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Michael Cianchette is a Navy reservist who served in Afghanistan. He is in-house counsel to a number of businesses in southern Maine and was a chief counsel to former Gov. Paul LePage.
Things are getting BANANAs in Maine. Yes, another acronym.
You’ve probably heard of NIMBYs: people who declare “Not In My Back Yard” when proposals come forth. The counter-reactionaries are YIMBYs, who say “Yes In My Back Yard” with some caveats.
BANANAs are those who say “Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone.” They are super-NIMBYs. So I’ll propose a new acronym: LIMEs. “Like Investment in Maine’s Economy.”
OK. Mine isn’t as catchy. And maybe it’s LIIME if you count the extra vowel.
There are lots of headline development proposals in Maine. One is in a Bangor neighborhood where a former basketball star wants to build a multitude of duplexes. Another is in Scarborough, where Amazon is looking to create a massive distribution center.
On the latter proposal, the local government has expressed a lot of interest and excitement at the possibility. The Portland Press Herald editorial board pooh-poohed the idea.
With the Bangor proposal, the neighbors have come out in force against it. Yet, at the same time, the city is considering rent control. Rents increasing is a simple economic consequence of demand outpacing supply. To bring rents down, more housing is needed.
Maine is changing. Maybe that is good, or maybe it isn’t. As with most things in life, it is probably a bit of both.
But we should focus on growing LIMEs rather than BANANAs.
One of the foundational principles of our nation is the right to private property. The Founders were inspired by philosophers like John Locke, who wrote about “inalienable” rights. For Locke, these included “life, liberty, and property.” Thomas Jefferson gussied up the words a bit in the Declaration of Independence.
A major policy area pushed by Democrats in both Augusta and Washington is the continued electrification of everything from heat pumps to vehicles. They justify this work in environmental terms. The misnamed Inflation Reduction Act is simply the newest gambit in that effort.
In order to advance that electrification, we need batteries. That is particularly true as we expand reliance on intermittent power sources like wind and solar. State-of-the-art battery technology relies heavily on lithium.
One landowning family hit the figurative jackpot, with lithium deposits on their Maine land exceeding $1 billion in value. They are probably pretty happy with Locke and Jefferson’s insistence on private property rights.
Yet, a couple weeks ago, it became clear that laws passed by the Maine Legislature have made mining that lithium economically unviable. The laws were pushed because people were concerned about the negative environmental impacts from mining.
When it comes to new investment in our economy — whether in the form of housing, mining, warehousing, agriculture, or countless other areas — the reflexive response should not be “no.” That does not mean throw reason to the wind. A massive new Amazon warehouse is going to have a very real impact on traffic, sewer use, and countless other public interests. Those should be considered and addressed.
But you can start from a place of private property rights. If someone owns a piece of property and they come forward with a proposal, the reception should be “how do we make things work?”
If we want electrification, we need lithium. If electric trucks are going to deliver online purchases to our dooryards, we need warehouses from which things can be shipped. If we want rents and home prices to go down, we need to have more housing available.
To bring those things to reality, the process needs to start with a cooperative – not combative – attitude. It needs people who Like Investment in Maine’s Economy.
So put a LIME in it and raise a glass to John Locke, Thomas Jefferson and the inalienable rights of life, liberty and private property.
