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Shenna Bellows · Newsradio WGAN

0:20
Good morning. Welcome to a Healthy
0:22
conversation with Doctor Lisa Belial and myself, Doctor Jeff
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Barkin. It's News Radio WGAN.
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Today, we're continuing a series of conversations with candidates
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from across the political spectrum as Maine prepares to
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choose its next governor and senator.
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Our goal is to give listeners the opportunity to get to know
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these leaders as people, not just a sound bite.
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Shanna Bellows grew up in Hancock, ME.
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She's the daughter of a Carpenter and a greenhouse
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worker who knew what it was like to struggle to make ends meet.
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They didn't have electricity or running water until she was in
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the 5th grade, but her parents never let her family feel poor.
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Shanna Bellows holds a Bachelor of Arts in international
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politics and economics from Middlebury College.
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She volunteered with the Peace Corps in Panama and AmeriCorps
1:01
or Vista in Nashville, TN. She returns home to serve as
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executive director of the ACLU of Maine.
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In 2016, Shanna won a state Senate race in Kennebec County
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in a district that also voted for Donald Trump.
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She currently serves as Maine's 50th and first female Secretary
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of State. She's worked to modernize
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government with programs such as online appointments at the
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Bureau of Motor Vehicles. Thank you for doing that,
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Shanna. Automatic voter registration of
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the Bureau of Motor Vehicles, electronic lean and titling and
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safe online voter registration. Now she's running for governor.
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Shanna Bellows, Welcome to a healthy conversation.
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Well, thank you so much. What a pleasure to be here.
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It's a delight to have you. And, and with that bio, first of
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all, welcome 2nd governorship. You have this incredible past in
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politics, both in terms of Secretary of State, where you've
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come up with some pretty controversial things in the past
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year or so regarding President Trump that has people in
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hackles, other people very excited.
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You have long and distinguished career in politics, Governor.
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That's a big, big charge. What led you to come to that
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decision? We're in such a critical moment
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for our democracy, but also our friends and neighbors are really
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struggling right now. I think about my parents, who
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when I was four years old bought a piece of land in Hancock.
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My sister was three, my brother was two.
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My dad had just started his own carpentry business.
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My mom at that time was working nights in a light bulb filament
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factory in Sullivan, and they pitched a tent and in their
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spare time, they dug out an old cellar hole.
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And that's where we lived in that basement the following
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winter. But I think now a young couple,
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a Carpenter and a factory worker, I don't think they could
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find a piece of land to settle near where they could work
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anywhere in our state. Life is simply not affordable
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for young families. And so I do think we this is a
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moment where we need leaders who are brave, who will stand up to
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Donald Trump and fight to protect democracy, but who will
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also deliver on affordability, have the experience both in the
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legislature and in the executive branch to implement real change.
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Affordability. As governor, how do you most
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impact affordability? Because I completely agree with
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you that things are just downright not affordable.
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I have two kids, they're both married, one just had a child.
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And it's hard. I mean, growing up it's, it's
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now going to be difficult for our kids and grandchildren, much
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more so than it was for us. The cost of housing, of
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healthcare, of energy and taxes. So how as governor are you going
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to balance those? You just named the big four and
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let's start with taxes. Property taxes are really
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killing people. I'm calling for a statewide
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moratorium on property taxes for Maine residents with a blue
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ribbon Commission to re evaluate how we fund schools,
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municipalities and counties and my very first budget on day one.
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I'll be ready to go with dramatically increased funding
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for our schools to take some of the pressure off.
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But I'm also calling for doubling the property taxes on
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non residents who are gobbling up our property.
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Because one in six main homes, a main is now a vacation home.
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If you walk around downtown Portland after dark, a lot of
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those apartments and condos are now dark because people are
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buying them up and then they stay in them for a couple of
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weeks or maybe a month in the summer.
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And that I think is part of the housing crisis.
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It's part of the affordability crisis now when I have a lot of
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ideas with housing and energy and healthcare, and I'm happy to
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talk about those too. But I do think it starts with
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rethinking in a very big picture way, how is the state funding
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our schools and our communities, because that's where it starts.
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So as I'm hearing this, I have the same experience.
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I lived in Maine all my life and I also have worked industries
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that really rely upon second homeowners.
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And so if you were to increase the taxes that dramatically on
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2nd homeowners, do you think there would be an impact on the
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businesses that are relying on those individuals to fund them?
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So I worked my way through high school and college.
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I won a an internship at Mount Desert Island Biological
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Laboratory when I was in high school and went on to be a
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research assistant there for several summers.
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And at 5:00, when others would go home, I would go to downtown
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Bar Harbor, where I'd work as a Subway sandwich artist, or I'd
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go wait tables at Country Cheers or work in the gift shop dancing
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deer or in the kitchen at Title Falls Lobster Pound.
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I worked seven days a week. And those seasonal industries
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are certainly really important to our economy.
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Meeting is vacation land and we are a destination for people
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from all over the world. I don't see that changing.
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I think with a different tax structure, especially with these
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folks from out of state who are paying cash for these
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properties, they can afford to pay their fair share.
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So we can put that money into healthcare into first time
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homebuyers programs for young Mainers who are who want to keep
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here right to work in in and grow our economy to fund our
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education. So there's educational
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opportunity for our kids. Maine can't just be a
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destination for vacationers. It has to be a place where
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working people, young people can stay and live and work and
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prosper. And that is at the core of my
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economic New Deal for Maine and my agenda as Maine's and ex
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governor. But how do you.
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Yeah, I think it's a really interesting idea.
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We're competing with all these other states.
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And it's not like there are these steel gates around Maine.
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What impact would doubling the property taxes on second homes
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have for people wanting to have a second home?
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I mean, why not just have a second home and.
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Michigan, can I clarify? Sure.
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Non residents, people from outside of the state.
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And you know what, it might reduce the number of people
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buying out Portland condos and apartments.
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And then there would be a place for young people who are trying
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to live here to be able to stay because those pressures to go to
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one in six main homes being a vacation home, that's created a
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real crisis in the housing market.
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And of course, we need to build more affordable housing, but we
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can build all of the housing in the world.
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And if folks just keep coming in from outside of our state and
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buying get out, young people in our state are never going to be
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able to afford you. You're listening to a Healthy
6:53
Conversation with Doctor Lisa Phil Island Doctor Jeff Barkin
6:55
on News Radio WGANAM 560 FM 98.5.
6:59
We've been talking with Jenna Bella's about her main roots and
7:02
her path through public service and and why she says this is the
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moment to run for governor. So I'm wondering with your
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biography, including rural Maine and national service, civil
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liberties work, legislative work, election administration,
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what different experience about these different experiences talk
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to you the most about what Maine people need from leadership
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right now? As Secretary of State, I've
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really been tested in a number of ways.
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I was the Secretary of State that ruled that Donald Trump was
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ineligible for the ballot because January 6th was an
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insurrection. And I was docs, my personal
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information placed online, threatened, swatted, a fake
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emergency call to law enforcement designed to bring
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law enforcement down on my home. And my husband and I had to go
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live in a safe house. And that every day in that safe
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house, I woke up and I drove to work to do my job as Secretary
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of State because I won't back down to bullies.
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And time and time again, when Trump's Department of Justice
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came after every Americans personal sensitive voter data, I
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was one of the first secretaries to say no, go jump in the Gulf
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of Maine. And then I recruited other
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secretaries to join me. We now have a coalition of 30
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states, including red states like Idaho and Kentucky and West
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Virginia, standing up for the sovereignty of the states in
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running the elections in protection of Americans voter
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data. So I've been a real leader on
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the national level as Secretary of State and we've been winning
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in court. And then most recently when I
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searched in name, they wanted undercover license plates.
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I run the Bureau of Motor Vehicles.
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And I said, no, we do not have secret police in a democracy.
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Now ISIS threatening to sue me. They just sent a letter last
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week and, you know, I've been tested.
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I'm ready for that. And I'm going to always stand up
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to defend Mainers and defend our communities.
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And I think that makes me ready on day one in a way that none of
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my competitors can say and. Given the polarization, it
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sounds like you know there's no I in team.
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How are you going to take that fighting spirit and apply it to
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the other side to work collaboratively?
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So I'll give you an example. Republicans, you know, tried to
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impeach me after the Trump decision in 2024.
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There was actually bipartisan support for keeping me in office
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as secretary. But I had a multi $1,000,000
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modernization initiative for the Bureau of Motor Vehicles.
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You know, as you said in your intro, I brought appointments to
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the BMV. We have new online services.
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You can get your REAL ID online. Just a few weeks ago, we
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launched a mobile BMV branch and a truck that can drive to
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veterans homes or senior living facilities.
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So I needed Republican support for my modernization plan.
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I went to the Transportation committee shortly after the
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impeachment vote. I put out my hand and shook
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hands with everybody, said, look, I know you didn't like
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what I did with Trump. I didn't really like the
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impeachment. But here, let's work on my plan.
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I've had unanimous Republican support for my budgets every
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single time. I got unanimous support for an
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election security bill that I brought last year.
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So I have a lot of experience in working with Republicans to get
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things done, and I'll bring that experience to the Blaine House.
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Yeah, I think that that's going to be so important.
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We live in such a polarized time, and we're going to talk
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more about that, no doubt, as the interview progresses later
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on, because getting along with people in this day and age, it's
10:01
like you're shunned if you do, which I think is toxic.
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Lisa and I are physicians, and we know that Healthcare is
10:07
delivered teams, not individuals.
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In politics, it seems as if the goal is to fight and all
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candidates are talking about what fighters they are.
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I want to hear about how you fight with others and when when
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you're fighting against the other team.
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Then you gave me a nice specific example.
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What about, from a policy perspective, something broader
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and broader arching, if you will, in taxation?
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So actually, I'm going to start with some of my policy wins.
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When I was in the state Senate representing a Trump district in
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my first term, Governor Le Page was in office, a Republican
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governor. I'm a Democrat, and I was in the
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minority in the state Senate. And I brought legislation to
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streamline licensing for medical providers, a bill supported by
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the Medical Association signed by Paula Page in my second term.
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You know, I'm very passionate about access to meals for kids.
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There should be no hungry children in our state.
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And in my first term, I had brought a bill to streamline the
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school lunch program to reduce stigma and increase access, and
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that had not made it through the finish line.
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So I brought it back and we were able in my bill to fund
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breakfast after the bell and modernize the application
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process for school meals. So I've been very successful in
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getting things done with teams of and some legislators from
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both sides of the aisle. Yeah, I think the most important
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thing right now in choosing our leaders really two things and
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even relates to the name of our show, Healthy conversation.
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One is healthy content, that is ideas, leadership ideas.
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That makes sense. That's not always easy thing to
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come to. And the other is a healthy
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process of dealing with other people.
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And that's something that I have found lacking these days.
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I I, I hear from people in the legislature, in politics how
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toxic it is and how they want to get out.
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Now more than ever, people are getting out of politics, but
11:51
you're getting in, Shanna Bellows, Democratic candidate
11:54
for governor of the state of Maine, here on A Healthy
11:56
Conversation News Radio WGAN. Don't go away.
11:59
We'll be right back. You're listening to A Healthy
12:17
Conversation with Doctor Lisa Belial and Doctor Jeff Bark in
12:20
the News Radio WGANAN 560 FM 98.5.
12:25
We've been talking with Shanna Bellows, Democratic candidate
12:28
for Governor here in Maine, and we end in the last segment
12:31
discussing process. Do you have more thoughts on
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that topic? I loved what you said about
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healthy process because I think that really is important.
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And when I was head of ACLU of Mean, we had to say no permanent
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friends, no permanent enemies, just permanent principles.
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And I worked on the campaign for Marriage Equality here in Maine
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for seven years as a member of the executive committee and as a
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Democrat. I actually spearheaded the
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formation of Republicans for the Freedom to Marry because we
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wanted to create a space at the table for conservatives who
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believed in the freedom to marry to be part of our campaign.
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And that ethic is something that I've brought to everything that
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I've done throughout my career, even after the ACLU Maine.
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I think it's really important that we bring everyone in.
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I recognize no two people are ever going to agree on
13:24
everything, but where do we find that common ground in those
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share principles? One of the things that you were
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talking about in the last segment that really struck me is
13:33
the difficulty of actually being a leader where you're having to
13:37
make unpopular decisions because not everybody is going to agree
13:41
with you as to the direction that you want to take.
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But I love that you're talking about this as a, let's not take
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it personally. Let's keep the, the space open
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so we can all show up in conversation.
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The, the way to do that, though, is can be really challenging.
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So and how do you open that space up for people and maintain
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a space where many voices can be heard at once and respectful
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way? The ACLU was a good training
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ground for that. I remember my first campaign was
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for civil liberties in the post 911 era and campaign against the
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Patriot Act. And I helped organize at the
14:17
National Library level, librarians and gun owners for
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privacy. And that was just a great
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opportunity to understand how you can bring people with
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diverse viewpoints together around a common goal.
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I've done that on reproductive freedom, on Internet privacy
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and, you know, carried that idea into the state Senate.
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You know, I remember in my second term, advocates in the
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recovery community working with people struggling with addiction
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came to me and said housing is really fundamental to the path
14:48
to recovery. But ME doesn't have any recovery
14:51
residences because we don't have that legal structure.
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So that was an issue that was completely nonpartisan.
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There were Republicans, independents in the room.
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I brought the bill, and now today we have 121 recovery
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residences. So I think to really tackle
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these big thorny challenges, we need to be willing to reach out,
15:11
but we also need moral strength and courage to do the right
15:15
thing. Now, I have received death
15:16
threats. In fact, when I told ICE they
15:19
couldn't have those undercover license plates, I got death
15:21
threats again. But it's really important to me
15:25
to not back down. And, and I think maybe because I
15:27
grew up without electricity or indoor plumbing until the 5th
15:30
grade, I always think about the most vulnerable among us.
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And you know, who doesn't have the privilege or the power to
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speak out and stand up. And I feel like it's really
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important to me to represent everyone.
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Yeah. I mean, that's that's quite a
15:43
message. And it seems that there are two
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fundamental dynamics that seem to separate everyone.
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And I'm going to lay it out and get your take.
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The first is and and this is totally not partisan, this is
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pretty geeky and it's to begin to marry some ideas to reality,
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go from aspiration to operation. I want to get your take on on
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this side. We have as a state 1.31.4
16:09
million residents. We're the oldest state.
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I think we're the first or second most rural competing with
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Alaska. We have what's called small
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fiscal capacity. We don't have a lot of
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millionaires to tax. We don't have a lot of big
16:23
companies to tax. We don't have multinational
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corporations like New York does or California or Texas.
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We don't have what's called a high fiscal capacity.
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We don't have the ability to take a lot of money in yet.
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There are a lot of things that we want to do.
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There are a lot of efforts we want to make, and those are
16:43
called fiscal efforts. My sense politically from where
16:48
I sit is that one of the schisms here in politics, and I myself
16:52
truly am not partisan, is different ideas over money,
16:58
different ideas over taxes, different ideas over how to make
17:02
life better. One idea, Democratic Party idea,
17:06
is to raise taxes. Another idea that I've heard
17:10
from other party, other people who are running for governor is
17:13
to lower taxes. How?
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By raising taxes or lowering taxes, changing taxes?
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Because as I understand it, there are a lot of taxes that we
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pay. There's property taxes, income
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taxes, there are taxes on sales, sales taxes, transfer taxes, all
17:28
of these taxes. But how do you fundamentally
17:30
marry the fiscal capacity, the amount of money that you can get
17:34
from the people or businesses to the fiscal efforts, the things
17:38
that US Mainers need or want? I love this question.
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I have a sweatshirt that says policy is my love language.
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And I always geek out around fiscal policy because budgets
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are moral documents. And I want to start with your
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bigger picture question around fiscal responsibility because
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I've been a nonprofit CEO, first at the ACLU of Maine, then
17:58
Learning Works here in Portland, and then the Holocaust and Human
18:01
Rights Center at Maine. And you always have to balance
18:04
your budget as ACEO. And then similarly, I ran my own
18:08
business for a short period of time for a couple of years
18:11
before I went into the state Senate.
18:13
And as Secretary of State, I have largely funded many of
18:16
these modernization initiatives by finding savings within the
18:20
Department of Secretary of State.
18:22
Now keep in mind the state budget is 12, over $12 billion,
18:28
and it's grown. The Republicans are right by
18:30
more than 70% in the last decade.
18:33
So and the legislature rarely sees most of the budget because
18:38
we follow an antiquated process called the baseline budget.
18:42
So the vast majority of those $12 billion just floats through
18:47
year after year without scrutiny.
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Given that I have been able to find sometimes between two and
18:53
$8 million a year in savings at the department, Secretary of
18:57
State, and my budget is about 80 million, I am confident that
19:01
digging into the $12 billion budget for the state is the
19:05
first priority for the governor. And this is where my experience
19:07
comes into play because I do think there's shared agreement
19:10
with Republicans and Democrats about the core priorities.
19:13
We need to be funding public schools so our kids have
19:17
opportunity to learn, right? We need to be taking care of our
19:22
seniors and people with disabilities.
19:24
And we need to support our rural hospitals, primary care
19:27
providers, birthing centers. Those are areas of shared
19:31
agreement. So your second question is about
19:33
tax policy. And I think that's important
19:36
too, because the challenge right now, you know, until this year,
19:42
carpenters like my dad was and home healthcare nurses like my
19:45
mom became at the very end of her career, we're paying the
19:49
same tax rate as millionaires until the legislature took steps
19:54
to change that with the millionaire's tax this year.
19:58
And I think that is wrong. And I think people get very
20:00
upset at the lack of fairness in our structures of spending and
20:04
in taxes. And that's, I think, a point of
20:06
unity. We've been talking with Shanna
20:09
Bellows about affordability, taxes, and what kind of future
20:12
Maine is trying to build for our workers, families and
20:15
communities. When we come back, we'll talk
20:18
about healthcare, aging, behavioral health, and what all
20:21
this feels like on the ground for patients, families, and
20:24
caregivers. You're listening to A Healthy
20:26
Conversation on WGANAM 560 FM 98.5 and on all the podcast
20:32
platforms and at healthyconversationshow.com.
20:36
Keep in mind you can always reach us at
20:38
healthyconversation@wgan.com. Welcome back.
21:06
It is a healthy conversation with Doctor Lisa Belisle,
21:09
myself, Doctor Jeff Barkin on News Radio, WGIM.
21:12
In studio, we have Shanna Bellows.
21:14
She is the Democratic candidate for governor in the primary.
21:18
Now in this segment, we're going to move into healthcare.
21:22
This is where policy becomes deeply personal.
21:24
Maine is one of the oldest states in the country and that
21:27
affects everything. Primary care, hospitals,
21:31
behavioral health, long term care, home care, family
21:34
caregivers and the healthcare workforce.
21:36
It's health which is one in six jobs.
21:39
Too many Mainers have insurance but still cannot get timely
21:43
care. Too many families are caring for
21:45
aging parents while raising children and working full time.
21:49
Rural hospitals and small practices are under pressure.
21:52
Inland Hospital in Waterville last year closed and behavioral
21:56
health needs often end up in emergency rooms because there is
21:59
nowhere else to go. Shanna Bellows If elected
22:02
governor of the state of Maine, how would you begin to just get
22:06
a handle on all of that? This issue is deeply personal
22:09
for me in a couple of ways, whether it was a basement or
22:14
kerosene lamps or genetic lack of the draw.
22:17
I have really bad asthma and emergency rooms and Ellsworth
22:20
and Blue Hill have saved my life and I believe deeply that no one
22:24
should be sick because they are poor or poor because they are
22:27
sick. We need universal healthcare for
22:30
all. And I will say my parents for
22:34
much of their working lives did not have access to health
22:38
insurance. My mother worked in the
22:40
greenhouse for 20 years at age 49.
22:42
No benefits, no health insurance.
22:45
At age 49 she thought I can't keep doing this manual labor and
22:49
not have health insurance. So she went back to school 1st
22:52
through adult Ed, then the University of Made at Augusta,
22:55
then the University of Made at Borno.
22:56
She became an RN and went in to nursing in Hancock County where
23:02
I'm from. And during the pandemic she was
23:04
a home healthcare nurse. So I have these personal
23:07
experiences in my own life where access to healthcare has been
23:11
life saving and where I've seen the challenges of lack of access
23:16
to healthcare. So I think on day one, it's
23:19
really important that our first budget do direct investment in
23:25
operating support for healthcare facilities across the state, in
23:30
rural hospitals, birthing centers, primary care practices,
23:34
and reproductive healthcare for family planning.
23:36
Because the payer system is completely broken.
23:40
And you know this better than I do.
23:41
I'm in the room with two doctors.
23:43
I'm intimidated a little bit giving your, your distinguished
23:46
careers, except what I've heard from folks around the state,
23:50
what I've heard from hospital CEOs and doctors and folks in
23:54
the profession is that when, you know, knee replacements are
23:58
adequately reimbursed, but births are not, you're going to
24:01
see the closure of birthing centers.
24:03
And how are we going to get young people to stay or to come
24:09
to our communities if they can't have a baby safely?
24:12
So this this is something that the next governor needs to
24:14
tackle. I have a lot of ideas on how to
24:16
do that. It's one of my top three
24:18
priorities. And I spent a lot of time
24:20
listening because there's so many solutions here in our
24:24
state, in our communities. Meds and ads, that's how people
24:28
choose where to live, where the schools are good and where
24:31
Healthcare is good. We have had, I think 4 and 10
24:35
birth units close within the past 12 months, give or take.
24:40
Ellsworth, Maine coast. Ellsworth, which is part of
24:42
Northern Light Health, is a high risk, imminent risk of closure.
24:46
It's on that list of, I believe four or five sort of critical
24:49
hospitals at that critical risk. Concretely, how would you do
24:53
that? Do you really think that a
24:55
universal single payer plan would work in Maine?
24:58
I have to share with you that I was in the world of Medicaid and
25:02
Mainecare, not just Maine, but multiple other States and
25:05
efforts in states including Vermont.
25:07
It it didn't work. So how would you do it
25:09
differently? How would you bring that ball
25:11
over the the finish line? We're at a moment that is
25:14
different from even 20 years ago.
25:16
And then I think there is shared support, including bipartisan
25:20
support for understanding that our system is broken and we are
25:23
already spending the money right in so many different ways.
25:27
And so I think step one is bringing stakeholders together
25:30
and that's one of main strengths as you well know, you can get
25:34
the players in a room together to talk about the approach.
25:38
We also need to bring in other states.
25:40
I think instead of going it alone, let's talk to like minded
25:45
states like Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire.
25:47
Minnesota. Minnesota.
25:50
We love Minnesota in elections, and we and in Minnesota are
25:52
always jockeying for #1 or number. 2 They have a lot of
25:55
people and a lot of young people.
25:57
And what happened in Vermont is Vermont tried to make a single
26:01
payer plan and it was sort of ideal political circumstances.
26:04
You had Bernie Sanders, I mean a democratic socialist senator.
26:08
You had Peter Shumlin, Democratic governor, but what
26:11
happened in creating what was called Green Mountain Health is
26:15
that the plan was designed, but the fiscal note, the actual cost
26:19
of it, was not done until the very end.
26:22
And by doing it, by kicking the can of how much is this going to
26:25
cost down the road, it would have led to an 11 1/2% tax
26:29
increase on every Vermont resident and an 11 1/2% tax
26:33
increase on every Vermont business, clearly making it,
26:37
even under perfect political circumstances, just not
26:41
feasible. So pooling with other states,
26:44
how would you approach other states?
26:45
How would you develop those relationships?
26:47
Because I believe, firmly believe that until every Mainer
26:51
has access to healthcare, it's not fair.
26:54
It's not right. We have to aspire and we have to
26:57
operationalize it, but we can't do it alone.
27:00
I couldn't agree more and I would bring the same approach
27:03
that I brought as secretary. I work really hard on those
27:07
cross state relationships, both in elections and at the bare
27:11
motor field. But talking about elections, for
27:13
example, we're one of the most serious moments for our
27:16
democracy, right? We're literally doing scenario
27:18
planning about how do we stop ICE from coming to our polling
27:22
places? How do we prevent federal
27:24
interference in our elections in 2026?
27:27
And so we're having those conversations with other
27:29
secretaries. We're in active litigation.
27:32
When I was a kid with a Bill of Rights on my bedroom wall, I
27:34
never dreamed that I would be in a case called USA versus
27:37
Bellows. But we are actively coordinating
27:40
and strategizing to move forward.
27:43
And so I think bringing that same approach showing up, I
27:47
chair a national working group on election security and cyber
27:50
security. Cyber security is one of those
27:52
incredibly complicated, incredibly costly issues.
27:56
A year ago, the feds eliminated funding to the states for our
28:00
election security and cyber security efforts.
28:02
So we had to work over six months together, create a shared
28:05
membership model. And this year we're standing up
28:08
the protections that previously the feds funded like a situation
28:11
room to protect our elections. And I know I'm going a little
28:14
bit off topic, but I use that to illustrate that I have the
28:18
experience already working with other states.
28:20
I'm really complex and critically important issues and
28:24
working with folks from red States and blue states.
28:27
Now I'm going to go really geek on you.
28:29
There are two big hospital systems in Maine and the second
28:32
largest, Northern Light Health, has a big debt, about
28:36
$678,000,000 in bonds. And last year they were sort of
28:41
caught paying bonds using a line of credit, which led to a
28:45
downgrade to junk status of their bonds.
28:48
The good news is that has been upgraded.
28:51
That's actually probably not news to most people.
28:54
It's a geeky thing, but it's an important thing that Northern
28:57
Light hospital debt is not considered junk, but hospitals
29:00
are on a precipice from a funding perspective.
29:03
How would you prevent them from closing?
29:05
Because this year and last year the failure passed the
29:09
supplemental budget led the state to curtail payments to
29:13
hospitals by 70%. For Maine Care now to give you
29:17
and listeners to sort of a sense of cash on hand, most healthcare
29:21
institutions, I was president of Tri-county Mental Health for
29:24
several years, don't have more than 9 or 10 days of cash on
29:30
hand. So when state government says,
29:33
well, we're not going to be able to pay full for 90 days, a lot
29:37
of places close, how are you going to work to prevent that
29:40
from happening? It's existentially killing us.
29:43
It is killing us and you're exactly right.
29:45
And we can start by paying the hospitals on time or paying them
29:49
upfront instead of after the fact.
29:51
The fact that hospitals in our state have to take a line of
29:54
credit to pay the bills that the state owes them is absolutely
30:00
insane. Yeah, I mean, we're the oldest
30:03
state, the poorest state. And the thing for people to
30:05
remember about hospital care is that 2/3 of the cost of hospital
30:10
care is paid for by the federal government from Medicare or from
30:14
state and federal government, which is a sort of blended
30:17
program for Maine care, which is Maine's version of Medicaid.
30:21
Technically, the program that to be eligible, one has to be poor.
30:26
So it's an income based program. The bottom line is for Maine
30:29
hospitals, it's really hard to make ends meet, so they have to
30:33
charge commercial health insurance companies a whole lot
30:36
more in order to make it so that they can keep the lights on and
30:40
pay the staff. I want to get your thoughts on
30:42
how to get to a place where every mayor can feel secure in
30:46
their healthcare, how to have good education and broadly your
30:49
vision for governor. We're here with Shanna Bellows.
30:52
It's a healthy conversation. News Radio, WGIN.
30:55
We'll be right back. You're listening to A Healthy
31:20
Conversation with Doctor Lisa Polian and Doctor Jeff Parkin on
31:23
News Radio WGANAM 560 FM 98.5. We've been talking with Shannon
31:28
Bellows about healthcare, rural strain, aging, Maine, and the
31:32
workforce required to care for people across the state.
31:35
Shanna, I love the story about your mother going back and being
31:39
educated at the age of 49 and becoming an RN.
31:42
And congratulations, because we need RNS.
31:44
We need all people on the healthcare team.
31:46
I've worked with many. It's a wonderful story.
31:49
So with that in mind, how can we think about education
31:53
differently to support our state's needs?
31:56
We need to completely rethink how we fund education because
31:59
we're balancing on the backs of property taxpayers and it's
32:03
really tearing communities apart.
32:05
You we see neighbor testifying against neighbor at school board
32:08
meetings and schools having to make tough choices.
32:11
Do they cut Ed tax and teachers or do they raise property taxes
32:15
or do they do both? And The thing is, whether your
32:18
third grade is 13, like mine was or 28 like my sisters was, you
32:23
still need a teacher. You still need the lights on.
32:26
And so those costs really need to be borne by the state in a
32:31
more significant way. So my education plan, my
32:33
education New Deal for Maine calls for the state to
32:36
dramatically increase investment in education, particularly
32:40
special education, English language learning, school meals,
32:45
which I'm very passionate about as a former free lunch kid,
32:48
school based health centers. When I was in the state Senate
32:51
in my first term, I teamed up with students in my district as
32:56
well as medical professionals to fight to protect the school
32:59
based health centers because Paul Le Page was going to
33:01
eliminate those in his budget. We saved them.
33:06
But the fact is many schools don't have a Health Center and
33:10
many schools don't have a social worker or mental health
33:13
counselor. We should have a mental health
33:15
counselor in every single school in the state to give, you know,
33:19
mental health care and preventative care, first aid to
33:22
our kiddos. So we also need to pay our
33:24
teachers more. I remember early on the campaign
33:27
trail, this dad told me about his daughter who's a teacher
33:31
married to a Carpenter. Like my dad was using the food
33:34
pantry to get by. And I thought that was an
33:37
anomaly. I, I was really surprised.
33:39
But then I toured schools. I spent a day in our shoes at
33:43
Stonington talking to teachers, being in the classroom.
33:47
And they showed me their food pantry and I said, oh, it's for
33:50
the kids. And later in the day, one of the
33:52
teachers took me aside and said some teachers use it too.
33:55
So I think the fact that teachers are having to use the
33:58
food pantry, teachers in this area are working second jobs.
34:02
They're leaving the school day and they're going to work at
34:04
Barnes and Noble or waiting tables or bartending during the
34:08
school year because they're not making it.
34:11
So that's why I think education needs to be a top priority.
34:14
I'm going to be an education governor for me.
34:18
Well, I appreciate your focus on that.
34:20
My mother was a teacher for many years in the Cumberland school
34:22
system and so I have a lot of love for people who go into
34:26
education. My other question relates to
34:29
your your father really and your mother who you said worked in a
34:33
greenhouse, your father was a Carpenter.
34:35
What about trades? What about how are we going to
34:38
educate people in the trades in the post secondary education?
34:41
World, this is extraordinarily important because it's part of
34:44
the housing crisis too is the cost of building.
34:47
And so part of my economic new Deal for me includes a Housing
34:51
Corps A2 year program like the Peace Corps or AmeriCorps that I
34:55
did, where we would bring people to work for the state as to
35:00
train them to be carpenters, electricians, plumbers, and
35:04
spend a couple of years fixing up falling down houses.
35:09
We know those dilapidated houses are in every community,
35:12
abandoned houses. Let's rehabilitate that housing
35:15
stock, get it back into the market with an affordability
35:17
lien on it and teach those young people skills.
35:21
But I also think as we think about supports in the schools,
35:24
we absolutely need to include the trades.
35:27
Bring back is what said many of my constituents in my state
35:30
Senate district would say. And I think.
35:32
That's really important too, because they're different
35:34
pathways for different students. Well, I, I think it's important
35:39
to recognize too, that people learn differently.
35:41
So in addition to what skills they can then bring to the
35:44
state, it also is how them, they themselves can evolve as human
35:48
beings. So if you have people who learn
35:51
by doing, if you have people who have more of an engineering mind
35:55
than a humanities, arts and science mind.
35:57
Really opening up the space so everybody can work at the
36:00
highest level of their ability. I love that.
36:03
And that's why arts and music is so important.
36:05
And STEM. And I will just tell you, when I
36:08
entered kindergarten at Hancock Grammar School, we were living
36:11
in the basement. I had a lisp and I was getting
36:16
free lunch, but I had free school based speech therapy,
36:21
great public teachers for Missus Johnston and kindergarten, you
36:25
know, up through Missus Layton in 8th grade.
36:28
And there's no question in my mind, but, but for the quality
36:33
public education at Hancock Grammar School in Ellsworth High
36:36
School, I wouldn't be sitting here with you today on this
36:39
radio as Maine's first female Secretary of State and
36:43
Democratic candidate for governor.
36:45
And so thinking through how do we support every child?
36:49
Because I could have had a very different experience if I hadn't
36:51
had that speech therapy, right? I speak for a living as
36:55
Secretary of State in some ways. And I do think making sure that
37:00
we're focusing those resources on the next generation, it's so
37:02
important. That concept of focusing
37:04
resources so important. When we settled in Maine in
37:09
1998, Maine was rated number six in education.
37:14
Public education this past year was rated 45th.
37:18
That's quite a difference. And yet we spend 3 times as much
37:22
per student, and that's adjusted for inflation.
37:25
There's this thing called the Mississippi Miracle, and it's a
37:30
program that cost the state of Mississippi.
37:32
I think they're the poorest state, basically nothing.
37:35
Are you, are you familiar with that program?
37:37
You're very. Familiar with the Mississippi
37:39
Miracle and and I do think that one of the challenges here in
37:44
our state is we are we have a $12 billion budget This is why
37:49
we chatted in the break. I support 0 based budgeting,
37:52
really digging into the details of the budget because I think
37:55
we're often spending money on the wrong things and we need to
37:58
put it into classroom instruction, put it into
38:01
training the next generation of teachers because we have teacher
38:04
shortages that stretch our teachers very thin.
38:07
And so my plan proposes A stipend for experienced
38:13
teachers, $10,000 for mentoring student teacher in the classroom
38:20
for a year, and also proposes A stipend for those student
38:23
teachers because I heard from folks, I heard from one Ed Tech
38:27
took her nine years to become a teacher because she was working
38:30
full time, going to school, trying to fulfill her
38:33
requirements. And so let's make it easier to
38:35
get more people into the classroom.
38:37
Let's focus on instruction in the classroom and let's dispense
38:44
for the things that are unnecessary.
38:45
I think we can do it. There is enough in the state
38:48
budget. Yeah, I, I hope so.
38:50
The other area is housing, and housing is a real blocker in
38:54
Maine. There's not enough housing
38:56
stock. It's hard for young people to
38:58
find affordable housing. It's hard for anybody to find
39:01
affordable housing. One idea I heard actually, it's
39:05
from one of your, your competitors on the other side,
39:08
which makes a lot of sense to me and I wanted to get your
39:10
thoughts on it. And no, it's not a thing on 0
39:13
based budgeting, which I think is a great idea just for our
39:16
listeners. 0 based budgeting, it's probably worth spending
39:19
like 30 seconds on, right? We're joking between breaks
39:22
about how geeky it is. But normally, like if you're
39:24
running a department and you're spending $1,000,000 on something
39:28
and you're doing budgeting next year, you'd say, well, we'll
39:30
spend the million plus percent inflation.
39:33
So let's say inflation's 10%. It's now 1.1 million and 0 based
39:38
budgeting. Shanna Bellows Governor, you
39:40
know who's running for governor of the state of Maine is
39:43
suggesting 0 based budgeting says, well, why make it a
39:46
million at all? Why not make it 0 and justify
39:49
the need? So this is the first time I've
39:51
heard a Democratic candidate actually come out and talk about
39:55
0 based budgeting. So thank you for doing so.
39:57
Fair enough. Absolutely.
39:59
That was a very fair characterization of my idea.
40:01
What's the housing idea? Because I my housing plan really
40:04
focuses on first time home buyers.
40:06
We need to go big on supporting our first time home buyers
40:10
because there are a lot of. Families that could build
40:13
equity, they could afford the mortgage, but they can't afford
40:17
a down payment. We also have a great program in
40:19
Greater Portland called that is supports renters.
40:24
Project Home supports renters by giving them the security deposit
40:28
first two months, last month's rent, providing wrap around
40:31
services to get them into stable and healthy rental housing.
40:36
That funding was extended just for greater Portland for just
40:39
two years. I think we should go statewide
40:41
with that program because we have a a small but really
40:45
vulnerable population of people who are unhoused in the state.
40:48
This is a solvable problem. So I think of course we need to
40:51
build more housing. My affordable housing plan would
40:54
also look at senior based housing, community based senior
40:57
housing, because if you're wealthy, there's some great
40:59
places to live when you retire. But if you're working class or
41:03
poor, we have a lack of senior housing that is community based.
41:07
And so folks stay in houses that are far too big for them that
41:11
could be opened up for the next young family if there was
41:14
somewhere for them to go. So those are a few of my ideas,
41:16
but. What is the idea?
41:17
The idea? It was an interesting idea.
41:19
I'm curious what your take is, is wouldn't it be interesting if
41:22
people who had low interest mortgages could sell them to a
41:26
buyer? So imagine you have an older
41:27
person who has a 2% or 2 1/2 percent interest rate on their
41:31
loan on their mortgage, being able to transfer that mortgage
41:35
to a new buyer. Because what is locking a lot of
41:38
people out of the housing market are high interest rates.
41:41
That is a fascinating idea and I think I'd be committed to
41:44
research and I think that in my department as Secretary of
41:46
State, one of the ethics in our department is that anyone is
41:51
welcome to share their input, right.
41:53
We, I meet with employees every quarter in labor management
41:56
meetings. And often times sometimes the
41:59
best ideas in terms of business processes, in terms of
42:03
modernizing some of the work that we did around electronic
42:06
lien and titling to make things more efficient for the car
42:08
dealers, getting rid of the fax machines that insurance
42:12
companies used to have to use to submit information to us.
42:16
Some of those ideas came from our employees, and I really do
42:19
think as governor that I will bring is boldness, but also a
42:24
fierce pragmatism, perhaps growing up as I did, a
42:28
hardscrabble in Hancock County and a commitment to getting
42:32
things done. So as we close out the show, I'm
42:36
wondering what is your hopeful vision from Maine 10 years from
42:39
now? What is the one thing that is
42:41
people are going into the voting booths that you hopefully
42:45
remember about Shanna Bellows? So of course I am the best
42:49
candidate to stand up to Trump in the short term, to protect
42:52
our democracy and to fight for manners.
42:55
But we need to think about the future of being right.
42:58
We need to think about five years, 10 years, 100 years down
43:02
the road where everyone can stay and live and work and prosper.
43:06
Let's make me the most affordable state in the nation
43:09
and a place that is great to start a business, start a family
43:12
and live a lifetime. Well, we really appreciate your
43:17
coming in here and talking with us today.
43:19
You're leaving us with a lot of really interesting information.
43:22
Jeff has not asked you to return.
43:23
If you are governor, we would like you to return.
43:25
I will come back as when I am governor.
43:28
I will come when you come back as governor.
43:31
We absolutely would love to have you back.
43:33
Since Jeff didn't ask, it put me on the on the spot to ask you,
43:36
but we're happy to have you back.
43:37
Today we've been speaking with Shanna Fellows, Democratic
43:40
candidate for Governor of Maine, on Healthy conversation with
43:43
Doctor Lisa Bile and Doctor Jeff Barkin on News Radio, WGANAM 560
43:48
FM 98.5 streaming, and all the podcast platforms.
43:52
You can also find us at healthyconversationshow.com and
43:55
reach us at healthyconversation@wgan.com.
43:58
Have a great week.