Threshold To Maine RC&D
Balancing Resource Use with
Conservation since 1970.
The purpose of the Threshold To Maine RC&D Area, Inc. is to assist communities in York, Cumberland, Oxford, and Franklin Counties improve their skills and commitment to balancing social, economic, and ecological issues around natural resource use. In partnership with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Threshold To Maine develops and implements a five year plan of work called an Area Plan. The Vision, Mission and Goals below are from our current Area Plan.
To position natural resource based industries as key economic development centers for southern and western Maine communities, expanding the number of small natural resource based businesses contributing to local, regional, state, national, and international economies.
Threshold to Maine RC&D Area, Inc. will help individuals and communities pursue natural resource based opportunities in southern and western Maine by providing technical assistance to promote social improvement, economic development, and environmental protection.
Nationally, the Resource Conservation and Development Program requires a focus on four areas: Land Conservation, Land Management, Water Management and Community Development. In order to meet that framework, the Threshold to Maine RC&D Council voted to develop goals dealing with agriculture development, forestry, and watershed management. Energy was also identified and is a part of each goal. It is recognized that the Council’s core functions in the region are assisting with job creation, capacity building, project coordination, and facilitation. Each of these will play a part in the successful completion of the identified goals and remain a unique and collaborative service that RC&D continues to provide for citizens in York, Cumberland, Oxford, and Franklin Counties.
Strengthen the local infrastructure supporting a viable and sustainable agriculture sector in the region by expanding business and job creation by 20%, helping coordinate government and nonprofit partnerships and facilitating community based projects, completing work by 2015.
Coordinate assistance covering 35% of the local forest resource through sustainable forest management practices and education by 2015, helping to keep Maine forests as forests.
Use rapid watershed assessments and other tools to help 6 communities in the Threshold To Maine RC&D Area deal with their watershed management issues thus improving water quality by 40% over the next five years.
Carry out all activities and deliver the RC&D Program protecting Civil Rights and promoting diversity reaching 25% more of ethnic and historically underserved populations by 2015.
The Threshold To Maine Resource Conservation and Development (RC&D) Area, Inc. is a nonprofit corporation, established under state of Maine law, with the purpose of fostering and advocating for natural resource protection through community restoration. Our intent is to provide information, education, and support to community residents in York, Cumberland, Oxford, and Franklin Counties, enabling them to solve natural resource problems. Programs are locally initiated, sponsored, and directed. Residents work to improve their communities through sound resource management, accelerated economic development, and improvements in the standard of living where adverse conditions exist.
However we describe RC&D, the basic resource continues to be the people involved and motivated to create change. That change is embodied in the vision of a strong agriculture industry in southern and western Maine.
The RC&D Council, with its sponsors and local citizens, have identified a future capable of supporting a balance between the utilization and conservation of our natural resources. This Web Site strives to provide information to expand the leadership ability and community capacity necessary to draw together competing interests in order to achieve compromise, mutual understanding, and the discovery of common ground on all natural resource issues.
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