As they work to bring the Legislature back into session, House Speaker Sara Gideon and Senate President Troy Jackson are doing right by Maine’s people. We are 100 days into the public health emergency, and we’ve learned a lot about our state. Mainers have great capacity to pull together. Our spirit of cooperation prevented a surge that could have overwhelmed our hospitals and caused greater loss of life.

We know more, too, about Maine’s vulnerabilities. Many front-line workers lack access to medical care and resources to quarantine when sick. We have the nation’s worst racial disparity in coronavirus cases. Remote learning revealed inequities at every level of education. Too many Mainers lost jobs, income and health insurance, and our support systems haven’t adapted quickly enough to meet the need.

Legislators have been helping our constituents with all of these issues since adjourning, but our role as legislators is also to establish public policy. We can now shift our approach from emergency response to enacting significant measures that address the root causes of these vulnerabilities.

We must increase workplace protections and remove health care barriers, especially for Mainers in low-wage jobs. We need to allocate federal coronavirus response funds and other resources to decrease cases in Maine’s communities of color. Working alongside the administration, we must prioritize safely returning teachers and students to classrooms to meet children’s educational and social needs and allow parents to return to work.

Together, we can set a strong course through this emergency and Maine’s rebuilding process.

Anne Carney

Democratic state representative; candidate, Maine Senate District 29

Cape Elizabeth

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