying well? – How does diet, exercise, creativity and a sense of purpose assist us in aging well?  – What is a “life span” vs. a “health span”? How can the two be combined for better outcomes?  – Why is isolation so detrimental to us? Why is it important to engage with others, and of all ages? Why might helping others be important for our own health? – Why is learning something new every day important, and why is being in nature good for us? – Are there risks to taking multiple medications? – What are the financial and legal aspects of aging well? How do we plan for a successful aging (life) experience? – Regarding grief: what is natural and expected after losing a loved one or experiencing loss in difficult situations? – Why is resiliency vital to our well being, no matter our age? Guest(s):  Marcy Cottrell Houle, MS., wildlife biologist and author of seven books including “The Gift of Caring- Saving our Parents from the Perils of Modern Healthcare”, co-authored with Dr. Elizabeth Eckstrom. FMI: In 2016, Rhonda Feiman interviewed Marcy Cottrell Houle, MS., about “The Gift of Caring: Saving Our Parents from the Perils of Modern Healthcare,” about how the current health care delivery model is ill-equipped to provide comprehensive, person-centered care to seniors, and how many treatable conditions and symptoms are dismissed as “just old age.” The discussion highlights specific tools that we can use to help prevent these mistakes and what we need to know to achieve healthy aging. archives.weru.org/healthy-options/2016/10/special-edition-of-healthy–options–10616/ www.thegiftofcaring.net Healthy Options 3/6/24: Advocating for the care needs & rights of elders in nursing homes & assisted living facilities Elder Advocate Jack Halpern, founder and chairman of MyElder. archives.weru.org/healthy-options/2024/03/healthy–options-3-6-24-advocating-for-the-care-needs-and-rights-of-elders-in-nursing-homes-assisted-living-facilities/ Healthy Options 12/6/23: Brain Health and Aging Well: Interview with Susan Wehry, M.D., geriatric psychiatrist and director of AgingME archives.weru.org/healthy-options/2023/12/healthy–options-12-6-23-brain-health–and-aging-well/ www.susanwehrymd.com agingme.org About the host: Rhonda Feiman is a nationally-certified, licensed acupuncturist practicing in Belfast, Maine since 1993. She primarily practices Toyohari Japanese acupuncture, using gentle and powerful non-insertion needle techniques, and also utilizes Chinese acupuncture and herbology. In addition, Rhonda is a practitioner of Qi Gong and an instructor of Tai Chi Chuan in the Yang Family tradition.

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Host: Peter Neill Producer: Trisha Badger ABOUT THIS EPISODE On June 8th each year we come together as a global community to celebrate World Ocean Day, a date set aside to recognize our relationship with the ocean. Public awareness of ocean issues in the United States barely advances year on year, despite consistent efforts by conservation, ocean, and other environmental organizations like World Ocean Observatory whose mission it is to inform and educate. What is World Ocean Day meant to do? Do we have the will to coalesce around a single issue, to be informed and changed into a voice for change? World Ocean Day is June 8th. Learn more at worldoceanday.org. WORLD OCEAN RADIO 5-minute weekly insights dive into ocean science, advocacy and education hosted by Peter Neill, lifelong ocean advocate and maritime expert. A catalog of more than 700 episodes offer perspectives on global ocean issues and viable solutions, and celebrate exemplary projects. Available for RSS feed and for broadcast by college and community radio stations worldwide. You will also find this week’s World Ocean Radio episode at Exchange.prx.org, at Audioport.org, WorldOceanObservatory.org where the full catalog of episodes is searchable by theme, and wherever you listen to podcasts.

The post World Ocean Radio 6/5/24: What is World Ocean Day Meant to Do? first appeared on WERU 89.9 FM Blue Hill, Maine Local News and Public Affairs Archives.

Host/Producer: Amy Browne Excerpts from an MDI Historical Society event with Brent Richardson telling historic family stories. About the host: Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices, Maine Currents and Maine: The Way Life Could Be, Amy also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and Maine Association of Broadcasters awards for her work in 2017 and 2021. Theme music: BreakBeat Chemists I, 2015 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 International License

The post Around Town 6/5/24: Local News, Culture and Events first appeared on WERU 89.9 FM Blue Hill, Maine Local News and Public Affairs Archives.

Producers/Hosts: Maria Girouard, Esther Anne Jeffrey Hotchkiss, Zoom recording technician Dawnland Signals highlights indigenous topics not immediately represented in mainstream media and is meant to share, inspire, and inform. Join co-hosts Maria Girouard and Esther Anne as they engage in critical conversations of truth, healing, and change in the Dawnland. This month: Join co-hosts Maria Girouard and Esther Anne as they engage in a conversation of truth, healing, and change in the Dawnland with special guests. The regular monthly show’s run ended in April 2023. Dawnland Signals returns to WERU for a special conversation about Beyond the Claims with Wabanaki artists and photographers Nolan Altvater and Maya Attean along with Kate Russell, project coordinator. In this episode, we will learn more about REACH’s oral history truth-telling project and the collaborative effort to bring the upcoming art exhibit – wikhkikonol – to life. wikhikonol features stories and photos from Wabanakik and opens on the summer solstice at the Sipayik Museum, Passamaquoddy Territory on June 20 at 2:00 PM. Guests: Nolan Altvater, Wabanaki artist and photographer. Maya Tihtiyas Attean, Wabanaki artist and photographer. Kate Russell, Wabanaki REACH Project Coordinator for Beyond the Claims, Stories from the Land & the Heart About the hosts: Esther Anne, is a Passamaquoddy from Sipayik who lives on Indian Island and serves on the Wabanaki REACH Board of Directors. Maria Girouard, Penobscot from Indian Island, is Executive Director of Wabanaki REACH, a statewide organization working toward truth, healing, and change in the Dawnland. Maria is a tribal historian with a Master’s Degree in History from the University of Maine and a special interest in the Maine Indian Land Claims. Maria has devoted years to community organizing, environmental stewardship and activism, and growing food in tribal communities.

The post Dawnland Signals Special 6/4/24: Beyond the Claims first appeared on WERU 89.9 FM Blue Hill, Maine Local News and Public Affairs Archives.

Producer/Host: Larry Dansinger About the host: Larry Dansinger (no pronouns) of Bangor came to Maine in 1974 and has been here ever since. Some of Larry’s activities since then: Done community organizing on numerous issues through INVERT and then Resources for Organizing and Social Change (ROSC), committed civil disobedience several times, grown a garden yearly since 1977, joined various food cooperatives and two men’s groups, refused to pay federal income taxes for war, lived on a community land trust for 23 years, and met a wonderful partner whom Larry has loved for over 40 years. Larry has produced Outside the Box features on WERU since 2007 and continues to look for unique ways of seeing almost any problem or situation.

The post Outside the Box 6/4/24: “Cheerful” first appeared on WERU 89.9 FM Blue Hill, Maine Local News and Public Affairs Archives.

Host: Brianna Cunliffe Description: Climate & Community covers the new Maine Clean Energy Jobs Network launched in late May by the Governor’s Energy Office, designed to connect Mainers to careers in clean energy, and bolster progress in this fast-growing sector of the economy that’s key to achieving our climate action goals. Access the network at https://mainecleanenergyjobs.com/   Johannah, Brianna, Tanvi, Gus, Corey, and Beth are the team at A Climate to Thrive, a nonprofit working to build a model of community-driven, solutions-focused climate action. Since its origins around a potluck table as concerned neighbors gathered to take action on climate change, A Climate to Thrive, or ACTT, has been supporting solutions on Mount Desert Island and beyond since 2016. Learn more at www.aclimatetothrive.org.

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Host/Producer: Amy Browne   About the host: Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices, Maine Currents and Maine: The Way Life Could Be, Amy also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and Maine Association of Broadcasters awards for her work in 2017 and 2021. Theme music: BreakBeat Chemists I, 2015 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 International License

The post Around Town 6/4/24: Local News, Culture and Events first appeared on WERU 89.9 FM Blue Hill, Maine Local News and Public Affairs Archives.

Host/Producer: Amy Browne A couple of events this evening, and excerpts from a speech by Gov Percival Baxter at the dedication of the then brand new Crosby High School in Belfast, as reported in Maine newspapers 100 years ago today. About the host: Amy Browne started out at WERU as a volunteer news & public affairs producer in 2000, co-hosting/co-producing RadioActive with Meredith DeFrancesco. She joined the team of Voices producers a few years later, and has been WERU’s News & Public Affairs Manager since January, 2006. In addition to RadioActive, Voices, Maine Currents and Maine: The Way Life Could Be, Amy also produced and hosted the WERU News Report for several years. She has produced segments for national programs including Free Speech Radio News, This Way Out, Making Contact, Workers Independent News, Pacifica PeaceWatch, and Live Wire News, and has contributed to Democracy Now and the WBAI News Report. She is the recipient of the 2014 Excellence in Environmental Journalism Award from the Sierra Club of Maine, and Maine Association of Broadcasters awards for her work in 2017 and 2021. Theme music: BreakBeat Chemists I, 2015 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 International License

The post Around Town 6/3/24: Local News, Culture and Events first appeared on WERU 89.9 FM Blue Hill, Maine Local News and Public Affairs Archives.

Producer/Host: R.W. Estela Hi, I’m RW Estela: Since 1991, I’ve been presenting A Word in Edgewise, WERU’s longest-running short feature, a veritable almanac of worldly and heavenly happenings, a confluence of 21st-century life in its myriad manifestations, international and domestic, cosmopolitan and rural, often revealing, as the French say, the more things change, the more they stay the same — though not always! Sometimes in addressing issues affecting our day-to-day lives, in this age of vagary and ambiguity, when chronological time is punctuated elliptically, things can quickly turn edgy and controversial, as we search for understanding amid our dialectic. Tune in Monday mornings at 7:30 a.m. for an exciting journey through space and time with a few notable birthdays thrown in for good measure during A Word in Edgewise . . . About the host: RW Estela was raised as a first-generation American in Colorado by a German mother and a Corsican-Basque father who would become a three-war veteran for the US Army, so RW was naturally a military brat and later engaged in various Vietnam-era civil-service adventures before paying his way through college by skiing for the University of Colorado, playing Boulder coffeehouses, and teaching. He has climbed all of Colorado’s Fourteeners; found work as an FAA-certificated commercial pilot, a California-licensed building contractor, a publishing editor, a practitioner of Aikido, and a college professor of English; among his many interdisciplinary pursuits are the design and building of Terrell Residence Library (recently renamed the Terrell House Permaculture Living & Learning Center at the University of Maine), writing Building It In Two Languages (a bilingual dictionary of construction terminology), aerial photo documentation of two dam removals (Great Works and Veazie) on the Penobscot River, and once a week since 1991 drafting an installment of A Word In Edgewise, his essay series addressing issues affecting our day-to-day lives — and WERU’s oldest continuous short feature. When pandemics do not interfere, he does the Triple Crown of Maine open-water ocean swims (Peaks to Portland, Islesboro Crossing, and Nubble Light Challenge) and the Whitewater Downriver Point Series of the Maine Canoe and Kayak Racing Organization. RW is the father of two and the grandfather of three and lives with his partner Kathleen of 37 years and their two Maine Coons in Orono.

The post A Word in Edgewise 6/3/24: From No-Mow May to June’s New Moon . . . first appeared on WERU 89.9 FM Blue Hill, Maine Local News and Public Affairs Archives.