Fuel coalition’s efforts hard work, but fruitful

SKOWHEGAN – For Belinda Raymond, founding and steering the Coalition to Lower Fuel Prices in Maine has been a learning – and teaching – experience.

She and her husband, Al, knew little of politics when they formed the coalition last month, and at the same time, state leaders knew little about the state’s trucking industry. So the Raymonds have been teaching state leaders about trucking and forestry while also absorbing lessons in politics.

The Raymonds and other coalition members are circulating petitions, working the phones, mail and Internet chat forums such as asmainegoes.com, and holding meetings around the state to increase coalition membership. The most recent meeting was held last weekend in Skowhegan, drawing about 125 people.

Their activism doesn’t pay the bills. Yet considering that the Kingman couple formed the coalition about a month ago and already have secured from the state legal action and legislative promises that may create millions of dollars of relief for the state’s $11.5 billion forest products industry, it has been an astonishingly quick and productive process.

It also has been an all-consuming, constant grind fueled by passion and occasional results.

“An exhausting education, that would be the best way to describe it,” said coalition member Larry Sidelinger, referring to the political process.

“I am amazed at the tortoise pace that it takes,” he added. “Everything has to be ‘politically correct,’ so to speak. Everything is slow, methodical, and time is of no essence to a politician. I just don’t see a sense of urgency.”

“Our house is no longer our house,” Belinda Raymond said. “So much of what we have has been given over to this process. You know how people at this time of year go to the mailbox and say, ‘Yay, I got a Christmas card’? With me, it’s ‘I got more petitions!'”

Political lesson No. 1: Decisions are made by those who show up. Lesson No. 2: Numbers, not rhetoric, make the wheels turn. Detailed statistics are gold in politics. That’s why the coalition seeks answers to these questions:

. How many independent truckers are in the state?

. How many truckers have lost, parked or sold their trucks because of high diesel prices or been forced to drive for another firm?

. In what ways do rising diesel fuel prices affect state businesses?

. What other industries, statewide or nationwide, should the coalition reach out to?

The coalition needs those answers to bolster its case for more aid for state truckers and to broaden its membership to anyone affected by high energy costs, they said. Members ask anyone who has answers to contact the Raymonds at 765-2023 and Sidelinger at 563-1692.

The numbers define a base that state leaders can address. They create a balance against which state efforts, and the expenditure of state funds, can be measured. In politics, a dollar spent to help 100 people is usually better than a dollar spent on one.

And efforts to aid the state trucking industry, particularly independent logging truckers, are pioneering in Maine – unlike, for example, aid to home heating oil recipients, which is channeled through established pipelines such as the federal Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program.

Other, better-organized industries have lobbyists, regular conventions, newsletters and Web sites funded by dues-paying members.

The Raymonds readily concede that they don’t do it alone. Their partners and thank-you list includes Sidelinger, Jim and Sherry Bacon of Mercer, and the Professional Logging Contractors of Maine association. Among state leaders it includes Gov. John Baldacci, State Office of Energy Independence and Security Director John M. Kerry, and state Sen. Elizabeth Schneider, D-Orono.

“You would think that it’s an easy thing to do,” Belinda Raymond said, “but it isn’t. It takes time to educate people.”

Schneider said she hopes the Raymonds and other coalition members see that state government works and that people in it care.

“What you need is the will to struggle and to fight, and they have that, absolutely,” she said. “They have the passion and understand what’s at stake. When you believe that you cannot change a system, you fail to lead, and they are succeeding.”

The coalition’s passion and ambition power its main goal, Belinda Raymond said: the 120-day repeal of the state fuel tax, which would drop diesel prices about 29 cents a gallon. State leaders have resisted the idea, fearing it would cost the state about $2 million a month, but she has hopes.

“That,” Raymond said, “would be our home run.”

Nick Sambides Jr. may be reached at nsambides@bangordailynews.net or 794-8215.