The first Growing Through Grief group will take place on Tuesday, Sept. 17 from 1-3 p.m. in Dover Foxcroft. Creative play coach, life stress reduction facilitator and local artist Terri Kelley Palin will facilitate the workshop/presentation portion of the program and will be addressing “artful grief.” Allowing grief to be expressed through creative processes can be incredibly healing and fulfilling and may even open new channels of creativity.

Pilots from across the country and Canada are expected to attend the popular International Seaplane Fly-In from Sept. 5-8, which also draws some of the biggest crowds of the summer season to the Moosehead Lake region.

On the morning of Friday, Sept. 6 the Piscataquis County Soil and Water Conservation District (PCSWCD) will be welcoming a new addition to the Law Farm located on Lee Cemetery Road, just outside of downtown Dover-Foxcroft.

On Wednesday, Sept. 11 at 1 p.m. at The Commons at Central Hall, a video presentation called “The Gut-Brain Connection: How to Heal Your Gut to Heal Your Brain” will be shown as part of the NAMI education program. It is free and open to all.

Last week the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife’s advisory council approved a rule that sounds ominous, but will actually change very little for the state’s anglers. Simply stated, in the state’s north zone, the general fishing law will ban the use of live fish as bait.

In my five years as your state representative the lack of high speed broadband has been a key issue and the citizens of Piscataquis County have demanded action. In response, I have worked to create a non-political broadband caucus to advocate for funding to stimulate investment in rural Maine. There have been dozens of bills introduced to include broadband in the two year budget, proposals to increase revenue and multiple bond proposals. This year the budget has included $4 million to address a multi-million dollar need.

I wanted to take a moment to respond to a recently published letter about the New England Clean Energy Connect (NECEC) project written by Urgel Pomerleau. As anyone reading the letter can sense, he has true passion for the direction of our state, but I feel it is important to ensure Maine people understand the process that is in place to consider such a major climate change solution.

American Legion Post 29 would like to invite the general public to attend an open house on Monday, Sept. 9 beginning at 5:30 p.m. to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Chadboune-Merrill Post 29 in Dover-Foxcroft.

On Tuesday, Aug. 27 15 members and three guests of the Piscataquis County Retired Educators were treated to an absolutely scrumptious luncheon at DKB Catering in Greenville. Guest speaker was Sandra Ryder, Greenville resident and volunteer extraordinaire, speaking on issues that citizens in our area are facing as they age.

New York City is frequently a place where bad policy is dreamed up, but I have to admit to occasionally still being shocked to see some of the things that are proposed under the watch of Mayor Bill de Blasio.