Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Chair Congresswoman Chellie Pingree secured $34.5 million for 15 First District community projects in the Fiscal Year 2023 Appropriations package. In addition to these 15 projects, Chellie fought to include provisions in the omnibus that support Maine lobstermen, help farmers address PFAS contamination, and protect the York River and its surrounding communities.
Preble Street will use the federal funding to support its Food Security Hub in South Portland, helping those facing hunger and homelessness. This Food Security Hub will act as an industrial kitchen, food processing center, educational site, office space, and conference center dedicated to collective advocacy work and efforts to address hunger.
Federal funding secured by Pingree will help the Greater Portland Immigrant Welcome Center create and launch their enterprise institute “Women Lead”, which will prepare immigrant women and girls to pursue small business leadership and ownership through a variety of services, including business mentorships, educational programming, language services, and assistance with marketing and finance.
Federal funding secured by Pingree will help restore and weatherize the Maine Irish Heritage Center in Portland, and help ensure the historic building, which was previously St. Dominic’s Church, can continue to serve as a community space and center for cultural education.
After years of advocacy alongside the York River watershed communities, Pingree secured long-sought federal protections for approximately 30.8 miles of the river in southeast Maine and surrounding acreage in the Fiscal Year 2023 government funding bill now headed for President Biden’s desk. The York River has gained a ‘Wild and Scenic’ river designation which will direct more federal funding and technical assistance from the National Parks Service and lift the region’s profile as a national destination. It also provides a local forum for the four watershed communities to collaboratively address long-term river stewardship needs.
With final passage of the Fiscal Year 2023 government funding bill, Pingree secured $3,452,978 for the Saco Water Resource Resiliency Project to make Saco’s existing headworks structure more resilient to the effects of sea-level rise, intensifying weather events, and climate change impacts.
Pingree helped dedicate $5 million to assist farmers whose land has been contaminated by PFAS or “forever chemicals”. As Chair of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies, Pingree also authored provisions in the spending bill to increase the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) ability to address PFAS mitigation nationwide.
Mercy Hospital in Portland will use the $1 million in federal funding to substantially increase access to its English Language Acquisition Program, with the goal of supporting participants in advancing in health care or related career pathways.
Amistad’s Portland-based women’s recovery-focused homeless shelter, Freedom Place at 66 State, will use the $535,000 in federal funds secured by Pingree to provide permanent, peer-supported, and recovery-focused housing for 38 women who previously experienced homelessness or incarceration, and who face challenges related to substance use disorder, mental health, and histories of trauma that include the experience of human trafficking and domestic violence.
$3 million in Community Project Funding will be used to renovate and expand the Louis B. Goodall Memorial Library's existing space, adding a community room, study rooms, and office space for volunteers to provide a crossroads of access to the town’s many resources. Additionally, funds would be used to update the existing technology currently used by the library.
Chip Schrader, the director of Goodall Library in Sanford, said when he expressed appreciation to Pingree and others for securing the expansion funding, that the funding "reaffirms the relevance, value, importance and significance of public libraries in a free society."
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