Growsmart Maine

Thought leadership: Growsmart Maine is the thought leader and voice for smart growth solutions throughout the state. Our overall goal in this work is providing communities with the tools and guidance to be proactive and to improve municipal and regional planning processes. Our strategies in fy22 included: - development and promotion of community guides, including a new version - regional collaboration for climate action- and an updated guide "historic preservation - an economic opportunity" - Maine smart growth awards has become an annual highlight of our summit, as we recognize projects, plans, and people with distinctive connections to advancing smart growth in Maine. - smartinis: the Maine alliance for smart growth hosts occasional smartinis networking events, and did so at the portland observatory in july 2021, highlighting the historic nature of portland's waterfront. - e-newsletters were provided to our email list of 3400 interested parties. In fy22 we provided smart growth updates in this way.

Advocacy: our overall goal in advocacy is to support comprehensive policies and funding for smart growth. The outcomes of our advocacy work are that: development supports mitigating the effects of climate change land use regulation is equitable, sustainable, and resilient communities are fiscally sustainable while providing amenities, including affordable and responsible housing and transportation choices our primary advocacy work is at the state level, much of it in collaboration through the Maine alliance for smart growth and the Maine broadband coalition, with focus on the following policy areas: -affordable housing -broadband -climate and energy -equity -historic preservation -land use planning -transportation one recent bill of particular note, ld 1240 was developed based on discussions within the 2020 summit and resulted in creation in 2022 of a commission to increase housing opportunities in Maine by studying land use regulations and short-term rentals, demonstrating the integration of our three programming areas.

Convening to action: Growsmart Maine leads smart growth-related community engagement to build a stronger and more diverse smart growth network. -smart growth webinars are recorded and posted on our youtube channel. In fy2022 these were: ofebruary 2022: exploring the infrastructure investment and jobs act oapril 2022: the gorham spur: spurring growth without spurring sprawl -annual summit: turning climate action into economic opportunity: smart growth guidance for Maine communities. With attendance of 161 at our in- person locations and virtually, we hosted dr. devashree saha, senior associate, world resources institute and kate dufour, director of federal and state relations, Maine municipal association to address conflicts and opportunities for Maine's diverse regions, iconic industries, and economies to ensure lasting positive impact from recent federal initiatives while activating our new climate action plan and 10-year economic plan. Outcomes of this event include: oin-person networking and connections and statewide information sharing obased on the regional breakout sessions and follow-up forum, Growsmart Maine created and shared a new community guide: regional collaboration for climate change, as noted in thought leadership.