Community Calendar

Attend the Chamber Regional Luncheon and enjoy networking, a delicious table-side lunch and learn useful information about one of the candidates for Governor of Maine, Eliot Cutler. Meet Eliot, ask him your questions and give him your suggestions.

Eliot Cutler worked in Washington, D.C. from 1968 to 1973 for U.S. Senator Edmund S. Muskie of Maine, where he helped craft the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the National Environmental Policy Act and other environmental laws. Cutler later served in the White House as Associate Director for Natural Resources, Energy and Science in the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

Cutler represented the President of the United States in the negotiations that led to the settlement of the Maine Indian land claims case and in other claims involving Native American tribes. He also served as White House energy policy chief during the energy crises of the late 1970s, led the interagency working group for the reclassification of the Alaska public lands and represented the United States in international negotiations.

As an independent candidate in Maine’s 2010 gubernatorial campaign, Eliot Cutler garnered 36% of the votes, the highest percentage of any independent candidate for major office in the United States in 2010 and the strongest finish among all first-time independent candidates for governor in Maine, including former independent Governors
Angus King and James Longley.

Cutler founded and served as chair of OneMaine, a political organization formed to promote moderation and collaborative efforts in Maine politics. He is President of the Emanuel and Pauline Lerner Foundation and serves on the Board of Visitors of the Muskie School of Public Service at the University of Southern Maine, where as
Chair for more than a decade he helped lead the School to a position as one of the leading graduate schools of public policy in the United States.

Eliot Cutler founded Cutler & Stanfield LLP, which under his leadership grew to be the second largest environmental law firm in the United States, representing both private sector and public jurisdiction clients in nearly 30 states in complex infrastructure projects involving airports, highways and other major facilities. Among a series of successes during the 1980's and 1990's, he conceived and implemented the legal and political strategy that led to the development of the Denver International Airport, the only new commercial airport built in the United States in decades and one of the most successful in the world.

Following his firm’s 2000 merger with the international law firm Akin Gump, Cutler lived in Beijing, where he opened the first office in China for Akin Gump, was the partner in charge of the firm’s Asia practice and represented Chinese clients in making investments outside China. Eliot resigned as a partner in Akin Gump law firm when
he began his 2010 gubernatorial campaign; he served as a Senior Counsel to the firm until December 2013. In 1988 he was part of a small group that bought the United Electric Co., a Texas manufacturer of air conditioning components. He served on the company's board of directors for many years and helped guide the turnaround of
the company and its eventual sale to the Carrier Corporation.

As a lawyer and business advisor for Skanska USA, the American subsidiary of one of the world’s largest construction companies, Cutler helped it grow from annual revenues of about $30 million in 1980 to about $3 billion in 1995. He later served for four years on the board of directors of the Swedish parent company Skanska AB, where
he was the first American and only the second foreigner to serve as a member of the board.

Cutler also helped to create the first of the Thornburg Investment Company mutual funds in 1983 and has served on the board of trustees of the Thornburg mutual funds for 30 years. The Thornburg family of mutual funds now numbers 16, with total assets under management of more than $70 billion. He also was a director of Thornburg
Mortgage, Inc., a publicly traded mortgage REIT.

From 2010 to 2012 Cutler was a co-founder and principal in Maine Seafood Ventures LLC, a company that helped open China and other foreign markets to exports of frozen Maine lobsters. Today Cutler is chairman of MaineAsia LLC, a company developing Asian markets for Maine foods, boats and other products and bringing sustainable,
year-round agriculture to Maine and other northern latitudes with greenhouses and other structures that integrate cost-effective solar energy technologies. He is also a principal in Chamisa Energy, LLC, a company developing grid-scale compressed air energy storage (CAES).

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