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W W W. M A I N E B I Z . B I Z 19 M AY 1 6 , 2 0 1 6 "My grandparents and my father came to this country to forge a better life," adds Biemann. " ey were fl eeing poverty and insecurity in Europe at the beginning of the last century and in the middle of the last century. ey were able to live here and with hard work, education and access to capital they were able to make a better life for themselves and their families. So that's one driver for why I've been motivated throughout my career to work on issues of economics and social opportunity." Biemann says she'll be spending the next few months listening and learning — from the staff , the board of directors and CEI's partners and funders — as a fi rst step of working with Bisson and the CEI team in "really pioneering the next stage of the organization's life and impact." "Ron has been an extraordinary leader of CEI," she says. "He's been involved in 39 years of innovation and entrepreneurship. It's quite remark- able what he's achieved. … We will continue to be inspired by Ron's optimism and his determination as we move forward and begin inventing the next future of the organization." Ja m e S M C Ca rT H Y , M a i n e b i z s e n i o r wr iter, can be reached at JmCC arTHY @ mainebiz.biz and @ Jame SMainebiz For more information, call 855-KUMaine or visit a campus in Augusta, Lewiston, or South Portland. New classes start every 10 weeks! Ron Phillips reflects on nearly 40 years leading CEI T he word 'retire' may not be in his vocabulary, so, for those who know him well, it won't come as a surprise that Ron Phillips already has a lengthy to-do list awaiting him at home: Work in the family's garden and woodlot. Explore getting involved with one or more town boards in Waldoboro, where he lives. Continue serving as co-chairman of an advi- sory board for St. Joseph's College, which has set a goal of doubling its enrollment and developing what he calls "sustain- ability enterprises" in agriculture, hospitality and health care. Complete several promised articles. Remain on the advisory board of University of New Hampshire's Carsey Institute that's looking at "impact investing" in rural economies. He'll be busy, but there'll be lots of reminders of his long career at CEI. He admits it's virtually impossible to take a drive in Maine without coming upon some company or busi- ness sector that's benefi ted from CEI's fi nancial expertise and access to capital. So, when asked if he would do so, it wasn't hard for him to imagine taking a virtual drive across time and space as a way of touching on some of the highlights of a 39-year career as CEI's founder, president and CEO. Here's the journey, in his own words: Well, of course, the initial ones had a lot to do with fi shing. Even to this day I cite the 1979 fi rst investment of $300,000 in the Boothbay Region Fish and Cold Storage. That established our commitment to the working waterfront and Maine's fi sh- ing industry. One can point as well to the Portland fi sh pier and other projects like the Gulf of Maine Research Institute, which we helped build. So, those sorts of fi shing-related proj- ects I'm really proud of. I'm proud that we could help Spear's Farm in Lincoln County, which has grown considerably and now has several hundred acres under cultivation for market-fresh and good quality local food for supermarkets and local school systems. That's another example: Agriculture. If you get into the Millinocket region, I'm proud of having something to do with Katahdin Resorts, Matt Polstein's efforts to develop a 1,000-acre hospitality-sector industry that can capture more of the tourist dollar on a four-season basis. I get even prouder when you start talking about the scale of activity of a sector like child care, which includes a marvel- ous program in Waterville called 'Educare.' It takes the whole question of early childhood development to a grand scale for lower-income kids and families. Tom's of Maine is a project we helped way, way back. Of course, [founder Tom Chappell] sold the business. Then there's Moss Tent. It used to be in Belfast, but it's also sold off now. For many, many years it employed 30 to 40 people and we had an equity ownership interest. When it sold, we got our capital back with some benefi t. But we took the initial risk. Not everything succeeds. That's part of the organic cycle of business, too. It doesn't mean it's a failure. It means there were certain achievements, but a project wasn't able to go into another level or stage. I think of us as the proverbial stone soup story: We create the platform or the bowl that contains the stone and we're asking you to fi ll it with vegetables. I love seeing a project come from zero to something alive. Now it takes capital to do that. We help put together the fi nancing for projects with the entrepreneurs, the developers. We're the easy part, actually. They're doing the deal and balancing everything that comes with running a business.

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