Portland employers may be required to offer paid sick time

It’s time for a long holiday weekend. For many people, it’s considered the last weekend of summer, so make it count and have some fun.

I won’t dilly dally. Let’s get through your headlines for the night so you can get to your barbecue.

What we’re talking about

Portland Mayor Ethan Strimling and two workers’ groups are proposing an ordinance which would require employers in the city to provide paid sick days for workers. After being presented to the City Council later this month, the proposed sick time ordinance is likely to be referred to the council’s health and human services committee for review, Strimling said.

Maine Craft Distilling LLC, a small Portland distillery, is expanding its production and tasting area on Washington Avenue and increasing its presence outside the state, the BDN’s Lori Valigra is reporting. The company raised $522,750 in equity, mostly from existing private investors, to fund its expansion.

A rash of art thefts from an exhibit at the Wells Reserve at Laudholm was called “sad and disappointing” by the Laudholm Trust’s president. According to the York County Coast Star, two pine cone sculptures valued at $750 each and a gold-plated oak leaf sculpture valued at $2,200 have been stolen from the exhibit over the last few weeks

On Thursday night, the Portland needle exchange hosted a vigil for the nearly 200 local people who have died over the last year from overdoses. As part of the event, members of the organization also handed out free doses of the opiate antidote drug naloxone and provided training on how to administer it. Watch a video from the BDN’s Troy R. Bennett here.

Kevin is back on the roof. Usually, when I write something like that in a newsletter, I have to qualify it as being “proverbially,” but in this case, Kevin is actually back on the roof. Portland STRIVE volunteer Kevin Fitzpatrick is living on the roof of Patriot Subaru in Saco to raise money and awareness for the nonprofit which helps teenagers and young adults with mental and emotional disabilities. This is the fifth annual Kevin On The Roof fundraiser event, and he pledges not to come down until he raises $35,000 for STRIVE. You can catch updates, watch a live stream and donate by clicking here.

Tweet of the day

From BDN Features Editor Sarah Walker Caron, who is planning a much more industrious Labor Day Weekend than I am:

The Big Idea

Coffee itself may not have extreme negative health effects, but it could have edible accomplices that do. Multiple studies in the past have found that although the caffeine in coffee is addictive, there really aren’t any major health ailments that can be linked to its consumption. In fact, most recent research found a host of health benefits to drinking coffee regularly. Now, scientists are saying that your coffee may block certain chemical receptors in our brain and, by doing so, make us more likely to crave sweets. So the coffee itself isn’t a problem, but the half dozen doughnuts you eat with it are.

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