I’m not sure what the protocol is for this sort of thing, but I hereby proclaim today Adrienne Bennett Appreciation Day . . .
Bill Nemitz
Bill Nemitz has worked as a journalist in Maine since 1977, when he became a reporter for the Morning Sentinel in Waterville after graduating from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
He moved to Portland in 1983, working first as a reporter for the Evening Express and later as a city editor and assistant managing editor/sports for the Portland Press Herald and Maine Sunday Telegram. He began writing his column in 1995. While focusing on Maine people and issues, his work has taken him three times to Iraq and twice to Afghanistan, where he was embedded with members of the Maine Army National Guard and the Army Reserve; to Belfast, Northern Ireland, for the 1998 referendum on the Good Friday Peace Accord; to Manhattan for the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks; to the Gulf Coast for the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina; and to Haiti following the 2010 earthquake. Nemitz is a past president of the Maine Press Association and for many years taught journalism part-time at St. Joseph's College of Maine in Standish. He also served for eight years, including three as chairman, on the board of trustees for the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies in Portland. In 2004, the Maine Press Association named Nemitz Maine Journalist of the Year for his reporting on the Maine Army National Guard’s 133rd Engineer Battalion in Iraq. In 2007, he received the Distinguished Service Award from the New England Newspaper Association. In 2015, Nemitz was inducted into the Maine Press Association Hall of Fame. Nemitz lives in Buxton with his wife, Andrea. They have five children and four grandchildren.
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Bill Nemitz: Advice to men: Don’t be such boobs
Let’s be honest here: If a man happens upon a woman who is breast-feeding in public, it’s likely a no-win situation . . .
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Bill Nemitz: Future of ‘resort’ based on ‘best guess’
Of all the lines in Superior Court’s 10-page smackdown of the Oxford Casino and its chief enabler, the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, here’s my favorite . . .
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Bill Nemitz: Real Maine ingenuity lost in the din of fireworks
We in the media get press releases all the time. But two that landed in newsroom inboxes recently are worth noting — for entirely different reasons.
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Bill Nemitz: Mortified by a geyser of trash talk from Maine’s governor
LePage’s latest verbal eruption has us once again reaching for the sanitary wipes.
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Bill Nemitz: Referendum too crucial for words
Are you having difficulty understanding this question? Don’t feel bad. The first seven words of this column register a Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level 14, meaning you have to be a college sophomore to truly grasp what you just read. Or how about this question: Do you want to allow same-sex couples to marry? Goodbye college, hello […]
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Bill Nemitz: Freedom in action stuns new arrival
Tuesday was an election day? Anicet Bavumiragiye couldn’t believe it. “Really?” he said, eyes wide, over coffee at a local bagel shop. “It’s so quiet!” Meaning Portland, Maine, in more ways than one, is a far cry from Burundi, Africa. He’s one of 100 to 300 Burundians who live in Portland, depending on whose estimate […]
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Bill Nemitz: Thank you notes to vets are musician’s calling
To her neighbors, Carla Beaudoin is the friendly woman in her 50s who works 37 hours per week at Hannaford. But this isn’t about Carla’s day job . . .
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Bill Nemitz – Error: 28 centsIntact family: Priceless
They call it the straight-face test. And Tuesday afternoon, just in the nick of time, the powers that be at Portland City Hall passed it. “I can’t believe it! I’m just so happy right now!” said Christina Shaw upon hearing that her day in court against the city’s Health and Human Services Department – over […]
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Bill Nemitz: Adoptive father finds no sense, only pain
We first met him in this space on the day before Thanksgiving way back in 1998 — a shy, smiling 9-year-old refugee from Maine’s foster-care circuit whose wildest dreams had just come true: He had a new mom and dad. He had a new home, a new neighborhood, a new school. He had, for the […]