Happy Wednesday!
New this week:
Beth C. Wright Cancer Resource Center and First National Bank’s Beth’s Trees For HOPE Festival event will be held December 13th, 14th & 15th at the Maine Coast Mall, Ellsworth, ME. NOW taking submissions for trees! Do you want to display a donated tree this year? Do you want to be an event sponsor? Contact Beth C. Wright Cancer Resource Center @ 207-664-0339, email: info@bethwrightcancercenter.org.
SMAA’s Falls Prevention Webinar Series
- September 9 – From Awareness to Action: 6 steps to prevent falls.
- September 16 – Stepping out Strong: Building strength & balance to prevent falls.
- September 23 – Tai Chi: Prevent falls by strengthening the body and focusing the mind.
- September 30 – Changing Thoughts & Behaviors: You have the power to prevent a fall.
Gathering & Growing for 25 Years
Trail Clean-up and Work Day
Join Maine Seacoast Mission on Friday, September 20th, from 9 am to 2 pm for a Downeast Campus Trail Clean-Up and Work Day. Volunteers are welcome to drop by to help clean up some of the many trails on the Mission’s 63-acre campus. Please wear closed-toe shoes and bring work gloves if you have them. Lunch will be provided. Please register here.
Maine’s Paid Family/Medical Leave Program
Rudman Winchell has posted this critical update: Maine DOL Issues Significant Revised Proposal Rules for Maine’s Paid Family and Medical Leave Program. One of the primary concerns about the prior proposed rules was the inability of qualified businesses to opt out of paying the payroll tax to be used to fund the costs of the initial program until after January 2025, the date on which the collection through taxes begins. This effectively meant that businesses who qualify to opt out because they offer an equivalent plan would have already paid in a substantial amount to the program before they were permitted to opt out in May 2026. The revised version allows businesses that can demonstrate an equivalent or better paid FML plan to opt out of the program starting in April 2025, almost a year earlier than the prior opt out date. Learn more at Rudman Winchell’s Annual Employment Law Seminar, October 1st at the Wells Conference Center. Register here.
For September, the StoryWalk® at Porter Memorial Library in Machias will feature, If You Give a Moose a Muffin, by Laura Numeroff. This children’s favorite illustrated by Felicia Bond introduces young readers to the importance of thinking before making decisions and how small actions may have unintended and far-reaching consequences. Learn more.
WIC of Hancock and Washington Counties has been working tirelessly to create a breastfeeding support program that provides education, supplies, peer counseling and more for our parents that choose to breastfeed their babies. In a little over a year, we have almost doubled the percentage of parents who breastfeeding beyond 3 – 6 months in Hancock and Washington counties! We submitted our application to the national agencies that oversee WIC and our local agency has been awarded the national WIC Breastfeeding Award of Excellence – GOLD! We recognize that we also share this award with our support agencies who are an extension of the compassionate care we all provide our families. Thank you for continuing to support WIC and our mission – we are grateful and proud to do the good work with great people! Read full press release.