AUGUSTA — A bipartisan group of Lewiston-Auburn lawmakers is again asking the Maine Department of Health and Human Services to pick up the pace on implementing new lead-poisoning standards that were passed into law more than eight months ago. The change, which would see Maine conform with federal blood-lead levels for children, could set in […]
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Peggy Rotundo says state should pay bills before adding to savings
AUGUSTA — Rep. Peggy Rotundo, D-Lewiston, said Tuesday a state revenue surplus of about $73 million should be used first to help cover the state’s bills before being put into Maine’s savings account. Rotundo joined other Democrats in countering a bill being offered by Republican Gov. Paul LePage that seeks to put all of the […]
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Rep. Peggy Rotundo set to leave Maine Legislature in 2016
LEWISTON — Rep. Peggy Rotundo, D-Lewiston, will leave the Legislature in 2016. Rotundo, who has served four terms in both the Maine House and Maine Senate, said she wouldn’t attempt to run for the Senate again now that she has served the maximum number of consecutive terms in the House. Rotundo has been an influential […]
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Rotundo bill aims to secure funding for college aspirations program
LEWISTON — New legislation proposed by state Rep. Peggy Rotundo, D-Lewiston, aims to protect and secure funding for a local nonprofit that has been working to increase the number of people in Androscoggin County with college degrees. Rotundo said the bill is necessary because an intended $75,000 appropriation meant for the organization in 2015 was […]
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Gov. LeRage: Paul LePage says area lawmakers, cartoonist should be shot
AUGUSTA — A top advocate for expanding passenger rail to Lewiston-Auburn said Thursday that Republican Gov. Paul LePage said state lawmakers from Lewiston should be “rounded up and executed in the public square.” Tony Donovan, a Portland-based real estate developer and member of the executive council for the Sierra Club Maine, said LePage made the […]
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Maine budget in full stall as lawmakers grapple for compromise
On Thursday, LePage again turned up the heat by going public about his displeasure with the state Senate’s Republican majority leadership. During an hourlong radio chat Thursday morning, LePage blasted Senate Republicans, again accusing them of siding with House Democrats in stymieing his efforts to lower and eventually eliminate Maine’s income tax. “The conflict is this,” […]
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GOP House leader vows to fight ‘tooth and nail’ for income tax cuts in Maine budget
AUGUSTA — House Republicans have entrenched themselves against the rest of the Legislature — including their fellow GOP Senators — and are vowing to fight a state budget being crafted in the Legislature because it doesn’t include income tax cuts or welfare reforms favored by Gov. Paul LePage. Meanwhile, Senate Republicans said they have forged […]
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Rotundo wants a woman on U.S. paper money
AUGUSTA — A state lawmaker from Lewiston says it is time to put a woman on U.S. paper currency and wants that woman to be a Mainer. “America hasn’t changed its paper currency for many years,” state Rep. Peggy Rotundo, D-Lewiston, said in a prepared statement Tuesday. “There is a national group organizing for this […]
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Fund for Healthy Maine survives in unanimous committee vote
AUGUSTA — In a bipartisan and unanimous decision, the Legislature’s budget-writing Appropriations Committee beat back a proposed $7.2 million raid on the state’s tobacco settlement funds, currently used for community smoking cessation and prevention programs. The committee instead took about $2.4 million from the fund to use on other parts of the $28 million spending […]
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Rotundo: LePage budget ‘shreds’ mental health safety net
AUGUSTA — The Democratic House chairwoman of the Legislature’s Appropriations Committee says the governor’s budget would “shred” Maine’s safety net for people with mental illnesses. State Rep. Peggy Rotundo, D-Lewiston, said in a statement late Thursday that a proposal by Gov. Paul LePage’s administration that would reduce by 10 percent the Medicaid reimbursement rates for […]