John Baldacci served as Maine’s governor from 2003 to 2011. He led the effort to establish the state’s community college system in 2003. John McKernan was Maine’s 71st governor from 1987 to 1995. He has served as chair of The Foundation for Maine’s Community Colleges since its inception in 2010.

Making the Maine Free College Scholarship permanent for the high school graduates of the Class of 2026 and beyond delivers on a promise the two of us made decades ago — and maintained since — to keep a community college education affordable to as many Mainers as possible.

Now Gov. Janet Mills is working to secure that same promise for future generations, by making permanent the Maine Free College Scholarship. Her plan invests $10 million in state funds annually to guarantee recent high school graduates in Maine a tuition-free community college education. It is a sound and profound decision.

If passed by legislators in Augusta, the investment will pay off for not just for students and their families, but for the state’s coffers in the form of more tax revenue, for local businesses in the form of more skilled labor available and for communities that will have more vibrant, engaged and employed residents.

Already, more than 23,000 Maine Free College Scholarship-eligible students have participated since the last-dollar scholarship program began in 2022.

The two of us have worked tirelessly, and across party lines, over the past quarter century to evolve the community colleges. As public leaders, we are partners in helping the state’s public two-year colleges find and secure the resources and tools they need to fulfill their state-ordered mandate of creating the educated, skilled and adaptable workforce Maine needs to fill jobs in Maine’s economy.

That was the vision when Gov. Baldacci led the effort to evolve what were then vocational technical colleges into a true community college system that expanded its academic offerings and offered an affordable pathway to four-year colleges.

At the same time, Gov. McKernan started his tenure as chairman of The Foundation for Maine’s Community Colleges, leading fundraising and making connections to strengthen the colleges. To date, the Foundation has raised over $147 million in support of the colleges’ programs, infrastructure, and scholarships — and the Maine Free College Scholarship will allow those philanthropic and grant dollars to stretch even further.

As a state, we committed long ago to making local, affordable access to quality postsecondary education a priority in Maine. Despite having the lowest tuition in New England, affordability remains one of the greatest barriers to higher education for Mainers. Making the Maine Free College Scholarship permanent is the logical, practical and necessary next step to true affordability.

We now applaud and welcome Gov. Mills into our mutual efforts to keep growing and strengthening Maine’s community colleges and making sure they remain affordable and accessible to the largest number of Mainers possible.

We urge today’s lawmakers to support this economic engine for Maine, giving young people the opportunity to pursue a tuition-free degree — while knowing their state believes in them and their potential.

Fewer visitors came to Maine last year, but those who did spent more than $9 billion in the state.

The Maine Office of Tourism reported there were 14.15 million visitors in 2025, down 4.4% from the year before. Visitors last year spent $9.37 billion, up 1.4% from 2024, according to the agency’s annual report. That number is not adjusted for inflation, Deputy Director Hannah Collins said.

“While overall visitor counts declined, those who did travel tended to stay slightly longer, travel in larger parties, and demonstrate strong spending patterns,” the report said. “This dynamic contributed to total direct spending growth despite fewer arrivals.”

The state conducted more than 4,600 interviews online and in person with visitors at local attractions, parks, hotels, visitor centers, service plazas, shops and other destinations between December 2024 and November 2025 to reach its findings.

So who came to Maine, and where did they go?

Here are four takeaways from the report.

MANY VISITORS WERE ALREADY HERE

Most people drove from the East Coast, although more flew in 2025 than in 2024. Nearly 20% of visitors came by plane, mostly to the Portland International Jetport or Boston Logan International Airport. That percentage has been steadily increasing in the years since the COVID-19 pandemic, the report says. In 2022, just 13% flew.

The state found that more than 80% of visitors to Maine last year came from 16 U.S. states and Canadian provinces. According to the report, 15% of visitors came from Massachusetts. New York and New Hampshire were also high on the list.

Which was the top state? Maine.

Nearly 20% of people, or 2.9 million, counted as visitors last year were residents exploring the state. That’s more than double the number of people who live in Maine because the report counts single trips, not unique visitors.

MANY WERE RETURN VISITORS

Nearly 40% of visitors had been to Maine more than 10 times, the tourism office said. Many return to the same region on every trip. The data shows that 18% of visitors were traveling in Maine for the first time last year. An overwhelming majority — 95% — said they definitely or probably would return for another vacation.

THERE WERE FEWER CANADIAN VISITORS

A sign on a motel in Old Orchard Beach welcomes tourists back in both English and French in February 2025. The town hosts a large number of Canadian tourists each summer. (Gregory Rec/Staff Photographer)

International travelers account for a small percentage of Maine’s overall tourism.

Less than 5% of visitors came from other countries in 2025, according to the report. Most — 3.6% — came from Canada. That number is down from 2024, a drop attributable to political tensions and economic pressures. In 2024, 5.4% of visitors came from Canada.

A GREATER PERCENTAGE WENT INLAND

Popular regions to visit last year included Greater Portland, the Midcoast, the beaches and islands. More than a quarter visited Down East Maine, including Acadia National Park.

Still, inland regions saw a small increase in their share of visitors, the report shows.

In summer 2024, 3% of the state’s visitors went to Aroostook County, 9% went to the Kennebec Valley and 16% went to the lakes and mountains. Last summer, 7% went to Aroostook County, 12% went to the Kennebec Valley and 20% visited the lakes and mountains.

Across the state, most people said they came to Maine to relax and unwind, the report says. The most popular activities included enjoying ocean views, eating lobster and other seafood, sightseeing, visiting local breweries, driving for pleasure and hiking.

Stephanie Cotsirilos lived in the Bangor area for 17 years and now lives in Portland.

I never thought I’d draft legislation, but after I witnessed Maine voters being intimidated in 2002, I did. A year after the bill passed, Shenna Bellows met me for lunch to tell me how she and her ACLU colleagues were making sure the new voter protections were followed. At that restaurant table, I recognized something at Shenna’s core: her conviction that, without access to the ballot, we lose all our other rights.

She acts on that truth even when it’s personally risky. Maine and the nation have witnessed her weathering attacks, then returning to Mainers’ needs. Now, when we rely on states as bulwarks against federal aggression, she will be the courageous and compassionate governor we need, in part because she remembers what happened in 2002.

That year, I was a volunteer voter protection attorney in Orono. I watched both familiar
and unidentified persons at the polls challenge, on the spot, UMaine students’ right to cast a ballot. By dinner time, the challenges occurred once every minute. All voting stopped. The voter’s name was announced aloud. Students flushed red and turned on their heels to leave rather than be called out publicly for having done nothing wrong. Poll watchers began documenting each challenge.

Another lawyer showed up to help witness the three Orono polling sites. The Secretary of State’s office was on notice. Finally, I filed a written complaint with an elections warden. Still, the harm was done. That election yielded more challenged Maine ballots than in the prior decades combined.

Having seen what voter suppression looked like, some Orono residents who’d participated in the challenges apologized. At the time, however, Maine law permitted polling-place challenges without evidence, simply by asserting lack of “residency.” Some folks believed that the Maine Constitution prohibits all students from voting where they go to school. But that’s not accurate.

While the Maine Constitution says students aren’t entitled to vote in a municipality solely because they go to school there, Maine statutes clearly state that neither can students be prohibited from voting where they attend school — as long as they meet age, citizenship and residency requirements like anyone else.

So after the election, my town colleagues and I gathered data, researched and drafted the current voter challenge law. It allows a person to exercise her right to challenge someone she believes is unqualified to vote at a polling place — as long as she signs a sworn affidavit that identifies herself as challenger, the person challenged and the reasons and source of information supporting the challenge. 

Passing a law is one thing, though. Following it is another. Shenna and her colleagues ensured that the new law was followed, resources like Maine Students Vote have emerged and unjustified polling place confrontations have fallen dramatically. 

Fast forward to now. Shenna’s a leader among nationwide secretaries of state with whom she closely collaborates — refusing to give away our private voter information to the federal government and resisting presidential executive orders seeking to illegally federalize elections.

As she’s explained on national media, under the United States Constitution elections are
managed by the states — with adjustments, if proper, to be made by Congress, not the executive. Meanwhile, Shenna’s instituted online voter registration and, in furtherance of civil rights, paused issuance of undercover Maine license plates to ICE in light of its lawless tactics.

Shenna routinely obtains bipartisan support for her work and was elected — three times — to the Legislature from a Trump district because she cares authentically about her neighbors’ needs, like property tax relief, and does something about them. 

In short, Shenna champions our ability to govern ourselves, to pursue our values and economic well-being in Maine as we see fit. She knows that all those things — and our democracy — depend on our making choices in the voting booth without fear of intimidation.

Because she’s fought for such foundational freedom all her life, and fights for it now, I’ll
rank Shenna my first choice for governor on June 9.