Tri-Town Equity & Inclusion Coalition
We are a group of community members raising awareness and catalyzing anti-racist actions in rural Maine.
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Updates
The Tri-Town Equity and Inclusion Coalition (TTEIC) condemns the racist interaction in November 2021 in which a Black man who was waiting in his vehicle with a white woman at a Freeport pizzeria was physically threatened by a white man who carried a gun. The white man also verbally assaulted the Black man with racist epithets. The Maine Attorney General, Aaron Frey, has filed a complaint under the Main Civil Rights Act for the incident. As residents of the community, we believe it is critical to understand and name that this terrifying racist interaction happened right here in Freeport. Furthermore, it is important to name the harm it creates for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color here and elsewhere - and the harm it also creates for the whole community. All people who live, visit, or play in Freeport, Pownal, and Durham should be safe and feel safe no matter their skin color. We ask other local organizations and institutions to also condemn this act and proactively seek ways to confront all forms of racism - and to actively examine ways to practice anti-racism. This very local incident is a reminder that ongoing work is needed everywhere, including in Freeport, Durham, and Pownal, to confront all forms of racism, including gross, overt, and visible acts like the one at a local restaurant in town as well as deeply rooted systems of structural exclusion.We acknowledge and honor the tribes who comprise the Wabanaki Confederacy – the Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, Maliseet, Abenaki, and Mi’kmaq peoples – who have stewarded these lands for centuries. We make this acknowledgement with awareness that this land is unceded and of the continual violations of water, territorial rights, and sacred sites in the Wabanaki homeland. Our work exists within this unceded territory—particularly the territory of the Abenaki—and it is our responsibility to acknowledge this historical context and build reciprocal relationships with the Tribal Nations on whose lands we are situated.