PARIS – For the first time, the Maine Legislative Youth Advisory Council is holding a public hearing in western Maine.

“I was glad we could have a meeting here,” said David Heidrich, 17, the grandson of former state Rep. Ted Heidrich of Oxford. The younger Heidrich, a senior at Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School, is the youth chair of the council, which consists of 18 youth members from across the state and four legislators.

The all-day session will get under way at 10 a.m. Jan. 28 at the high school.

Now in its third year, the council has the power to conduct public hearings, draft bills and make recommendations on pending proposals under consideration by the Legislature.

Heidrich said the point of the public hearing is to gather views from the region about the important issues facing youth today. The council also welcomes ideas about solving those issues.

Since its inception, the council has helped to persuade the secretary of state to push for graduated driving privileges, rather than raising the driving age across the board to 17.

The council has also won agreements to overhaul the Maine Youth Drug & Alcohol Use Survey, and expand it to include school dropouts. The council has also advised the state commissioner of education to explore other options to the D.A.R.E. program that are more relevant to high school students.

“Our dialogues exposes things you don’t really think about,” Heidrich said. He said the council is working on ways to stop the “brain drain,” in which a high percentage of high school graduates go out of state for college or jobs.

Other public hearings will be held by the council in other locations in the state later this year.