Do you have a special place in Maine? A place you hold dear and would hate to see change?

On Wednesday, May 24 at 6 p.m., the Community Center will host the first Boothbay-area showing of the film “Down to Earth” produced by Anne D. “Andy” Burt.

An Edgecomb resident who served as director of environmental justice programming for 16 years with the Maine Council of Churches, Burt has taken a lifetime of concern for our environment and used it to create her film.

Through the hearts and experiences of 13 Mainers, Burt’s film shows how and why they each started their activism about climate and what compelled them to take the next step. The film chronicles their stories and provides a fascinating look at the way immense global issues have become very personal and individual commitments.  

As Burt said, “The storytellers are your neighbors.”

Becky Halbrook served for years as a corporate attorney who represented chemical companies and Texaco during the course of her career. Now a resident of Phippsburg, in the film she explains her transition to the environmental activism that led to participating in a 2011 sit-in on the White House grounds to protest the Keystone pipeline.  

Rachel Mason Burger joined her voice to those of her neighbors to keep tar sands from South Portland. Their efforts resulted in the city’s Clear Skies law in 2014 which, according to the Clear Skies website, “bans the loading of crude oil onto tankers in South Portland’s harbor.”

Burt refers to her work as “climate justice,” rather than “environmental protection.” She said in an interview, climate justice is “looking at who pays the cost for what we are doing to our planet.” She said misuse of the environment is not an abstract theory – it has very real outcomes. She cited the problems faced by farmers growing our food. Much of the mining done in the U.S. now takes place on tribal lands, she added.

The film took Burt nine months to produce. She teamed with Arrowsic videographer Charlie Hudson and with Portland musician and composer Kyle Morgan and launched a crowdfunding campaign in the winter of 2015. The effort raised $6,000 and was followed by grants of $6,500 from the Eleanor Humes Haney Trust and $5,000 from The Lyman Fund.

In total, the film cost around $16,000 to produce. Since its completion in May 2016. Burt has shown it around the state to small audiences including schools. The film is free, although donations are welcome. The film can be downloaded at www.downtoearthstories.org. There is also a study guide for teachers.

Burt has organized the showing at the Community Center into a 90-minute program. After the film, she will facilitate a 30-minute discussion about the roots of individual activism. For more information, call Burt at 380-5387.

“Down to Earth” has been submitted to the Maine International Film Festival, the Portland Eco Film Festival and the Middlebury New Filmmakers Festival in Vermont.