Camden voters undecided about the Article 7 dam removal vote in June have a golden opportunity to learn more this weekend, which will also be a chance for passionately decided voters to rally for their cause and become volunteers.

On Friday, the Megunticook River Keepers (MRK) are holding an informal Free The River Happy Hour from 5 to 7 p.m. in the Community Room on the Public Landing level of the 16 Bay View hotel.

On Sunday, the Save the Dam Falls Committee will hold their second Community Conversation at 2 p.m. in a rented room at  the Camden Public Library. Both events are free and open to the public.

I am proud to be a member of the board at MRK, but this letter is 100% my responsibility. That said, I hope that many questions are asked about this recent STDF statement: "It should be noted that removing Montgomery Dam alone does not achieve any of the goals of river restructuring. Every dam site on the river would need to be restructured, and so the Montgomery Dam vote could trigger an enormous project in the heart of Camden."

There are many reasons why just the vote we’re taking — Yes to remove the Montgomery Dam, but only with outside funding and Library approval — could be a great improvement, even if the upstream projects take decades to complete. And there’s a particularly good reason that you may be able to see with your own eyes this weekend.

I refer to the baby eels who die right beneath the dam unless the River flow slows enough that they can wriggle up the concrete wall. Every year some of these amazing catadromous fish make it all the way to the Lake, where they grow up to be (delicious) teenagers and then swim all the way back to Sargasso Sea for romance.

At the Public Landing you’ll also see the fascinating and highly valuable elver fishery in action. The fyke nets are obvious while the dip netting goes on at night, sometimes all night. And the Marine Patrol is often present to enforce the three sets of tight regulations and quotas involved, because the Penobscots and Passamaquoddies are very much involved.

You may even see good samaritans carefully catching the tiny “glassy” stage elvers and putting them back in the river above the Dam.

The elvers and the elver fishery would benefit significantly if just the Montgomery Dam is removed. Moreover, they are a major reason why the regulators tasked with permitting a rebuild of the dam may demand a very expensive fish ladder, while no fish ladder is required at all if the dam is simply removed.

Both the Town and the Megunticook River Citizens Advisory Committee (MRCAC) host voluminous information about the years of study that preceded MRCAC’s 8-1 vote in favor of dam removal.

Meanwhile www.MegunticookRiverKeepers.org advocates for your Yes vote with lots of source material, although so far “where is www.StopTheDamFalls.org?” is only another good question to ask.

Ben Ellison lives in Millville, Camden, and writes for himself, but is also the Treasurer of Megunticook RiverKeepers.