BANGOR – Maine’s first lady Mary Herman will launch Penobscot County’s Raising Readers program Wednesday, Dec. 13 at Eastern Maine Medical Center’s Family Practice Center. Herman, wife of Gov. Angus King, will speak about the importance of childhood literacy and will distribute the first Raising Readers books to children beginning at 11:30 a.m. at the center, located in the EM Healthcare Mall at 750 Union St.

Funded by the Libra Foundation, the Raising Readers program will distribute more than 160,000 books per year to Maine Children at a cost of approximately $1 million. The program will be offered through hospitals, rural health clinics, physician practices, and public health programs that provide well child care. The program will be pilot tested in Penobscot and Cumberland counties for a year before it is expanded to the rest of the state.

Raising Readers will provide advice to parents about reading aloud to their young children along with books carefully selected to stimulate young minds. Parents of newborns will receive two books before leaving the hospital or upon a home birth or adoption. Thereafter, children will receive books at their regularly scheduled well child visits at 2, 4, 6, 9, 12, and 18 months and at annual checkups from ages 2 through 5.