MONTPELIER, Vt. – The New England Grassroots Environment Fund announces that eight community groups across Maine received grants from the fund at its recent grantmaking committee meeting.

The funds support a variety of local initiatives to improve environmental quality across the state. The groups received a total of $14,000 in support.

Hilltop Community Gardens, Lewiston: $2,000 to build community capacity and local leadership through urban agriculture and community greening projects.

Thompson Lake Environmental Association, Oxford: $1,500 to help fund five high school Youth Conservation Corps students who will identify and fix erosion problems in the watershed and educate members of the community about the threat of non-point source pollution, its effects on water quality and how everyone can help.

Bayside Neighborhood Association, Portland: $2,000 to expand the Bayside community garden into a multi-use space that uses food as a tool for increasing cultural understanding, engages youth receiving food assistance in the full cycle of food production/consumption, and increases residents’ exposure to locally grown organic food.

Fairplay for Harpswell, Harpswell: $2,000 to block the lease of 70 acres of land to ConocoPhillips and Transcanada for an LNG terminal and gas plant.

GrassRoots Organizing Workshop New England, Monroe: $1,000 to help fund a series of annual weekend trainings for grassroots organizers from environmental, social and economic justice organizations in Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine to gain skills to continue organizing for a sustainable and egalitarian future for their communities.

Hampden Citizens Coalition, Hampden: $2,000 to conduct water and soil testing on or near the Souadabscook Stream and the Pine Tree Landfill and to hire a professional hydrologist and engineer to review water quality data.

Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, Millinocket: $1,000 to bring an educational and outreach “grassroots traveling road show” slide show about the Allagash Wilderness Waterway to all areas of Maine.

We The People: For a Healthy Environment, Milford: $2,500 to oppose the purchase and subsequent expansion of a sludge dump in West Old Town by the state, which will change the use of the dump into a statewide landfill to be run by Casella Waste Management.

The New England Grassroots Environment Fund guidelines and application forms are available at NEGEF, P.O. Box 1057, Montpelier, Vt. 05601, call 802-223-4622, e-mail [email protected] or visit www.grassrootsfund.org.