Every corner of Maine harbors intense sparks of desire, determination, and vitality.

To harness that energy and promise, Maine needs a vision that we can share and believe in, a government we can trust, and a governor who has the courage, the experience, the temperament, and the independence to lead the way. I welcome the challenge of leadership. Ill make the tough choices and do the hard work that is required of a leader. I have worked hard my whole life from cleaning cooking vats in a hospital kitchen, to building roads and parking cars, to working with Ed Muskie and President Carter, to building law firms and successful companies. My grandfather was an immigrant peddler who arrived alone and penniless in Bangor when he was 12 years old. He spoke no English. He began his life in this country by walking on the Airline (Route 9) from Bangor to Calais and back, selling notions to folks who lived along the road. Through hard work, grit, and determination and with help from a family who took him under their wing he started a business, got married, and had three daughters, who all graduated from college and the oldest of whom was my mother. My grandfathers story is a story of opportunity, and for me equality of opportunity is what this campaign is all about not just opportunity for the lucky, but opportunity for every man, woman, and child in Maine. We cannot guarantee success for anyone, but we must guarantee opportunity for success to everyone. Opportunity should be the product of deliberate policies and practices, not the random consequence of birth. Opportunity for all Mainers should be what the leaders of our state work to achieve and indeed it is what we can achieve, if we have a vision, a plan, and a strategy. My background makes me uniquely poised to lead this effort. As a public servant, I helped craft Americas foundational environmental laws and managed the policies and budgets of federal energy, natural resources, science and environment agencies. As a strategist and lawyer for governments, business corporations, and citizens groups, I helped clients grapple with worldwide legal and public policy problems during a career in three law firms and two countries that spanned more than 35 years. As an active entrepreneur, businessman, and investor, I have started and managed successful businesses, served on the boards of directors of private and public companies, and advised and managed private and public philanthropic organizations. I hope you will read the book I spent much of the last year writing, A State of Opportunity: A Plan to Build a Healthier, Smarter, Stronger, Younger and More Prosperous Maine. The book details my plans to lead Maine forward and is available for free download on our campaign website, http://www.eliotcutler.com. I would welcome the opportunities to meet with you to discuss the issues of most importance to the union and to work with you to return Maine to a path of vitality and prosperity for all.

1. Describe your philosophy in regards to public sector services and government-funded programs. Maine people deserve a government that is responsive, efficient, and creative. I intend to lead a state government that is smart, entrepreneurial, and effective, paid for with taxes that are fair, equitable, and efficient (see answer to question #2). My philosophy starts with the social contract that binds us all together. I worry as I have said in speech after speech over the past several years about the growing inequities that no political slogan can hide, and about how Maines bedrock values of fairness and opportunity too often are ill served today. Great value remains in the notions of common goals and mutual enterprise, where burdens, obligations, and rewards are fairly shared. Government policies ought to enable, not inhibit, real opportunities for each of us to make the most of our respective talents and should encourage us to pursue those opportunities. That is how public sector services and government programs serve Mainers best. Delivering public services in efficient and cost-effective ways does not need to mean and does not have to come at the expense of our civic culture. If we are smart about it, we can strengthen and enhance the vitality of communities while we improve and make more efficient the delivery of government services in ways that end up costing us less. It is important that the delivery of public sector services is executed in the context of positive, forward-looking leadership, and strategic vision and planning. Experienced public sector leaders and employees should be engaged in this effort. 2. Please explain your position on tax reform, tax breaks, and the general question of generating revenue. What will be your primary approaches to balancing the State budget? First and foremost, we all need to acknowledge that we must increase the overall level of economic activity in the State of Maine. Otherwise, it wont matter much what our tax structure or rates are, because 10% of zero and 5% of zero is still zero. My priority is increasing net incomes across the board for all Maine people. We can do this by broad reforms in our tax structure (including reducing the burden of property taxes), by reforming health care, by investing in a serious and sustained way in education, our competitive advantages and our infrastructure, and by developing an umbrella Maine brand that can be an enduring economic driver even in challenging economic times. Picking out one element of tax reform as a symbolic exercise is no substitute for a vision, a plan and a strategy. We need to reform Maines tax structure in ways that will help us leverage our competitive advantages, create and protect opportunity, and grow our economy. Standing between Maine and sustained economic growth, more jobs and shared prosperity is an outmoded, inefficient, highly regressive, and unfair tax structure. Our whole tax structure needs to be overhauled to make it more fair and sustainable. Tax breaks should be treated and justified like any other expenditure. We need to examine all tax breaks to ensure that they are fair and result in long-term economic development for Mainers. Each year we effectively spend hundreds of millions of dollars that are not collected because of tax breaks, deductions, and credits. That backdoor spending isnt mentioned in the governors budget proposal, and the legislature does not consider and appropriate the money in the

biennial budget; but those tax breaks increase the tax burden on taxpayers on a dollar-for-dollar basis. That kind of off-budget spending might be tolerable, if we were confident that all of those tax breaks were accomplishing important objectives!but we cant be confident, because we just dont know. Many of those tax breaks were enacted years ago for purposes that seemed important at the time and that perhaps we could then afford. But for the most part, theyve been on autopilot; most have never been closely evaluated to see if theyre still working, still needed, and still accomplishing their goals (if they ever did). They should be identified in our budget as expenditures that we have chosen to make. The path to prosperity for Maines economy is to leverage our extraordinary combination of hard working people, natural resources, location, and quality of life. We should invest in a serious and sustained way in the development of an umbrella Maine brand that can be an enduring economic driver even in challenging economic times. A focused effort to leverage Maines competitive advantages can generate jobs and increase incomes. Our future growth will be driven by the manufacturing and research sectors, agriculture, tourism, and the arts. Further, wise decisions about capital investments choosing among compelling needs for spending on infrastructure repair and human capital development will require a capital budget and a capital budgeting process. Well-run businesses have capital budgeting processes, and so should the State of Maine. A focused and strategic effort to leverage Maines competitive advantages will generate jobs and increase incomes, and the members of Maines unions ought to support me as the candidate for governor who has the broadest experience, the most developed skills, and the staunch independence to lead the way in that effort. 3. With the passage of national health care reform, what is your strategy to implement reform measures in our state, and to ensure that affordable health care is available to Maine's working families, including state and publicly financed workers? Whether they are old or young, employed or unemployed, whoever they are and wherever they live, all Mainers should have a medical home and access to primary and secondary preventive health care because it is the right, fair and morally responsible thing to do and because it is the financially and economically smart thing to do. With universal access to essential health care services, Maine can muscle down our health care costs while staying in the top tier of Americas healthiest places and making Maine more competitive as a place to live and to work. Lower health care costs will be a big part of the turnaround in the Maine economy under my administration, easing the burden of crushing premiums and creating jobs and opportunities for Maine workers. As I explain in A State of Opportunity, we need to apply traditional Maine concepts of value and innovation to our health care system. The ACA has provided an extraordinary opportunity for us to innovate with healthcare delivery organized around Maine's not-for-profit hospitals and community health centers not around health insurance companies and with rewards and incentives for consumers' healthy lifestyles and caregivers' cost-effective performance. We missed a significant opportunity when Governor LePage vetoed the bill to expand the pool of those eligible for MaineCare earlier this year and when he rejected the opportunity or Maine to design its own health exchange and probably

about $100 million to do it. Nearly 70,000 low-income Mainers were expected to have qualified for access through the expansion at relatively low cost to the state. The federal governments obligation to cover the costs of newly qualified individuals would have remained at 100% for three years and then been reduced gradually to 90% in 2020, while it currently reimburses the state only 64% of the cost for current MaineCare recipients. Maine lost about $600 million in that bad bargain. My plan will provide essential health care services for all Maine citizens, including public sector workers, at a cost that we can afford and that can be sustained. We will focus on keeping people healthy, so that we are not just paying for costly procedures after people get sick. 4. Will you support fully funding the State's share of employee and retiree health insurance? YES/NO If we want to grow Maines economy and create opportunity for all Maine citizens, we need to get health care right, and that means providing universal access to quality health care, period. My plan will provide essential health care services for all Maine citizens, including public sector workers and retirees, at a cost that we can afford and that can be sustained and will direct the States current health care expenditures toward supporting the development and operations of more efficient, high quality health care organizations. When one considers the funds expended for MaineCare, state employees, public school and university employees as well as municipal government employees, the State of Maine directly purchases over 50 percent of all health care services. These public dollars represent an enormous opportunity to advance the statewide delivery and financing of health care services for all Mainers. 5. In the FY '12-FY '13 Biennial Budget, cuts were made to state employee and teacher retiree pensions in order to decrease the Unfunded Actuarial Liability (UAL) debt. Despite the fact that retirees did not cause or create the UAL, retirees paid for this decrease by cutting their COLA benefits from a maximum of 4% to 3% of CPI, freezing their COLAs for three years, and calculating all future COLAs on a $20,000 base amount, regardless of the retiree's actual pension . Will you rectify or restore these cuts to retirees, and will you protect retiree pensions from future cuts? YES/NO The State of Maine must meet its current obligations under the retirement plan for state employees and public school teachers, but we must also make sure that the State has on hand sufficient assets to fund future benefits, while offering new state employees and teachers the same options as those in the private sector enjoy. This change will benefit those employees who currently leave state government and teaching prior to becoming fully vested in their retirement plan.(Only 1 in 5 state employees remain in their jobs long enough to get a full pension, and those who dont are significantly disadvantaged under the current system.) These employees who do not vest take neither a pension nor any social security credits with them when they leave state employment.) In order to make the needed reforms over the longer term while making sure that the current retirement plan is well funded and protects its participants, we need to consider a constitutional amendment that would permit the amortization of the UAL under a 25-year rolling period (similar to the bill sponsored by Senator Tom Saviello of Wilton). This approach is common among other states, is actuarially sound, takes into account significant swings in market return, and balances current state needs with payment of the UAL.

Any changes made to the Retirement System and state government must be accomplished with the partnership of current state employees who should help determine how best to make the necessary changes. Freezing the cost of living adjustment for three years was devastating to the purchasing power of retirees' pensions during a recession and at a time in the lives of retirees when they were not in a position to replace the losses. I supported neither the freeze nor the COLA cap and would consider eliminating those rollbacks in the context of making the necessary reforms in the system that would ensure future stability. I do support the change made in the Normal Retirement Age for new hires and non-vested employees (employees working less than five years) to age 65. 6. MSEA-SEIU Local 1989 and the State of Maine are engaged in protracted efforts to ensure that state job s are compensated appropriately, applying sound principle s to the demands of the specific job. This effort includes reclassifications, as well as negotiations to revise the entire pay plan. Our members have participated patiently in this process, performing the work assigned to them without question, while they trust the system to produce a fair result. Will you support the ongoing labor/management efforts to bring the State Employee pay plan up to date, and will you fund pay increases that result from the reclassification or negotiation process? YES/NO I would support negotiated efforts to bring the State Employee pay plan up to date, I want to see workers and contractors classified properly and compensated fairly. 7. While direct public employment is highly scrutinized and regulated, much of the state's work is performed by private contractors whose work is not reviewed for its quality or effectiveness, and who often pay low wages and few benefits. As Governor, will you support responsible- contractor legislation to hold these contractors accountable for the quality of the work they do, the cost effectiveness of their work, and their employment practices? YES/NO State procurement, contracting and grants need to be fair, transparent and free of cronyism. Certainly the work of private contractors should be reviewed for quality and effectiveness, as all State services should be. I would support appropriate responsible contractor legislation, so long as it does not seek to simply transfer to private contractors the same rules that apply to government employment. 8. Will you support legislation to require contractors and public employers to provide a living wage and health insurance benefits? YES/NO The minimum wage right now is too far below a living wage. I believe that raising the minimum wage ought to be part of a comprehensive strategy to improve the opportunities for all Maine workers. Among our other related and important objectives ought to be increasing the demand for skilled labor in Maines highest-paying industries (including, for example, construction, forest products, and precision manufacturing) and to increase the number of skilled workers who are available for those jobs.

9. Public attacks on State workers and other publicly-funded employees, combined with the steady erosion of their standards of living and job security, have undermined morale and harmed efforts to recruit and retain a new generation of public servants. As Governor, what will you do to reverse these trends and restore respect and pride in Maine's public service? I understand that the morale of State employees has been hurt in recent years, and I am troubled by the negative rhetoric about public employees that the current administration has used. We all need to pay better attention to our words and behavior in public discussion and debate. Words can inspire and heal, or they can hurt and inflame. We should never excuse repeated and intentional distortions of the facts, bullying behavior, and slanderous marks about good people. Our leaders should demonstrate both the intention and the ability to draw from us the best that is in each of us, to unite us, and to engender trust among us. We should expect our leaders to have a clear understanding of the world in which we live and compete, the skills and the grace to represent us well in that world, and the ability to guide us in ways that will make our great state better for our having lived here. I intend to harness the experience and wisdom of State workers to improve workplace morale and the delivery of services in ways that will once again make men and women proud to work for the State of Maine and that will induce young workers to enter State employment. 10. Unions are required by law to represent all employees in a bargaining unit, whether they are members of the union or not. By statute, all employees in the bargaining unit receive the benefits included in the contract. As Governor, will you support retaining the agency fee or fair share provision in successor collective bargaining agreements? Will you also oppose so-called "right to work" legislation that would ban agency fee or fair share agreements in the State of Maine? YES/NO I have always supported and will always protect the right of workers to form and to join unions, and I have witnessed the important contributions that unions have made for decades in scores of Maine communities. I will zealously guard against interference in the process through which workers are permitted to decide whether to organize or not. I also deeply respect the laws and rules that govern the relationships between management and labor. While I will work within that position to ensure that all Maine laws protect the rights of workers to engage in union formation and union contract activity, I do not anticipate that as Governor I will insert myself directly in disputes between workers and employers. I will oppose right to work legislation (which arguably prohibits labor and management from negotiating union security clauses that require all members of a bargaining unit to either belong to the union, or contribute to its services) so long as union security clauses are negotiated openly between unions and employers and so long as the collections from non-union employees truly reflect only the costs of collective bargaining. 11. MSEA-SEIU Local 1989 believes strongly in the American system of collective bargaining as a means of resolving problems arising between employers and employees, and giving working families a collective voice to address the economic forces that influence their standards of living. This Union has worked with employers and governments to extend collective bargaining rights to new sectors, including

especially the lowest-paid publicly funded employees. Will you work with MSEA-SEIU Local 1989 to help protect and extend the benefits of collective bargaining as a tool of state economic policy? YES/NO With all respect, and recognizing the importance and value of collective bargaining in labor-employer relationships, I do not consider collective bargaining to be a tool of state economic policy. I have devoted a great deal of thought to the economic policies of the State of Maine, and I have observed in my book, A State of Opportunity, that the economic policies that we have pursued in Maine during the past decade have left Maine flat-lined in comparison with the rest of New England and the rest of the United States in most significant measures: job growth, income growth, productivity and GDP. I have set out in A State of Opportunity a plan to build a healthier, smarter, stronger, younger and more prosperous State of Maine. The plan and the strategies that I have set forth in the book comprise the economic policies that I think we need to follow in Maine. 12. What are the five main issues upon which your campaign is based? My campaign can be summarized by my goals for Maines bicentennial in 2020: Maine will match the national growth rate in jobs and employment, double our growth rate from the 2002-2012 decade in per capita GDP and quadruple our average annual growth in median wages. Maine will be the healthiest state in America while Mainers will spend less on healthcare than we do today. Every Mainer will have access to preventive healthcare, and no Mainer will face the risk of financial ruin brought on by the costs of care. Every child in Maine will read proficiently by the end of third grade, and financial circumstances no longer will bar a student from post-high school training or education. The number of annual visitors to Maine will be twice the number who visited in 2012, and each of them will spend 50% more on meals, lodging sightseeing and recreation. Maines will be a four-season tourism economy. The amount of agricultural land in Maine will be twice the 1.3 million acres in 2012, and the acreage in year-round cultivation will increase by twenty-fold. The number of births in Maine will outstrip the number of deaths, and Maine will be getting younger faster than many other states.

13. Do you want the endorsement of MSEA-SEIU Local1989? YES/NO As I have written in my introduction to these responses to the MSEA-SEIUs questions, I am under no illusions that I will receive your endorsement. If Local 1989 is comfortable with my views and positions as I have set them out here and believes that creating and protecting equality of opportunity for all Maine people should be the foundation of a new way forward for Maine, I would certainly accept the endorsement. 14. Is there anything in your background, your political views, or your union affiliations that you think MSEA-SEI U Local 1989 members should know in considering your candidacy? Beyond what is set out in A State of Opportunity and in my Announcement Speech and my speech to the Institute for Civic Leadership, both downloadable from www.eliotcutler.com