Happy Wednesday!
This is the Community Caring Collaborative Weekly Communiqué where we share announcements about trainings, meetings and other events, including announcements from our collaborative partners. Look for links to meeting minutes and agendas in the Meetings section, training registration forms and flyers in the Events section, and job postings and other items of interest in the Announcements section. Subscribe here to get the Communiqué. Make sure to add Community Caring Collaborative to your contacts at claurel@cccmaine.org. Gmail users, check for the Communiqué under the Promotions tab. This mailing goes out every Wednesday, so if you have announcements, please send them to Christine by 5 pm Monday to be included. Thanks!
Photo from Susan Bennett’s Monarch Butterfly Rescue Project
Announcements
Active Bystander Training: August 21st at the CCLC – see more under Events below.
Save the Dates: Healthy Acadia is coordinating trainings on the following dates:
- August 8th – From Heartache to Healing-Families recovering from addiction, 6-7:30 in Calais
- September 12th – Naloxone Training, 6-7:30 in Machias
- October 10th – Changing Face of Opioid Abuse, 6-7:30 at location tbd
- November 14th – Marijuana in the New Millennium, 6-7:30 at location tbd
- December 12th – Hidden in Plain Sight, 6-7:30 at location tbd
Contact Terri Woodruff for more information.
The Broken Ladder: Meghan Duff invites you to a discussion on Keith Payne’s book, The Broken Ladder: How Inequality Affects the Way We Think, Live, and Die, 3 pm on August 16th at the UMM Merrill Library. Please circulate or print & post this flyer – thanks!
Free Summer Series: St. Croix Regional Health Center will be offering a Summer Series on Thursday afternoons from 1:30-2:30 p.m. The series offers a mix of interest sessions with guest presenters on a variety of engaging topics from health and wellness to financial protection and fascinating historical accounts. Light refreshments and a time for catching up with friends new and old will follow. This program is Free and open to all! For more information please contact Christine Morris at 796-5503.
Your announcement could go here: email the details to Christine by 5 pm Monday for inclusion in Wednesday’s Weekly Communiqué.
Updates
This is where we post updates on programs, initiatives and pending legislation.
Events
Now listed chronologically, so make sure to scroll down for items just added!
LGFB Training Offered: The American Cancer Society is sponsoring a “Look Good Feel Better” training on July 31st from 10 am to 2 pm in the Conference Room at at Down East Community Hospital. See this flyer for registration details.
Donna Beegle in Maine this August: Dr. Beegle will be holding her poverty & coaching institutes in 
Augusta, Maine, August 8-11 at the Augusta Civic Center. Details and Registration links for the Poverty Institute here, and Coaching Institute here. The Maine institutes are the only east coast Beegle Poverty Institutes on the schedule for the rest of the year!
Active Bystander Training: offered on August 21st from 1-4 pm at the Cobscook Learning Center. Suggested donation of $20. We are also paying Claire’s travel expenses from Portland, so please be generous if you can. Sign up at the CCLC website www.theCCLC.org, or call them at 733-2332
Maine Wisdom Summit: Jessica Maurer of the Maine Association of Area Agencies on Aging asks everyone to save the date of September 20th for the Maine Wisdom Summit – Cultivating the Opportunities of our Age at the Augusta Civic Center, 9:00 am – 3:30 pm (registration 8-9 am). The Wisdom Summit will focus on reframing the conversation about our aging demographic and older Mainers. It will challenge ageist assumptions and help us understand how cultivating the intelligence, ingenuity and resiliency of older Mainers is moving us toward innovation, interconnectivity and economic 
prosperity. Julie Sweetland of the FrameWorks Institute will give the keynote presentation.
Summit work sessions will be targeted and hand’s on:
- HR directors and employers will get tools and ideas they can use to recruit and retain older workers;
- older folks can learn how to start a small business, lead a community development effort or become a more effective volunteer;
- elder service providers will learn how service delivery changes can bridge the gap in workforce shortages;
- leaders in policy and higher education will hear about new research and technologies and learn about opportunities for future development; and we’ll all learn how creativity can grow our economy and support healthy aging.
Click here to find out about available exhibitor and sponsorship opportunities. Contact jmaurer@maine4a.org for more information. We’re pleased to already be able to thank our Premier Sponsor, the Maine Community Foundation, our Platinum Sponsors, MaineHealth and COR Health, and Gold Sponsor, AARP Maine. Registration will go live in early August! Please keep an eye out for the registration email. We look forward to seeing you in September!
Save the Date: Sue O’Clair of MaineHousing invites you to save the date of September 22nd for 
the 2017 Maine Affordable Housing Conference at the Holiday Inn By the Bay in Portland. This event will provide a forum for housing partners to gather and share information about what is being done currently – and what more needs to be done – in the affordable housing arena to bridge the gap between housing needs and housing availability. There will be a mix of keynote speakers and workshops to choose from that will be targeted to all partner groups. MaineHousing is still pulling together info on the conference agenda and speakers and hopes to have more info and a registration portal ready to go soon.
Needs & Offers
Passages Program accepting applications: Wayfinder Schools Passages Program is currently accepting applications for the upcoming school year. Passages is a home-based high school degree program for young parents, age 14 to 20, who live in Washington County and whose education was derailed by early parenthood. Teachers and students together create trusting, supportive and resilient relationships. They meet weekly in the student’s home and via the phone and Internet. Self-directed learning, undertaken within the teacher/student relationship, can provide a young parent with the opportunity to flourish as a responsible citizen and as his or her child’s first teacher. Students study a combination of academic, parenting and life skills. The final “Passage” is an opportunity for students to design an individual project that addresses a particular passion, fear or need in their life. To learn more, visit the Wayfinder Schools website or contact Andie Hannon.
SNAP Benefits at Milbridge Farmer’s Market: The Women’s Health Resource Library is partnering with
the Milbridge Farmer’s Market to bring SNAP benefits and Harvest Bucks to the market. Families can use SNAP/EBT to purchase food from the market. For every $1 of SNAP spent at the market, they will receive $1 in Maine Harvest Bucks to use to purchase fruits, veggies, and food-producing seedlings at the market. Look for us at the Market Info Booth next to the Incredible Edible Milbridge trailer on Saturdays to learn more. We are a National Nutrition Incentive Network Member. This project has been made possible with help from the Maine Federation of Farmer’s Markets.
Elder Services Navigator for Washington County: WHCA’s Elder Services Navigator, Lisa Suarez, is available by phone (207) 460-8129 and email lsuarez@whcacap.org to help elders connect to resources in order to live well at home in Washington County. There are no income limits for initial intake, although some resources may have income guidelines. Caregivers, friends, children of elders, health care providers, banks, food pantries, town offices, etc., are encouraged to refer people who may need help as they deal with issues of aging.
Child Care Openings: Child and Family Opportunities has immediate full-day, full-year childcare and 
combination Head Start/childcare openings for children ages 3-5 years old at the St. Croix Early Care and Education Center in Calais and the Flaherty Early Care and Education Center in Machias. We are also accepting applications for our part-year Head Start and Pre-K programs at the Calais Elementary School, Harrington Elementary School, Milbridge Elementary School, and the Flaherty Center in Machias. Our part-year programs will be starting up in the fall, and CFO will be doing rolling acceptances through the summer for part-year applicants. Families interested in year-round childcare or part-year programming are encouraged to apply as soon as possible. Our Enrollment Specialist is standing by to assist families with the application process. Contact us at 207-667-2995 extension 237 or enrollment@childandfamilyopp.org.
NHN Home Repair: Neighbors Helping Neighbors, a program of Down East Maine Missions, is a home repair program servicing the needs of low income folk in the communities from Beals Island to Eastport. Eight work teams will be hosted by NHN this summer beginning next week, headquartered at the historic Jacksonville Campground in East Machias. If you have folks with grants for repairs that need to be done, NHN may be able to help. Likewise, if you know folks who need repairs, then you are welcome to provide them with a copy of this application. Contact David Grainger, NHN Director, with any questions.
Next Step Support Group: Next Step is offering a support group for those experiencing or affected by domestic violence. It occurs each Tuesday during the day. Call 255-4934 for the time and location. Please help spread the word, and refer anyone who might find it helpful.
Send us your agency/community needs or offers, such as job recruiting or housing needs.
Favorite Resources
This is a new section of the Communique where we post links to helpful websites and videos. Send us your favorite links to share with other Communique readers.
Following the exciting gathering of employers around Addiction, Recovery and the Workforce: a summit for Washington County businesses of all sizes, on July 13th at UMM, we are posting some of the resources made available to summit participants on a special resource page of our website. We recommend you check out these Power Point presentations and articles provided by our summit speakers for data points, strategies, signs of substance use, and where to go for help whether you’re an employee or employer. Find this page under Resources for Substance Abuse & Addiction. More summit resources will be added as we collect them.
Meetings
Work Group & Poverty Busters: Minutes from the June and July meetings are now available. Please note that we will not be meeting in August, the month of vacations and family visits. Our next meeting will be on September 6th from 1-3:30 pm at the SCEC House. Enjoy the rest of the summer!
St Croix Community Connections: This is Poverty Buster’s sister group in Calais, organized by Christine Morris. This group meets monthly – new members welcome!
Photo courtesy of Susan Bennett