You Decide…
For years, families in Maine have been left to navigate a care system that feels more broken by the day. Facilities close, workforce shortages deepen, and too often the default answer is: Medicaid will pick up the tab. But if you talk to any family who has been through this, you know that answer comes with real costs — financial, emotional, and generational.
I’ve watched this firsthand. What starts as a hospital discharge or a sudden decline at home quickly becomes a crash course in rules, contracts, and fine print. Families don’t get to choose their path so much as react to a maze that was designed without them in mind. Medicaid — or MaineCare here — has become the backbone of long-term care. Yet too often, leaders in Augusta or Washington sidestep how fragile that backbone really is.
That’s why this year’s Senate race matters. It isn’t just about red or blue. It’s about whether aging policy gets treated as infrastructure or as an afterthought. Whether Maine families will keep being told they “have no choice” but to spend down into Medicaid, or whether leaders will take seriously the middle-income squeeze that defines our state — the oldest in the nation by population.
You don’t have to take my word for it. Look around:
Facilities announcing closures or pulling back admissions.
Home care agencies with waiting lists twice as long as the number of clients they serve.
Families cashing out retirement accounts because no one told them they had options.
I’m not a politician. I’m someone who has seen the inside of this industry, asked the hard questions, and helped families who were told they had none. That’s why I speak up — not to play sides, but to make sure people understand what’s really at stake.
The truth is, you get to decide what kind of system we build next. You get to decide if Medicaid should remain the default answer, or if Maine deserves something better — something built with dignity, sustainability, and choice.
The conversation is finally happening. That’s not an accident. It’s because people like you and me refused to look away.
You decide.
