Gun violence. Homelessness. Climate change.

Communities across the country are dealing with the fallout from these stubborn and escalating problems – and not getting very far.

In 2023, these life-or-death challenges and others confronted Maine in devastating, undeniable ways. How will we respond in 2024?

Our final editorial of the calendar year opens with the opening lines of last year’s final editorial (“In 2024, Maine has to act on the painful lessons of 2023”). At that time, we called for positive action on several of our most pressing issues. As the above reveals, they are still our most pressing issues. How, then, did we respond in 2024? Let’s take a look.

GUN VIOLENCE

“The Legislature … opens its session this week with a number of bills focused on reducing the likelihood that a firearm will be used to kill or maim. Legislators are expected to once again debate universal background checks, waiting periods for purchase, an assault weapons ban and red flag law. Each of these provisions has failed in Maine before, often because their opponents deemed the state too safe to need them.”

Maine made some progress this past spring, ushering in expanded background checks for private sales of guns, making improvements to the yellow flag law and rightly criminalizing the transfer of guns to prohibited people. The elements in bold, however, remain all but untouched by the Legislature. The need for a red flag or Extreme Risk Protection Order law is something this editorial board continues to give a particular emphasis — most recently on Dec. 15, in this section, as we hailed the recent FRONTLINE documentary about Lewiston.

We ought to have taken that opportunity to issue our praise of and support for the ongoing campaign to put an ERPO initiative on the ballot in Maine in 2025. “Safe Schools, Safe Communities,” supported by the Maine Gun Safety Coalition, will have to turn in the required signatures next month. A couple of weeks ago, only 7,500 additional signatures were required (to meet 67,682, or 10% of the total votes cast in the last gubernatorial election), with the bulk of them reportedly gathered on Election Day last month. That level of support is heartening. Let’s stay focused.

HOMELESSNESS

The Legislature will take steps to address a range of housing-related issues … That work is critical to keeping more Mainers from falling into the abyss of homelessness. Most communities in Maine have a housing shortage; residents should come together and decide where it makes the most sense to put new units and do everything in their power to make it happen.

The local focus on homelessness we promoted this time last year needs to be retained and it needs to be sharpened. Shameful opposition to affordable housing projects, by vote or otherwise, needs to be exposed as just that.

The round rejection of a reasonable proposal for an affordable housing development in Cumberland stands out as a particularly bleak moment in Maine’s 2024 record. If we are to have any expectation that there will be places for people to live, that is a shining example of how not to proceed.

Creative actions that maximize existing buildings and land, of which there were more than a few very nice examples in 2024, must be encouraged and supported. They will not in themselves be enough to solve our crisis — the state must fund shelter — but a rising tide lifts many boats.

CHANGING CLIMATE

Community leaders should recognize their role in making their areas more resilient to wild storms. That requires major investment: new planning around flood zones, a strong warning system, and flexible plans for evacuations and rescues.

The above paragraph was published weeks before the major storms that battered many parts of Maine in quick succession last January. There’s nothing like an emergency to kick people and things into gear. Maine now has a state commission focused on storm communication and preparedness; this is the body tasked with leading work on many of the elements called for above. Its first report focused on short-term rebuilding priorities and storm preparation. A second report will outline a long-term plan for climate disaster, and it’s about time.

Long-term planning requires the confrontation of hard truths about where we live and what we’re about to be living through. As we said after the storms: Homeowners, businesses and municipalities, instead of asking themselves when they can rebuild, need to ask themselves whether they should be rebuilding at all. That’s an uncomfortable conversation to have. Until we start having these conversations, however, nothing much will change.