March 2011

A Trawler on the Portland Waterfront

By Carol McCracken  (Post # 742)

“I have tremendous respect for the crews and that’s why I’ve written this play,” said Cullen McGough recently.  “They don’t have access to power brokers.  There is no cohesive forum for their issues to receive the attention they should,” McGough  said at the Hilltop Coffee Shop last week.   He was speaking of the crews on trawlers  who go to sea to make a living under extremely  harsh circumstances.  Men get hurt all the time, said McGough.

McGough, a Hill resident, worked as a subcontractor for  the National Marine Fisheries Service, “NMFS”, for almost a year as an at sea monitor.   About 20 days of each month he went to sea with the crews of deep sea trawlers in the area - monitoring  the number of fish caught and then reporting those figures to his now former employer.  In mid-January, McGough returned from a particularly hard 10 day fishing trip. (Trips lasted anywhere from 1 to 10 days at sea.) There were big seas and  the crew and Captain on the trawler were not on the same page – it was a bad trip in every way. 

 McGough saw a poster calling for entries for the 10th Annual Maine Playwrights Festival presented by Acorn Productions.  He’d really had it with his job, and although he’d never written a play before, he decided to give it a try. Within hours, this Boston University liberal arts graduate, had a manuscript ready  to submit to Michael Levine,  Acorn Productions.  It was accepted. It’s a 30 minute play with four male actors in it and it takes place on the deck of a  trawler at sea.  “It’s about the tensions for fishermen between growth and sustainability,” said McGough.

This topic is an important  one in the press these days.     Ever since the implementation of the 2006 Magnuson-Stevens Act, fishing has become so much harder, partly because there are so many more rules to follow.   Because of his work as an at sea monitor,  for the NMFS, McGough wasn’t very popular with the crews either, which usually were composed of 3 – 5 men.  An intelligent and personable young man, the job was really getting him down.  “No one liked me because I’m an employee (subcontractor) of the NMFS,” he said. 

“The Last Fish in the Sea” is directed by Michael Levine and is part of Schedule A in the 10th Annual Maine Playwrights Festival for  2011.  The Festival is at the St. Lawrence Arts Center and can be seen on Thursday, April 14th at 7:30 pm – following which there will be a ”talkback” with McGough.  It can also be seen on Saturday, April 16th at 8 pm; Friday, April 22nd at 7:30 pm and Saturday April 23rd at 5 pm.

For tickets, please call 207 854-0065 or www.acornproductions.org

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By Carol McCracken  (Post # 741)

Over the weekend, the controversial  mural was removed from an alcove in the  Labor Department building in Augusta and put into storage.   No one in the Governor’s office would say where it is located  or why he decided to have it suddenly removed.  A spokesman from the Labor Department told mhn.com that the mural would not be removed until a new location had been found for it.

Adrienne Bennett, an assistant  press secretary said in a statement:  “The mural has been removed and is in storage awaiting relocation to a more appropriate venue.  Workers and employers need to work together to create opportunity for Maine’s  50,000 unemployed.  We understand that not everyone agrees with this decision, but the Maine Department of Labor has to be focused on the job at hand.”

According to a report in the “Bangor Daily News,” a Portland attorney, Jon Beal, of the Maine Peoples’ Voting Coalition questions whether or not the Governor has the authority to remove the mural from the state government building.  MHN.com is awaiting a return call from Beal.  His wife told MHN.com that all of the information in the article is not correct.

City Councilor David Marshall who with state rep. Benjamin Chipman, had been in contact with the Governor’s office last week over the possible relocation of the mural to the Portland city hall said this afternoon:  “I feel that the Governor has made the artist and the mural famous.  I don’t support the removal of this art work and I do support the legal challenge to the Governor’s authority to remove the mural.”

Please visit posts # 740 and #739 for more background information.

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Frances Perkins, (L), as Depicted in the Controversial Mural that Governor LePage has Banned from the Labor Department, Augusta

By Carol McCracken  (Post # 740)

Contrary to some local media reports that the relocation of the controversial labor mural that currently hangs in a small alcove in the Department of Labor, Augusta, to the Portland City Hall is a done deal is not correct, said Portland Mayor  Nick Mavadones last night.  We need to see what the residents of Portland want he added.

The controversy, which has made national headlines, erupted when an unknown source wrote Governor LePage and said that he found the mural,  focused on the history of Maine’s labor struggles to be inapproriately placed in the Labor Department building because it sends the wrong message to the business community.  LePage ordered the mural removed from the building. 

“I’d prefer to see the mural remain in Augusta, because it tells a big story about the history of the labor movement in Maine.  It’s not just a Portland  story,” said Mayor Mavodones.  “It’s much bigger.”  If the mural is about to be stored in a closet up there or something of that nature, that could be a different story, he continued.   “In that event, I’d like to see it on display in the Portland city hall, but on a temporary basis only.  It could travel to different locations around the state that share this labor history,” he said.

Portland had this “thrust” upon it by state rep. Chipman and city councilor Marshall because they’ve apparently been talking to the Governor’s office without my knowledge – in a well intended way the Mayor had no doubt.  “I’ve just not discussed the matter with either of them at all,” he said.  The Mayor expressed concern that the City might end up helping the Governor to solve a public relations problem of his own making. Mavodones said he has been receiving emails on the subject – of which most of them are opposed to moving the mural to Portland.

Public comment on the disposition of the  mural will be taken at the regularly scheduled city council meeting on Monday, April 4th.

Adam Fisher, communications director, for the Labor Department in Augusta, told MHN.com on  Friday that no decision has been made as to where the 36 ft. mural will be moved.  The mural will not be removed until a new location has been determined for it. Several non-profit organizations as well as the Frances Perkins Center, Newcastle, have expressed interest in displaying it. 

For more information, please visit FrancesPerkinsCenter.org and the previous post on MHN.com

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By Carol McCracken  (Post # 740)

Contrary to some reports in the media, the removal of the controversial mural from an alcove in the Commerce Street, Department of Labor, Augusta, to the Portland City Hall is not a done deal said Mayor Nick Mavodones last night.

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