Newsletter #11: Town Halls and the Town Square
The Audacity: Creative Action Together | AudacityCAT.com | Newsletter #11 | 4-10-25
Contents:
1. Update on our 75 Grievances and our Town Hall Invitations
2. Democracy in the Town Square: plans for Sat. April 12 and Sat. April 19
3. Visual Arts and a Brass Band
4. Making it Possible: Raising Resources
1. Update on Our 75 Grievances and Our Town Hall Invitations
75 Grievances: An Update
As you on March 1, we visited the Knox County Courthouse and noted 75 instances of actions taken by the Trump Administration since Inauguration Day. A member of The Audacity read each of the 75 grievances for which we'd peaceably assembled, and then the crowd responded: "You Work For Us! What Have You Done About It?"
We published our 75 grievances as of March 1 on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R53r77B4syc and also sent communication of the grievances to the offices of Representative Chellie Pingree, Senator Angus King, and Senator Susan Collins. The following are the responses from our members of Congress:
Rep. Chellie Pingree's Chief of Staff Jesse Connolly reached out to us, and in communication we agreed verbally that some response on each point would be helpful. Energy in conversation has shifted to the April 13 town hall in Rockport (see below). To date, no response to the 75 grievances has come from Rep. Pingree's office; we will follow up on this point following this Sunday's town hall.
Senator Angus King's office has only responded with a form letter unrelated to the 75 Grievances -- you can see the form letter response in Newsletter #9 archived at https://www.audacitycat.com/news/the-audacity-newsletter-9-saturdays-of-joy-outrage-in-augusta-town-halls-coming online. We have called Senator Angus King's office to follow up on this point but have not received a response.
Senator Susan Collins' office has not responded at all. We have called Senator Collins' office to follow up on this point but have not received a response.
Town Halls Update
As I shared in previous newsletters, 1,089 Mainers signed our petition calling for in-person town halls in Knox County with our three congressional representatives -- Rep. Pingree, Sen. King, and Sen. Collins. Folks signing the petition are overwhelmingly local, with 851 signatures from Knox County and 142 from adjacent Lincoln and Waldo counties. These are huge numbers given the small, rural nature of our Knox County communities.
The petitions were sent to all 3 of our members of Congress in early April with an explicit request for a town hall, with great flexibility. Our gracious invitation indicated a willingness to host a town hall any time of day or night during the two-week period in which members of Congress are in recess and are supposed to be spending time with constituents:
The following are the responses from our members of Congress:
Rep. Chellie Pingree's Chief of Staff Jesse Connolly promptly reached out to us to affirm that we'd have that town hall, and we will!
When: Sunday April 13 from 4-5:30 pm
Where: Camden Hills Regional High School, Route 90, Rockport
Format: Line up for microphones and ask your questions in real time
All free tickets for the 826-seat auditorium were snapped up within 24 hours! This is a good indication of vital local pro-democracy energy. If you weren't able to get a ticket in time, the town hall will be streamed on Rep. Pingree's YouTube page at https://www.youtube.com/user/CongresswomanPingree online.
Senator Angus King's office only responded with another form letter, entirely unrelated to the petition or our request, with no option to reply other than to make another communication. We have called Senator Angus King's office to follow up on the petitions but have not received a response.
Senator Susan Collins' office has not responded at all, except to say that they don't expect to even read the request soon. We have called Senator Collins' office to follow up on this point. We were told by a member of Senator Collins' staff on Tuesday, April 8 that "it's going to take a long time" for The Audacity to receive a response from Senator Collins' office and that "I can't say for certain that anyone has even looked at that message."
Despite the dismissive responses from both Senator Angus King and Senator Susan Collins, we're not dropping either the grievances or our petition for Knox County town halls -- this is an important test of the health of our democracy and an absolutely necessary element of representation during the current democratic crisis. We will continue to be civil but firm, giving our senators Look for more updates as the weeks move forward.
2. Democracy in the Town Square: plans for Sat. April 12 and Sat. April 19
The demonstrations on Saturday April 5 were wonderful -- we sent as many members of The Audacity to Augusta as we could to help drive up numbers for the media that provided coverage there -- and still we had our largest demonstration in Rockland yet.
We can't stop, and indeed we must increase our turnout to public demonstrations. It's an essential part of our work to show politicians and the public that We The People are determined, unafraid, robust in our exercise of constitutional rights, and steadfastly opposed to the wrecking of this country and the targeting of its most vulnerable people.
I know you're on board, so please come to these next two Saturday Noon events in Rockland (corner of Park and Maine) on Saturday, April 12 and Saturday April 19.
Some of you have been asking whether there's a plan -- given the #50501 social media channel's call for another National Day of Protest on April 19 -- to turn people out to Augusta. The short answer is no, and as a matter of fact the folks who organized the big April 5 Augusta protest told Maine organizers on a Signal chat recently that they need a break from hosting. This means the national day of action is going to occur with statewide actions in the big and small towns all over Maine, including our Rockland action.
When you come to Chapman Park in Rockland, do what you can to keep our community reputation positive... and it is positive! A few things to keep in mind:
There may come a time when we take to the streets, but we're not there yet; please stay off the street right now as much as you can.
Be sure to give folks passing through lots of space.
The occasional engine-revvers and swearers are looking to get a rise out of us; let's just ignore them as long as their provocations remain symbolic.
Finally, the Rockland Police Department would like to return the American flag that a member of The Audacity donated to replace the "Trump Train" flag; they've got the city's big flag flying again. If it was your U.S. flag sent up the pole, please write contact@audacitycat.com so we can get it back to you.
3. Visual Arts and a Brass Band
Not all of our activity is in the park on Saturdays. Some upcoming all-welcome events:
Visual artists have a production gathering at the Hope Library in the Hope Town Office this coming Sunday, April 13 from Noon to 2 PMish. Design a poster, a button, a banner, a scarf... get creative! The address is 441 Camden Road, Hope, ME 04847.
The brass band working group is small, but some of its members (including me) had a grand time in Augusta lending its energy to the big crowd there. We want to bring that energy back to Rockland. But in order to do that, we need more players. Do you play a brass or any other street-corner-friendly instrument, including percussion? Write contact@audacitycat.com and ask to join the group -- when we have enough, we'll start to schedule some rehearsals.
Other working groups are meeting and planning all sorts of good things -- to join a working group, please visit https://www.audacitycat.com/join-a-working-group and fill out the online form there. Your contact information will be shared with the folks who are organizing the working group you're interested in.
4. Making it Possible: Raising Resources
Finally, all this takes resources -- time, people, and supplies. We have more we want to do, but we're a group that has started from $0 and that up to now has squeaked by from passing the hat at meetings. I'm so pleased (let's hear it for Joe Ryan and Jessie Davis of the Fundraising working group for organizing this!) to announce that we now have a fundraising page to accept donations online:
https://www.audacitycat.com/donate
We're not going to be one of those groups that is constantly asking for cash, because your heart and voice and hands and feet are what really powers this movement. But if you've got a bit of extra dough, or if you can't make it to our public demonstrations and want to help in some other way, a donation would be really, really helpful. Consider:
$25 helps us buy sign-making material
$50 helps fund our button making and giveaway project to spread the word
$100 covers the rental cost for a community meeting space per meeting
$250 helps us keep our website, our primary communication tool, up and running
$500 would cover the cost of a yard sign order to make dissent residentially visible
$1,000 and beyond helps us invest in infrastructure (a permanent space, production equipment) to strengthen community and plan for the long term as we face an uncertain authoritarian future
As individuals, we simply can't resolve this nation's crippling crisis alone, and that's what made us despair in November, and made us hide in December, and made us cringe in January...
... but we are learning that as a community, if we all put in a bit of work together, giving each what we can based on our abilities and strengths and reserves and just a bit of sweat, together we can and will move mountains.
