29 Apr Midcoast News April 29, 2015

Saying No To A Pay Raise

The LePage administration and various business groups are joining to urge the legislature to stop cities and towns from enacting local minimum wage requirements exceeding the state minimum of $7-50 an hour–something under consideration in Portland and Bangor. This effort comes as legislators are considering at least eight bills that would hike the minimum to levels ranging from eight to twelve dollars an hour.

Mayors vs. LePage

Mayors of some of the state’s largest cities are not happy with Governor LePage, saying that state-local partnerships have eroded during his time in office, and urging lawmakers to pass a budget that broadens the sales tax but protects revenue sharing. The sentiment comes as the legislature’s budget committee moves further into the formulation of a two-year budget plan widely expected to focus on income tax cuts.

Changing Hands

Donald Sussman, the financier who has owned the Portland Press Herald since 2012, is planning to sell the newspaper company to Reade Brower, a newspaper executive in Rockland who publishes weekly papers such as Rockland’s Free Press and Courier Gazette, the Camden Herald and the Republican Journal in Belfast. No word so far on the price tag of this deal. Sussman’s takeover of the Press Herald has been perpetually controversial in light of the fact that his wife is Maine Democratic congresswoman Chellie Pingree.