Leaguers,

This was an incredible year. We stuck together and we reached for goals that we've never tried for before. Help us make 2011 even better by taking a moment to donate: action.theleague.com/donate-me

The best part of this year for us was seeing how many young people joined with the League in pushing to make a more healthy, fair, and welcoming state. Volunteers, leaders, and allies joined together to roll up our sleeves and break a sweat for justice! Thank you to all of our friends, helpers, pushers, donors, muses, task masters, cheerleaders, and tough cookies- yeah, you know who you are.

This year, we threw most of our weight behind three important measures in Portland: Electing Our Mayor, Rank Choice Voting and Re-Establishing Voting Rights for Immigrants. We were thrilled to see Elect Our Mayor pass, not only because it will help improve Portland's democracy, but because the measure included Rank Choice Voting. Given the outcomes of the last two gubernatorial cycles, and many before that, the League is inspired to continue to push for Rank Choice Voting on statewide elections, and we'll be working on it in the years to come.

While we were disappointed the Voting Rights ballot initiative didn't pass, we were encouraged by how close the vote was. We're looking forward to continue to work with young immigrants and refugees across the state to fight for immigrant rights. We welcome members that interested in this work, or other issues that we'll be working on in 2011 to get in touch with us to get more involved.

This year we continued to provide a thoughtful, and member endorsed Voter Guide. We continued the integrity of our Project Vote process where members who have volunteered over 8 hours with the League in a given year, help make the decisions on who the League endorses. We got over 10,000 voter guides into the streets, and for the first time ever, our guide was available online at theballot.org.

2010 was also the year that we were able to get back to fulfilling our mission of serving young people across the state. We hired a new organizer to work on organizing outside of Portland, and connecting Leaguers from towns throughout the state. We've begun meeting with young people in Lewiston/Auburn and reaching out to folks in Southwest Maine. They've been giving us killer feedback and are excited to begin working with the League. We hope to see our voter guide in new places, and expand the support we can bring to even more towns in the coming years.

We're back up and running on our cellphone action network, and on Twitter (@maineleague) and Facebook. Keep your feedback coming to us! If you have events coming up, send us the listings and we'll include it in our revived community calendar emails coming out each month.

The League, as part of MaST, got Fee in Lieu of Parking passed this year (increasing the incentives to use alternate transportation around the city). We started a TDM (travel demand management) advisory committee that will work with employers to find the best ways to encourage their employees to commute to work using something other than their car (unless their carpooling). We released our ZOOM report to the public and are seeing loads of support around this. And we decided to start working on closing down Congress Street to cars during first friday gallery hours. Whew, we've been busy on the sustainable transportation front!

Portland 101, a young person's crash course in local government, brought over 20 people into the inner workings of city hall, the Portland Police Department, our Water Treatment Facilities and more.

This was a huge year of building and growth for the League. We'd be nowhere without the guidance and inspiration of the young people in Maine that give to our organization and our community with their time, energy, ideas, and money.

The seeds of 2011 lie in the work that we've sown in 2010, and we hope you'll take a minute to email your feedback or thoughts on where the League should head and what we should focus on for 2011. Send your feedback to either Nicola nicola@theleague.com or Hilary hilary@theleague.com.

And, please help us make 2011 even better than 2010- let's keep the victories rolling in for young people across the state.

Donate Today and Help us: action.theleague.com/donate-me

• Keep expanding to more towns in Maine
• Grow Portland 101 to more Portlanders, and more towns in Maine
• Continue to support young electeds, and the issue campaigns that matter the most to us.
• Push for Rank Choice Voting and the expansion of the Zoom bus system
• Engage more young people in running our city and state!