Kids Count #225

Claire Berkowitz:

sure that they're all taken care of, not just by their family but by the community in which they live.

Jim Wellehan:

And I've got three kids, all good kids, all doing their own thing, nice daughters in law and seven grandchildren and I really don't want to see the world destroyed for them.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

This is Dr. Lisa Belisle and you are listening to Love Maine radio show number 225 Kids Count, airing for the first time on Sunday, January 10, 2016. How do we help the most vulnerable members of our society not only survive but thrive? As the future of our world, our children deserve important consideration. Today we explore concepts such as childhood poverty, resilience and family friendly policies with Claire Berkowitz, the Executive Director of the Maine Children's alliance and Maine Children's Alliance Corporate Giraffe Award winner Jim Wellihan, Co Owner and CEO of Lamie Wellihan. Thank you for joining us.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

worked at Maine Health as the medical advisor for raising readers, we were fortunate to cross over with the Maine Children's alliance on a very regular basis. And today I'm extremely fortunate to have with me Claire Berkowitz, who is the Executive Director of the Maine Children's alliance. And in fact she has in her hands, hot off the press, the 2015 Maine Kids Count book, which is something that as a Raising readers medical director and advisor, I spent a lot of time with. So I appreciate the work that you've been doing and the work that the Maine Children's alliance is doing. And thanks so much for being in here.

Claire Berkowitz:

Thanks for having me and for letting us lift our voices about the data book and about kids issues in Maine.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, tell me about the Maine Children's alliance for people who may not be that familiar with it.

Claire Berkowitz:

Sure. We've been around for over 20 years. We are a multi issue child advocacy organization and we are based in Augusta. So we do a lot of work on policy, making sure that policies are when people do make policies, that they're thinking about what's best for children first and foremost and we also want to then once that policy is passed, how it's implemented and sharing best practices, trying to convene people who work with children and for children, and making sure that across communities in Maine, people are sharing best practices and making sure that kids get the best start and the best access to services so that they can reach their full potential.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

What was it 20 years ago that caused the Maine Children's alliance to come into being? Was there any triggering event?

Claire Berkowitz:

I think it was there were some people that were doing good work around child protective services and child welfare, really looking at what's happening to create the need to have children taken from their homes. And so I think that was a catalyst. I wasn't here when that started, but that's what I understand. And from that growing into other areas, realizing that poverty has so much the condition of poverty has so much of an impact on children and families and so branching out into other areas of children's lives over the years to make sure that they're all taken care of, not just by their family, but by the community in which they live.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

When I worked for Maine Health and Raising Readers, one of the reasons we thought it was important to get books into the hands of children. And this was an organization that still is out there giving books to kids ages 0 through 5 in doctors offices and with healthcare providers, nurse practitioners, physician assistants, is that we understood that in order to grow as a child, you had to have all the right conditions. You had to have the right nourishment, the right food, the right education. And that poverty was something that impacted every single aspect of your life, your health, your long term earning potential, your educational abilities. And this is one of the things that I've really liked about the main children's alliance is that there are so many different places that you've had to work on issues and you're really, you're really right in it. You've really been looking at this for quite a while.

Claire Berkowitz:

Yeah, yeah. And I, and we still are trying to look for where we still need to be. We've been doing some work around the social emotional development of young children. We've been hearing through our work, just from providers of childcare and folks who work with young children, that there's behavioral health issues going on for young children that childcare providers don't feel equipped to handle. And so we've just, in the last year, just from like, just from conversations, it's led us down a path of exploring with others what needs to happen to prevent kids from being expelled or suspended from childcare. We're talking, you know, three and four year olds. But that's not to fault the providers, they don't have, you know, they're not equipped, they don't have folks who can do the consultations and help them better understand what's going on for a child. And so we're doing work with the Maine Children's Growth Council and exploring what the issues are so that we can find solutions. So we're constantly listening to people looking at the data research, knowing full well that it, you know, it's those early years that are the most crucial in terms of mitigating negative outcomes later in life for kids. So really focusing on the birth to five prenatal actually is key for our public dollars, but as well as just how we think about the well being of children. So we're really a little laser beam focused right now on that time period in a child's life.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Today is the release of the Maine Kids Count book. And it's something that I think that most providers around the state look forward to on a yearly basis because it's such a wealth of information about the children that we care for and their families. Really? Tell me what sorts of things? Well, first of all, tell me about the Kids Count Book. What is it exactly?

Claire Berkowitz:

Well, it is a state level look at data across the areas of physical and mental health of children, social and economic status, as well as education, including early care and education going through to young adults. And we've been gathering data on this for this is our 19th edition of the data book and it's funded by the Annie E. Casey Foundation. Every state in our country has a Kids Count grantee who produces similar kinds of data products. And so we're proud to be a part of that network. There's really great people doing this work across our country on behalf of children. And so it's really a snapshot. It's a snapshot. And I mean like that it's going to change tomorrow. This data, you know, is living, breathing data. And we'll get new data tomorrow that will change what's printed in the book. So we do also have a data center, it's called the Kids Count Data center, where you can find online information and, and make really cool graphs and maps and things of county level data on some of the indicators. But it's really a tool for policymakers, decision makers, business leaders, grant writers, anyone who needs data to make the case for the work that they're doing. And so we use state agency Data, we use U.S. census Bureau data. It has to be reliable, it has to be consistent. And we, and we use it and track it and look at trends over time.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So give me some examples of important data points that you're interested in looking at.

Claire Berkowitz:

Well, we talked about child poverty and that is something that underlies so many of the other indicators that we're measuring. And so this is 2000. So as I said before, data changes. We printed our data book and at the time, 18.2% of children in Maine under age 18 were living in poverty. Well, new data came out yesterday from this source that we use for 2014 and it was up slightly to 19%. So I mean, we're basically staying steady. It's not getting better for kids. Over the last decade, child poverty has risen in Maine and the poorest are, the youngest are birth to five kids. One in five of our youngest are living in poverty. And so that is a concern of ours and we've been talking about it for years. And what it tells us is that families aren't making enough money to meet the basic needs of their kids. And so trying to figure out solutions to that is what we want our decision makers to be doing. We don't want, you know, the children born into poverty. It is of no choice of their own. And as a condition, it is not a personal, you know, failure. It is a lot, a lot of times it's generational. And so trying to find solutions where it's two generation approach to, you know, providing parents who maybe don't have tools to access family supporting wages, jobs with family supporting wages, giving them the tools maybe to finish their GED or get training so that they can access, can apply to jobs and at the same time making sure that there's childcare for their kids when they do go to work, quality childcare. So, you know, there's a lot at play then that comes out of talking about children in poverty. How do you support them and their families without punishing or being punitive? Because withholding supports, which we've been doing lately with these families and with these children, it's not clear to me what is the result of that. When we've taken, we used to have, just a few years ago, we had about 23,000 children receiving Temporary Assistance for Needy Families TANF and now it's down to a little over 10,000. But our poverty rate during that time didn't change. And so the economic needs are still there for the children. And so what's happening? And I'm not we, you know, we don't have that answer in the data book. It's something I'd like to explore to figure out if these, you know, stricter sanctions and strict time limits that we've set in place for families in an economy that's not working in all parts of our state, how is that working for kids? And I don't know the answer to that yet.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Maine Magazine and the Maine Media Collective, we spent a lot of energy getting behind the efforts of John woods and Full Plate's full potential and share our strength. And this is an effort to end childhood hunger, specifically in Maine, but also around the country. And when John talks about the 40 plus percent children of school age who are food insecure, meaning they don't even have enough in their bellies to be able to learn properly over the course of a school day, I find that shocking. And part of the issue that he describes and why he is doing Full Plates Full potential is that the money exists. There is government funding for providing lunches to children and breakfast to children. But for some reason there's a disconnection between the money that is out there and the children themselves. Is this the type of thing that you're talking about? Is helping make connections on various levels?

Claire Berkowitz:

And we actually, the Maine Children's alliance, we've become involved with Full Plate's full potential and support that work. And we actually gave them a giraffe award this year at our Champions for Children award in October for the work they're doing to raise awareness and raise best practices around getting kids food. And so I love what he's doing because it's true that money, it's federal money, the USDA is paying for that. And so we and the kids are eligible. And so it is in our best interest to get every child who to fill out their application as to whether or not they're eligible. And that's in districts maybe where the poverty rate isn't so high. And then there's other ways you can do community eligibility where based on the poverty rate, the number of kids in your community who are receiving TANF and snap, if those reach a certain threshold, then you can have what's called community eligibility. And then all kids just get lunch and it's so simple. And then we're drawing down the money and that builds our economy at the same time because we're buying food from people from Cisco, from folks who provide food to our schools. And so it's a win, win. And then our children are ready to learn because they aren't sitting there hungry, which can cause behavior issues, which can cause feelings of stress, sickness. And then they go to the nurse and it creates a disruption in their educational day. And so if we can do things like, you know, if kids get there late to school, let them grab a breakfast and take it into the classroom while they're working. So it's not so it's easy. We need to make it easier for kids who might be struggling with living in the condition of poverty or not even, not even poverty. Low income families making, you know, less than 38,000 approximately, you know, family of three, a parent and two kids, that's low income. And so you're not making enough to just get by. And so it may not look to the teacher or to someone in the school that the child is living in poverty, but they still might not have what they need in their refrigerator at home. And so we have these programs that feed kids and, and I love what Full Plate's full potential is doing. They're working across sectors, with business leaders, politicians, communities, food service directors to make it happen.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

It's interesting as we're talking about this, I'm thinking about kids in schools and specifically because I have patients who are teachers and are educational technicians and people who work in the social work field. And they so want to help children and they are absolutely experiencing the stress of not having the tools they need, as you have alluded to, like childcare providers saying, we have behavioral issues we're dealing with and we have no, we don't have the background for this. And this is something that I worry about burnout. I worry about provider burnout for these children who really need so much and these families who need so much. And yet even people who are dedicated, have dedicated their lives to taking care of them and helping bring them, I guess, in a positive way into the world. They're feeling stressed.

Claire Berkowitz:

Yeah. My husband is a principal in an elementary school That's a Title 1 elementary school. And I can attest to the stress that he carries as an educational leader around what's going on with kids. And there are kids who are showing up with what I call trauma, you know, and they are in what might look like behavior issues that might be, you know, that could look like ADHD or something else. It's trauma. And so there's some good work going on with the Maine Resilience Building Network. Merben. They train folks in trauma informed care, working with providers, working with public health nurses, going into communities to teach people that what trauma looks like, we why kids might be misbehaving because they might be exposed. It's not just poverty, but violence, separation and divorce, death of a parent, incarceration, all kinds of things that are called adverse childhood experiences that weigh heavily on a child. And if not looked at and dealt with in a way that provides healing, it will carry into their adulthood and, and create issues of not just physical health, but emotional health issues as well as possible workforce issues for them. So it's really imperative that we have our providers, our teachers, nurses, doctors, all with a trauma informed lens so that they can recognize it in children. And so when a child is misbehaving class, understanding what might be going on for them outside of the classroom allows the teacher to not react in a way that might trigger even more for that child. And sometimes school is a safe place for a child to let off the steam that they've been holding in, in a home that may not feel safe to them. And so that's. Sometimes that's at play as well. But I agree. I think that we need to do a better job of equipping the folks who are on the front lines, working with our kids, you know, in teacher training and early ed programs, making sure that that's a part of the curriculum of folks who are working with children.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

The other group that I deal with also are the children. And so I've had on more than one occasion a parent who came in with a child, and maybe even a fairly young child who was told, because there was no other good answer, you should bring your child to the doctor because your child might have adhd. And because of this attention deficit hyperactivity disorder that's presumed your child may need medication. And as a doctor, I struggle with that because I certainly have seen children who need medication, and I have seen children for whom medication is the absolute worst thing. But in either case, it's a multivariate approach. It really is. If you need medication, then you need medication. And you also need some help with logistics and how to organize your day if you're a child or a parent. You also need family structure. You also need looking into past trauma issues. But the most successful children that I've ever seen are children that require and families that require multiple services. And it can be very successful if we can look at it that way.

Claire Berkowitz:

Yeah, it's a multi faceted approach. And I think sometimes there's silos within those systems. And so maybe the parent is receiving services over here and the child over here and trying to make, you know, and every, you know, all the folks in the family have case managers, but they're not communicating. So it's trying to find ways to break those silos down. You know, we don't do. We haven't done much around the medication of children yet, but I've read studies, you know, there's over medication of children, especially like in foster care, you know, over prescribing and what that does, you know, it's so important to make sure that across that it's monitored well and consistently given. And that's not always happening when a child may be going between two households and making sure dad, you know, is giving the medication at the same time as when mom has the child and is doing it and those kinds of issues that, that then come back and play out in the school. If the child was with one of the parents over the weekend and the medication didn't get given and then they show up on Monday. A lot of things to think about in all of this. And then also, just as children are changing and going through puberty, what does that do? Making sure that you have a good physician who's following up on all of that and making sure that it's the right dosage and consistent over time. So lots of things to be concerned about over that.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

When it really is, it's a team approach. So it's in the patients that I have with ADHD or autism or some other diagnosable issue or patients, children with trauma. As a doctor, if I was standing there by myself, I would be absolutely at a loss. It's working with my nurses and the medical assistant and the people in the front office and all the people that help the family and the teachers and the social workers. And so I think it is incumbent upon all of us who want to work with children and families to learn how to be a part of a team.

Claire Berkowitz:

That's right. I think of that too, like, in terms I keep going back to the schools, but, like, in thinking about the outcomes of schools, you know, like, if we look at their reading scores or we look at graduation rates, thinking of that as a team number, it's not just the school's number. It's just not a reflection of the high school graduation rate, isn't a reflection of what the school has done. It's what the community has provided to the kids to give them the best chance at reaching their full potential and success. And so it's a team approach as well. So how are the providers working with the schools and getting feedback about that so that it informs then your decision as well? You know, medical provider, how's this working for the child in their daily life? And so I think, you know, places like IEP meetings for kids who are diagnosed with a special ed and receiving special ed services, that's a place where that kind of information is shared. And wouldn't it be wonderful if all kids had access to people talking about them in ways that are, you know, collective and sharing information so that everyone's working, you know, parents, providers, teachers, we're all working together to make sure kids are doing their best.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I feel like there's so many different directions we could go with our conversation. You've been in Maine since 96, and you've been the head of the Maine Children's alliance since 2014. You've worked in all different areas of helping people. What is it? What is the one thing that you would hope to see in your personal, professional career, in doing the work that you do? What is the one thing you would hope to see changed?

Claire Berkowitz:

I think I would like for people to. I guess I would like to turn some of the conversation around. Around poverty and stop. I would like for people to stop kind of beating up on people who live with the condition of poverty. And instead of saying that that's the problem, I think poverty is a condition that's created by greed. You know, there's enough in our world. And so how do we talk about that and how do we then help people make headway in our economy and in our workforce so that they. So that everyone has the right and the potential to earn a job that supports their family and without it being about personal failing? I guess that's. I'd love to see the conversation change, and I think it is in communities. I live in Bath, and I think it's been a wonderful place to raise kids. I mean, we have a high poverty rate, a high child poverty rate. But I feel like there's been interesting work to quiet work to meet the needs of kids and understand that we need to give them what they deserve to meet their best potential. We have an indoor skate park and teen center for kids who, you know, maybe don't fit the mold of, you know, what kids, you know, sports that are offered through the schools after school, and a place that's safe. And I worked there for a while. It's a neat concept. And our community did that. They saw a need. They saw an issue of kids skating in downtown Bath, and it was bothering our shoppers and our business folks, which of course it was. And so they found a solution. Instead of it being like those bad teenagers, it became like, what can we do to change that? And so I'd love to just see more of that. And I think there is. It's just we don't. We end up focusing on the bad news so much that we don't think about what communities are doing to support kids. And then we need to just share across communities best practices that are working. So I know, like, I think it's. In Bowdoin, they're trying to build a skate park too, you know, so. And they. They know about ours, and there's some feedback and some want, you know, sharing of best practices. So I think I just wish there would be more of that and less kind of pointing blame at people for not living up to some standard that we expect them to be at.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Claire, how can people find out about the 2015 Maine Kids Count book or the Maine Children's alliance?

Claire Berkowitz:

Our website is mekids.org and you can find all kinds of. You'll find the data book online. We're on Facebook. We have a Facebook page, and we also are on Twitter, and I don't know my handle right now. It's like Mechildren, I think. So there's lots of ways to engage with us, and we love to hear from folks, and we want to visit different communities. In 2016, we want to go on the road and try to visit every county in the state and talk about data and hear what people are doing. You know, there's really great things happening. You know, from Washington county to York county up to Aroostook and Piscataquist, good things are happening. We just need to lift them up and share them and then. And then see if we can maybe replicate things in other parts of the state.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

We've been speaking with Claire Berkowitz, who is the executive director of the Maine Children's Alliance. Thank you so much for the work that you're doing and I hope that our conversation today is going to encourage people to find out more about what's going on with children in our state and the good work that the Maine Children's alliance is doing.

Claire Berkowitz:

Great. Thank you for having me.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I appreciate it.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

When I was younger, one of my earliest memories upon coming to Maine was to go buy shoes with my mom at Lamy Wellihan. And so it's very interesting that life being what it is, I now have the opportunity to sit across the microphone from Jim Wellihan, who is the co owner and CEO of Lamie Wellihan, which is a Maine based family owned shoe company. This year he was a recipient of the Corporate Giraffe Award given by the Maine Children's alliance for his dedication to family friendly policies and fair wages for employees. So thank you so much for coming in, for doing all the work you've done, not only for putting shoes on my feet, but the shoes. Shoes on the feet of many Mainers, but also the work that you're doing for families in Maine.

Jim Wellehan:

Well, Lisa, it's all been fun. There are lots of, there are many, many social issues, as you know and we all know in Maine. And you grew up at a time when life was a little bit easier, a little more rosy. And so did I. When I was a kid, we'd just come through the recession, the Depression, then we had World War II going on, then I grew up. We had the wonderful days of the Cold War and the Korean War and the Vietnam War. But somehow or other everyone in town had a job, families stayed together, there was more social cohesiveness. There wasn't a big drug problem. And when I was a kid, I will confess to drinking a couple of cans of beer senior year. But that was it. And now I was at a meeting with some school board members just this was in Auburn about two weeks ago. And one of the sad things they were talking about the heroin epidemic. And we've gone so far. I mean, 20, 25 years ago, kids used to puff on the weed and it wasn't a good thing. Don't misunderstand me. But heroin is just so much more deadly, so much more addictive, so much more destructive of life that we've come a long ways and it hasn't all been good. Some good things have happened. Don't miss Jamie. If we stay talking together for a while, we'll think of one or two of them. But what's going on? We need. As I came into Portland today, it was kind of sad. When I go into Portland, I see lots of homeless people wherever I go. And that wasn't the case when you were a kid or when I was a kid. And I think we've got lots of issues and we've got to resolve them. But you've got the answers for those. See what you can do.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Oh, well, I don't know if I have the answers. That's why I bring people like you in, so that we can have conversations to see what you think. You were born in Lewiston in 1938. So that's kind of an interesting and pivotal time in our country.

Jim Wellehan:

Well, I think there's nothing but pivotal times. This is an interesting one now. And I look at where we're at and it's interesting in many, many areas. We check retail sales, see what's going on. In many communities, retail sales put in a slight downgrade in general merchandise sales for the last five, six, seven years. That's true in Augusta. It's true in Vanguard, it's true in Andchaugin County. And you look at that and say why? And when you get the income inequality we have and Maine is not as bad as many states. Don't misunderstood me. But when you've got that there are lots of people who can buy nothing and it's just an awful way to have it, to have so many people in desperate want and others, most of us are doing all right, don't misunderstand me. And there's Maine is fortunate. There aren't many people who just want to spend and spend and live these extravagant lives. There are a few, but not too many. But it's an issue we've got as a society. The major top, the top to bottom pay ratio for the top CEOs in this country. Compared to the base worker is 347 to 1. And you know, yes Matt, you work hard, but you aren't 347 times smarter than the other people you see. And you don't work 347 times as long or as efficiently or anything, nor do I. So I think we look at these things and say how do we make it a fair society where we can educate all of our children, we can bring up all of our children, we can enjoy each other as people, we can be one society and that's our challenge.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So tell me about these family friendly policies that you've taken to heart within your company.

Jim Wellehan:

Well, you know, first you're very kind to ask about that. But if you pay people $7.50 an hour, they can't live very well. So we've tried to put incentives in our pay structure and the average pay for all of our non managerial people is $15 an hour. And that works. Now we need to have it in such a way that we have high expectancies of our people and we want high rewards. We want them to do well and they take pride in their work, they stay a long time and they enjoy it. And their children doesn't happen very often. There's a situation where it comes up. They're welcome to be at the office for a bit and do what they need to do and so forth and draw some pictures. And the couple we've had in have always been well behaved, much better than I would have been. So those are some of the things that we do. And we have a low top to bottom pay ratio. It's three and a half to one, top to bottom and that's enough. And Kath and I live well, we've got a nice kids and good grandchildren and you need enough, you don't need too much.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So you came into the family business after having done other things.

Jim Wellehan:

Well, everyone does other things. I enjoyed my grammar school at St. Pat's and St. Thomas High School and went off to college at Holy Cross. But when I was a sophomore in high school I began working in the stockroom. And when I was in college I sold shoes and I worked in the downtown Portland store too. And we had some very cute girls come in from Montreal. So I decided I was going to learn how to speak French better. And having lived grown up in Lewiston where it's a very Franco American community, I was fortunate. So many of my friends were from French families inside St. Dom. So I, I learned French. But after I met these Montreal girls I said, I'm going to perfect this thing. So I worked at it, and I enjoy the language, I enjoy the culture, and was still very active at the Franco American center and things like that. But we just want our people to have enough. We want to be. If somebody has an illness, if somebody has some time they need to be off, something going on, we try and find ways to make that happen. That's what you have to do, and that's why we have people. Nancy Fournier has been with us 38 years. We've got a lot of people with us in the 30 years. Great many have been with us 20 years. And, you know, if they don't like it, they go someplace else. But most people really enjoy it and they stay with us. We have very low turnover for a retail operation. And if you have a low turnover, you can work with your people. They can be better at their jobs, they can learn more. We make sure all of our people have podortic training. So they're very good at foot deformities, foot issues and so forth. They can work with people to help make them more comfortable. And, you know, the funny thing is when people walk out of the door and says, boy, this is great. My feet haven't felt this good in years. When somebody says that to you, you feel good. And so that's one more reason to stay.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So why did your family choose to focus on shoes?

Jim Wellehan:

Well, dad was born. My dad was born in 1888, which is a few years ago. And he went to where he had to leave high school in ninth grade because there was no money in the family. His dad had come up when the railroad was being built. So dad got a job with Race Fossett, Dingley Fossett, a shoe factory in Lewiston. He worked in shoe factory to get a few other jobs. Then he went to work for Peck's Department Store. And they were a wonderful operation to work for. In fact, Harding Peck wrote a book, the World of Department Store, about his things about his operation. He was very socially concerned about people at the time as well. And dad was the sign painter and window trimmer. And he would start trimming the windows on a Saturday night when the store closed at 10, trim them all Sunday, go up to church at St. Joe's and keep on trimming. Go up to the furniture department and crawl into bed and sleep for five, six hours, seven hours, eight hours. And when he got up in the morning, he'd have a new collar to button onto his shirt and new cuffs to button onto his shirt. And he went to work. I don't think he took a full shower. So it was a different world then. Life keeps on changing. But he and Charlie Lamy got to be friends. They went in the shoe business and they did well. They opened at St. Patrick's Day because, you know, we are a good Irish operation. So it was the sort of thing that dad loved it. It was a wonderful thing. And he wound up marrying my mom down in Old Orchard back when he was 40 or so. And they had my brother and then they had me. And so I. It was just always what Willa Hinz did. So I went off and I. After. I taught overseas for a year in Lesotho. When I came back and I said, what's next? I worked in a shoe store for six months. When they have active reserve for six months, active duty at Fort Dix. And you can call me Sarge, by the way. And then I said, if I'm going to do this, I better learn something. So I went to Wharton and got a master's degree in business in marketing. And that was in the good old days before they had the wonderful courses in lying and cheating and stealing. It was part of all the master's programs in business. But they don't really have that. I'm kidding you, Lisa.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, I was going to say my brother is actually at Wharton right now.

Jim Wellehan:

I asked him about that course. What's he doing at Wharton?

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

He's getting his mba.

Jim Wellehan:

Oh, is he? That's interesting. It was a great place for me, and we'll talk about that later.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Okay.

Jim Wellehan:

But it was a good experience. And I came back and went to work and I guess I liked it over time. And it was a very welcoming community to be back in Lewiston. It was fun to be with everybody and all that stuff, all the old friends. Old friends are good friends. And so things kept unrolling along, and when dad passed on in 76, I was the guy said, okay, Jim, you're in charge. And I'd kind of been increasingly making decisions for a while, and it was a good way to grow into it. Dad had two people worked with him who were very capable and very. He had a lot of long serving people as well. The same sort of thing. I mean, he took good care of his people. It was example that he set. And I knew that was what you're supposed to do, so I did.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

What was it like being Irish in Lewiston?

Jim Wellehan:

It was great. You know, I'll tell you a story, Lisa. When my dad was a kid, the French Canadians were Just coming in because the western wheat had failed up in Quebec and they had to go to something else. And all these. You know, it may surprise you, but the French Canadians had very large families. 10, 12, 13, 14. I had one friend who had 17 brothers and sisters. So they came in, came down, and they looked for work in the mills and came to Lewiston and Waterville and Westbrook and Biddeford and Lawrence, Mass. And Lowell, Mass. And Manchester, New Hampshire. And good people. And as they went to work in the mills, they took their areas, and that became their territory. The Irish had their territory, Conbeef Hill or the gas patch or all these places. So an Irish kid didn't walk through a French neighborhood without another 20 Irish kids with him. And a French kid didn't walk through an Irish neighborhood without another 20 kids with him. And then all of a sudden, Shawn noticed that Monique was pretty cute. So something started to happen there. And then Jean Pierre was looking at Patricia and Sheila and Poy. It was great. So pretty soon we got to be in a mixed group. And they used to be in the French Irish baseball games. And as the thing wore down to the end, an old friend of mine, farmer coach Harry Lazotte, used to play for the Irish team, despite having a good French name. So it was an interesting thing. The Irish, despite their ability to breed quickly in many areas in Lewiston, they stayed home and took care of the folks. If you go up to Mount Hope, you'll see a lot of Irish names. And that's just the way it was. So the French took over, and they were good people. I really came to like French values very much, and I emotionally and spiritually at least have French as well as Irish. And we brought up our kids to speak French, too. Now, all my friends didn't bring up their kids to speak French because they had been mocked and kidded when they were young, and you get this accent. And when they went off to college or when they went off into the service, they were kidded. So they named all their kids Patrick or Michael, whatever, just give him a good Irish name. Because if you weren't French, well, I guess Irish will do. You know, one of those. We'd gotten to be friends over time, and now it's funny to watch the way communities change. The Somalis have come in over the last 10, 12, 15 years, and they honestly have done a wonderful job in the community. I don't know if you're aware, but Lewiston won the soccer, the state soccer championship this past weekend, and it was all there were 10 Somali kids and a white goalie. And they were a great team. And it was wonderful to see everyone cheering the team on as they, you know, all calling out the names and so forth. Just as easy as if they were French or if they were Irish or if they're Somalis. And they are a wonderful asset to our community. We've been very blessed to have them. And Mayor Gilbert did a great job with him. You know, his daughter Karen works with you here, who's an old friend. She used to work in our store. And so he made sure they had a good place to be. And there's election coming up and I Hope if Mayor McDonald wins, he goes through some rethinking because these are good people that come in. They know nothing to live on and had hard times and they need to have help just the way the Irish did. I mean, years ago when I was first married. So we're looking maybe at almost 150 years ago. There was a hundred year ago column almost 50 years ago when I was first married. But there was a hundred year ago column in the Sun Journal. It talked about a cave in in the street and said no one was injured. Two or three Irishmen were buried and the first Irish church in Lewiston was burned to the ground. And we all are very slow to accept new people and we're very defensive. But as I see the world changing and I see more different races coming in and us becoming more intermingled, I think it's one of the greatest things that can happen to learn from each other, develop from each other. And also, if you look at world peace, it's a wonderful thing. I really don't want to go to war with Ireland. And if we've got some Somalis who don't want to go to work, well, with Somalia and some people from Congo or wherever, and when the Syrians come in, we start to think we're all one race. I mean, we're a little bit different. I mean, you're a blonde and I was dark haired and so forth. But we are all really one people. We need to work together. We need to help each other, whether we're selling shoes or building a better world. And that's what we need to do. You know, I'll tell you a story, Lisa, as long as I see you nodding there. You want another story? You didn't know I was so chatty, did you?

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I'm happy to hear your stories.

Jim Wellehan:

Yes, please give me one. When I taught in Lesotho, it was a very interesting year. And Lesotho was a small British protectorate surrounded by the Republic of South Africa. And apartheid was in style then. Henrik Vauv Wood ran the country and it was very harsh. And they believed in predestination. If you were white, you were going to be saved. And if you were not, white looks tough. So that's the way the world was. And the African people, the Basuto in the country would go to work in the mines for nine months, a six month period, and they'd have to leave their families and so the wives would do the planting and so forth. Harvesting of the food is a very tough world. And I was walking down the street one day and a fellow belonging to the African National Congress looked at me, raised his thumb and said, hi boya. And that means white man, get out. So I said, ay Kona. And that means that's a crocker bull. So he said, hey lies, you're white, you must get out. I said, no, it's not true. I said, give me your arm. So I took his arm and I put it next to mine. I'd been out building buildings and after school and doing things that needed to get done. He was a very light masudo and I was surprised how little difference there was. I asked him, is there much difference between these two arms? He didn't look down. He kept looking in the eyes. Yes, you are white, I am black. Take another look. Look at these two arms. He looked down. Is there much difference? He says, no, there's not much difference. I said, is there any reason these two arms can't work together to build a better country? And he said, we can do that. In that short bit we had become friends, established relationship, common goals. We can do that. We can work as humanity towards peace, towards kindness, towards love, towards sharing, and it's what we need to do.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, I agree. I think that's a very interesting. It's interesting you had that experience and now are living in Lewiston, where I'm guessing that probably 50 years ago you wouldn't have thought we would be seeing Somalians.

Jim Wellehan:

No, not at all. And it's funny, it was a very white community. And I went to Holy Cross and when I was at Holy Cross there did happen to be three African Americans there, but they were in different years. So I never get to know any of them. And I remember reading a book and you know, you look at times do change, as you probably have noticed. But I remember reading a book and one of the questions was talking about African Americans and so forth. I said, would you Want your sister to marry one of them? Well, I didn't have any sisters, but I still didn't know the answer. But when I got over to Lesotho and get to know the people a little bit, I knew the answer. Which one? Same as a white guy. It makes no difference, you know, it's just you want good people for your sister and they come in all stripes and colors. So let's work to be one.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

It seems like it would be helpful for us sometimes to think about where we've actually been, where we've come from. The time of, say, the civil rights movement or how about slavery? Or slavery, that's not that long ago either. But really any of these major social causes, and they weren't that long ago.

Jim Wellehan:

No, we've made great progress and it's good to see. Although as you see the cartoons that are in the newspaper with President Obama, the big ears, the thick lips, much different from his real lips, it's just so wrong, so gross. To push this out of belief, we got to be in it together. I have many, many faults, one of which is I'm a left wing, socialistic, environmental extremist, peacenik radical. But as I look at Ben Carson running, I think it's wonderful to see another black candidate. He doesn't have to be my candidate, as you might expect, but it's good to see that he feels free to run. And this, this ability to be who you are and what you are is critical for all of us.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So this idea that you have strong environmental interests, from what I understand, you've translated that into some of the business precepts within Lamy Wallahan.

Jim Wellehan:

We've been very lucky. We've had all the people be very involved in it. And I've always been. My wife has been. My wife is Kathy and she's been very concerned about the same sorts of things. But as you see, the world, it's gotten a little more messed up since I was a kid and we decided we needed to recycle things. So we started recycling and worked to recycle. 95% of the solid waste that comes into our store went up to 96, but Cathedics started back in 94 and we are awarded the governance waste management for recycling. It is the sort of thing, as I went for a run this morning around the neighborhood and there were lots of most people doing a wonderful job putting out two, three bins of recycling and a few people just putting it all in the wastebasket and trash can and it's just not the way it should be because, you know, if you've got stuff, do you want to throw it away and cut down some more trees or dig out some more minerals, or do you want to use the stuff? And if you've got it, why not use it? There was a wonderful ad. I was watching Bloomberg this morning after I came back, and there was a wonderful ad on it from Timberland. And they're talking about making tires now. And these tires, once they're finished, they'll all be recycled and turned into soles for Timberland boots. And it's the way things should be. We need to. We save everything we possibly can. And we're very concerned about many things. One of the things we've been concerned about is global warming. And in 2003, we began to work to cut our energy cost, and we've taken them down 40% since then. We've changed fuels, we've changed temperature settings, we've increased our insulation, we've put as we built new buildings. The new Topsum store, for example, is a great store for us. And the ceiling is R50, and the walls are R30. They're low E windows. All the lighting is low E window. The lighting, sorry, is LED lights. And we have an internal vestibule entrance. So it really keeps it nice and not much change in temperature. And we keep our settings for temperature. In the wintertime, you come in, if it's 68 degrees, you're pretty happy to be inside. So we don't have to be 72, we don't have to be 75. In the summertime, we keep it at 75. If you come in from the heat, 75 is comfortable. So you just got to. We've got to adjust all the time and always look at things. So we're happy to have cut our carbon emissions. And the last couple of years we took on a new initiative, and that's to look at plastic in the ocean, which is an awful thing. And there are these huge gyres in every ocean. Well, weren't quite in every ocean. They've just had to show up in the Arctic Ocean. And so there are these gyres. The Pacific gyre is. They all vary in size. They spread out and contract a little bit, but as largest, it's half the size of the United States. And nothing lives in these gyres in general. And if sea turtles eat a plastic, they're all filled with plastic. The sea turtles eat a plastic bag. They can no longer ingest food. They starve to death. They just found two whales with the same thing that happened in the Arctic Ocean where they've just started to gather plastic there because it all whirls around and goes here and there in the next place. So it's a tough, tough deal. So we stopped using plastic bags and we said, shall we use paper bags? Well, if you look at paper bags, between cutting of the trees, transporting of the wood, producing of the paper, transporting them again to where their destination is, they give off at least five times as much carbon emissions as creating a plastic bag. And if you look at our oceans, acidification is a major issue. The oceans are getting warmer. You probably heard in the news this morning about the lobsters moving north. No lobsters in southern New England. And the professor, I believe his name is mark green at St. Joseph's was saying, look, we are not going to be able to have clams because they're not able to grow their shells. And we're not going to have mussels because they're not going to be able to grow their shells because the ocean has too much acid in it. And this is because it's getting warmer and warmer and it's got to take all the cabin and all these things and put it into its new being. And we're just doing awful things to the planet we live on. And I've got three kids, all good kids, all doing their own thing, nice daughters in law and seven grandchildren. And I really don't want to see the world destroyed for them. And we're capable of doing that. And this year, this is the first year that cabin missions have been have been over 400 milligrams per whatever it may be. We crossed a threshold and so we've got to start changing everything we do. The cars our people drive, we have some company cars, they're all Priuses and it's what we get to do. There are no options on it.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I really appreciated the conversation that we've had about the work that you're doing. I can certainly understand why the Children's alliance has given you its corporate giraffe award. How can people find out about Lamy Wellihan? Do you have a website?

Jim Wellehan:

We do, it's lwshoes.com doesn't everyone have a website?

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I'm assuming everybody does have a website. Yes. So go to the website people who are listening or go to a Lamy Wellihan shoe store and see what's going on there for yourself.

Jim Wellehan:

They're nice people and you'd like them and they'd like you.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, I've been there and I do like them. So I'll go back again and I will be reminded and the people who are listening now, they can, they can do the same thing. So we've been speaking with Jim Wellihan, who is the co owner and CEO of Lamie Wellihan, a Maine based family owned shoe company. This year he was the recipient of the Corporate Giraffe Award given by the Maine Children's alliance for his dedication to family friendly policies and fair wages for employees. Thank you so much for all the good that you're bringing to the State of Maine, Lisa.

Jim Wellehan:

You must be bringing some yourself. Thank you. It's nice to be here.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

have been listening to LoveMain radio show number 225 kids count. Our guests have included Claire Berkowitz and Jim Wellihan. For a preview of each week's show, sign up for our E Newsletter and like our LoveMain Radio Facebook page. Follow me on on Twitter as DRLISA and see my running travel, food and wellness photos as bountiful1 on Instagram. We love to hear from you, so please let us know what you think of Love Maine Radio. We welcome your suggestions for future shows. Also let our sponsors know that you have heard about them here. We are privileged that they enable us to bring Love Maine Radio to you each week. This is Dr. Lisa Belisle. We hope that you have enjoyed our Kids Counting show. Thanks. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of your day. May you have a bountiful life.