Maine

Business is good in ‘Vacationland.’ It would be even better with more housing.

Published

2 years ago

August 4, 2024

Business is good in ‘Vacationland.’ It would be even better with more housing.

ROCKLAND, Maine — Noah Barnes can’t sell bunks aboard his schooner fast enough. The ones unoccupied by his staff, anyway.

Barnes, the owner and captain of the 153-year-old Stephen Taber, said demand for multiday voyages off Rockland has been “as good as the Clinton years.”

“Typically in election years and times of uncertainty, we see a little bit of a dip” as people hesitate to plan vacations, he said in late June as the turbulent presidential race ramped up. “We haven’t seen any of that.”

rockland maine vacationland (Michael G. Seamans for NBC News)

Even so, several bunks on the 115-foot-long ship, with room for 22 guests and up to six crew members, double as housing for employees like Grey Litaker. Litaker, 40, cooks in restaurants during the rest of the year but works and lives rent-free on the vessel in the summer because onshore rentals are “phenomenally expensive.”

“Staying on the boat just made economic sense,” Litaker said.

Barnes, who’s putting up two other workers aboard the Stephen Taber full time this summer, said finding onshore housing for seasonal staff members used to be easier.

He’d love to keep his best employees on the payroll year-round for “continuity,” but it feels out of reach: “A lot of that has to do with how difficult it is to find a place to live that you can afford in this ‘Vacationland’” — the nickname emblazoned on state license plates.

A market squeezed at both ends

Maine’s housing crunch isn’t new, and it’s hardly unique in the U.S. Affordable housing shortages are crimping hiring in South Florida and Nashville, Tennessee, Atlanta Fed researchers said this summer. And many outdoorsy travel spots have grown so popular that service workers and wealthy homebuyers alike have been priced out.

But Maine encapsulates a dilemma at the heart of the U.S. economy, months from an election that may hinge on it. A massive wave of consumer spending — especially on leisure — has powered the pandemic rebound, yet surging shelter costs continue to prop up inflation, weighing down growth along with households’ economic outlooks.

“Even prior to the pandemic — where we’ve seen this influx of individuals coming to Maine and prices really, really driving up — we were on an upward trajectory of housing costs,” said Kelsi Hobbs, an assistant professor of economics at the University of Maine.

State home values rose more slowly than in the rest of the country from 2017 to 2022, and Maine’s nearly 74% homeownership rate outstrips the nation’s at 65%, the latest Maine housing data show.

But the state’s distinct challenges ramped up “really in the last decade,” Hobbs said, as its residential market got squeezed from both ends, with strong demand vying for tight supply.

Just 1.6% of Maine homes were available to rent or buy as of 2022, lower than the 2.5% national average, and Vacationland is packed with vacation pads — both seasonal rentals and privately owned properties. The state data shows 16% of its homes sit empty for parts of the year, compared with 3.5% nationwide.

Maine’s housing stock, like its population, also skews old. Just 6% was built from 2010 to 2019, compared to 9% nationally, while 60% predates 1980, well above the 48% U.S. average, and Hobbs said much of it is in disrepair.

rockland maine vacationland no trespassing sign abandoned house (Michael G. Seamans for NBC News)

Some of that is changing. A recent homebuilding spurt has helped boost inventories, TD Bank analysts said in June, but Maine still has “lower than average supply levels, which we expect will lead to above average price gains in 2024.” The state’s rental availability has lagged the nation’s since 2019, and nearly half of tenants are “cost burdened,” spending at least 30% of their income on housing.

“It’s a really big worry,” Hobbs said. “You cannot have a strong and prosperous economy without affordable housing.”

Unlike other parts of Maine, where populations swing sharply with seasonal tourism, the state’s Midcoast region, which includes Rockland, has plenty of full-time residents, said Shannon Landwehr, who leads the Penobscot Bay Regional Chamber of Commerce.

“There are people who want to work, who want to be here — want to live here, want to be part of the businesses that are here — who are struggling to find the housing,” she said.

Landwehr worries about sustaining the “diversity of the population” needed to power the economy and keep the area desirable for both residents and visitors if the problem deepens: “We’ll start to see kind of a division, if you will, of who’s here.”

rockland maine vacationland deckhand worker (Michael G. Seamans for NBC News)

Housing as a hiring problem

Maine hosted 8.5 million visitors last year, netting an estimated $16 billion in economic impact. Already, frustrations around wealthy vacationers’ driving up local living costs are colliding with opposition to workforce housing projects — tensions that could deepen political divides.

Maine and Nebraska are the only states that can apportion their Electoral College votes to multiple presidential candidates. Vacationland has delivered a split only twice — in 2016 and 2020, with its rural upstate district backing Donald Trump both times and the more affluent coastal one supporting first Hillary Clinton and then Joe Biden.

Service-sector employers like Barnes say they’re focused on keeping prices affordable for customers. Among the Stephen Taber’s guest bookings this year, “we’ve got pilots, and we’ve got lab techs, and we’ve got plumbers, and we’ve got cable installers,” he said. “It’s everybody.”

Eleven miles south of Rockland, nightly rates at the Craignair Inn by the Sea start at around $200, little more than $40 above the national average. Like Barnes, owner Greg Soutiea said business has been good — even though he’s also housing some of his workers.

Yearly sales at the 21-room hotel and restaurant have surged more than 500% since Soutiea bought the property in 2018, he said. Bookings this summer are already on par with the last two, when people’s discretionary “revenge spending” was booming.

But “housing has been a significant challenge for not only our staff but ourselves as restaurant owners,” said Soutiea, who employs about 25 people in the offseason and 50 during the summer peak. The issue limits the pool of candidates who “can commute in a reasonable amount of time and who can work year-round,” he said.

About three years ago, Soutiea bought a four-unit building in downtown Rockland to rent to employees at below-market rates. He now owns three properties with a total of 10 rental units, eight of which are set at levels allowing someone earning 80% or less of the area’s median income to spend no more than a third of their pay on housing, a common measure of affordability.

Five of his rentals are occupied by full-time employees, with another four workers — three seasonal ones and a year-rounder — living in the Craignair itself.

Soutiea said becoming an employer-landlord has “definitely been a significant driver in staff retention.” Even so, he still has only enough workers to keep the inn’s 95-seat Causeway restaurant open five nights a week.

Shannon Dennison, 38, a mother of three who heads up housekeeping at the inn, has rented one of Soutiea’s two-bedroom apartments for $1,250 a month for about a year. Before then, Dennison, who grew up in the area, had “thought about moving out of state” as housing costs surged.

rockland maine vacationland shannon dennison (Michael G. Seamans for NBC News)

Dennison recalled paying $750 a month for a two-bed as recently as 2015, and she said renting from her boss has been a lifeline for her and her husband. “If we were to rent from anyone else, we both would have to work two jobs,” she said.

State lawmakers have been trying to shift the equation. In 2022 and 2023, Maine’s Legislature passed a pair of bills loosening zoning restrictions to allow for greater housing density and to streamline approvals to build accessory units. The state has also poured tens of millions of dollars into subsidizing affordable housing construction, and it launched a rent-relief pilot program for low-income tenants this spring.

rockland maine vacationland schooner tourists (Michael G. Seamans for NBC News)

In the meantime, Landwehr said, calculations like Dennison’s and Soutiea’s — about how much to work to stay housed and how much to invest in housing to stay staffed — aren’t uncommon. But while the problem is urgent, it attests to a thriving economy.

“We’ve got people interested in this community,” she said. “Now we just need to find the right ways to support that.”

This article was originally published on NBCNews.com

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Maine

44th annual State of Maine Sportsman’s Show in Augusta draws big weekend turnout

Published

11 hours ago

March 29, 2026

Press Room

44th annual State of Maine Sportsman’s Show in Augusta draws big weekend turnout

AUGUSTA, Maine (WABI) – Thousands flocked to the 44th annual State of Maine Sportsman Show at the Augusta Civic Center this weekend. The event is organized by The Maine Sportsman magazine and the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine.

“We have 125 exhibitors, with anything you want that relates to the outdoors, ATV’s, boats, fishing gear, hunting gear, trapping gear. We average around 8,000 people through here over 2 1/2 days,” says Will Lund, Managing Editor of The Maine Sportsman.

Organizers say it’s a great opportunity to not only meet readers of the magazine, but to bond over shared interested in the Maine outdoors.

“Sometimes I’ll ask them what their favorite article is, and what really puts a spring in my step is if they tell me that my article is their favorite one, and that is very enjoyable to hear,” says Douglas Tibbetts, a writer for The Maine Sportsman and retired game warden for the state of Maine.

“All of the readers are looking forward to the open water season coming up, but many of our subscribers are here and we get to see them every year,” says Lund.

Many seminars, demonstrations and exhibits throughout the weekend helped to satisfy attendees during a period of downtime.

“We’re in between ice fishing, so you can’t really go to that anymore. For most places in the state, open water starts next week, so it’s a way to release some of that that pressure for kids and their parents,” says David Trahan, Executive Director of Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine.

Local businesses and non-profits were also given the chance to promote the significance of outdoor culture across the state. Those in attendance say the event provides a warm welcome going into the upcoming season.

“Maine outdoor industry is really just one big family, so we’re all kind of in the same boat. We all support the same activities in the outdoors and its therapeutic for everyone to get outside,” says Nicole Waite, President of Operation Reboot Outdoors — a recreational therapy non-profit that assists veterans.

“This has been a really tough, cold winter. People are itching to get out. Our organization represents sportsmen, conservationists, trappers — This is a way for us all to get together and come out of our homes in that new fresh spring air. I think it’s kind of a sign of spring,” says Trahan.

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Maine

Maine’s juvenile offenders and at-risk youth have been cast aside again | Opinion

Published

23 hours ago

March 29, 2026

Press Room

Maine’s juvenile offenders and at-risk youth have been cast aside again | Opinion

Mariah Pizzuto is a licensed social worker and MSW student at the University of Maine at Orono. She is also a former Child Protective Services caseworker.

The Maine State Legislature has again failed to affect real change regarding Long Creek Youth Development Center. LD 1923, An Act to Repurpose Long Creek Youth Development Center and Build a Community System of Support, has been amended to the point where we will not see real action on the subject for another five years, if at all.

The original bill proposed that the facility be repurposed with a start date of no later than Jan. 1, 2027. Amendments now state that studies will be conducted over the next five years to provide recommendations for exactly how the facility should be changed — ridiculous considering the fact that the state has known since 2021, when Gov. Mills vetoed legislation to close the facility due to a lack of proper interventions being in place, that supports for Maine’s juvenile offenders and at-risk youth need to be investigated.

Here we are, five years later, with the state putting off change yet again in favor of “studies.” How many of our youth must be exposed to the revolving door of a broken criminal justice system before we see real steps forward? Frankie Bachelder, a former resident of Long Creek who was there five separate times from the ages of 14-16, said it best in his testimony to the Joint Standing Committee on Criminal Justice and Public Safety:

“Each time I was released from Long Creek, there was no real treatment plan, no meaningful re-entry support and no follow-up care. I was sent home and expected to do better, with the same trauma, the same addiction issues and the same lack of support I had before…..the problem wasn’t that I was incapable of change. The problem was that Long Creek wasn’t designed to help me change.”

Powerful, impactful words from a youth who has firsthand experience in not only being
subjected to Long Creek, but finding his way out of addiction and maladaptive behaviors. We know what needs to be done. LD 1923, before its amendments, outlined it in perfect clarity. We must implement services for housing, behavioral health, education, substance use disorder prevention and treatment, wrap-around case management, the list goes on.

The original bill even included a section regarding development of a working group to study options and best practices for repurposing the land and facilities at the center — we had it all, but it was taken away in order for the state to avoid assuming responsibility for affecting change by 2027.

“I’m standing here today employed, sober, involved in my community and working with youth organizations because someone finally invested in my rehabilitation. I am living proof that when we focus on treatment instead of punishment, lives change,” Frankie Bachelder testified.

What is stopping Maine legislators from being the force to invest in our youth? I know that fixing a broken system will take time, money and effort. I know that it is a massive responsibility and it is much easier to let things continue on as they currently stand. Mr. Bachelder probably felt the same after repeated stints at Long Creek. But if he can turn things around, make an effort to dig himself out of a system that is not designed to help him and support his improvement, then the very least we can do is follow his lead.

But we won’t. The Maine State Legislature has proven that. We have failed him, and will continue to fail every child that enters our broken and outdated facility. Why are we so afraid to take action?

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Maine

Colleges: Despite two home runs, UML baseball team falls to Maine

Published

1 day ago

March 28, 2026

Press Room

Colleges: Despite two home runs, UML baseball team falls to Maine

One day after a nine-run victory over Maine, the UMass Lowell baseball team fell 9-5 to the Black Bears during America East action at LeLacheur Park in Lowell.

Despite the game being played in 35-degree temperatures, the River Hawks received a pair of home runs.

Catcher Nicholas Solorzano blasted a solo homer to right field in the second inning. In the ninth inning, first baseman Sean O’Leary ripped a pitch over the fence in right field.

UML managed eight hits. O’Leary led the offense, going 2-for-5 with an RBI and scoring two runs. Center fielder Carlos Martinez went 2-for-5 and drove in one run. Third baseman Joseph DeLanzo went 1-for-4 and collected one RBI.

But three UML pitchers allowed 14 hits to Maine, which scored twice in the second inning, three runs in the fourth and two more runs in the seventh.

Taking the loss was Brian Foley (0-2). Foley allowed seven hits and five earned runs, while striking out four, in 3.1 innings. He was followed on the mound by Nolan Geisler, who yielded seven hits and two earned runs in 3.2 innings.

Track

A group of runners from the UMass Lowell men’s and women’s outdoor track and field team competed on the final day of the Raleigh Relays on Saturday afternoon in Raleigh, N.C.

Junior Emily Burdick (Billerica) kicked off the day in the women’s 800-meter run, finishing in 156th place with a 2:17.20 mark.

Next was the women’s 200, where junior Jayani Santos (Tewksbury) impressed with a 39th-place performance out of 149 runners in 24.75.

The men followed, starting with sophomore Michael Fisher (Wallingford, Conn.) in the 200. He claimed 80th place in 22.46. The 800m run closed out the weekend and graduate student Graham Stedfast (Rowley) and senior Basit Iddriss (Milford) ran well. Stedfast finished in 29th place with a time of 1:51.33, while Iddriss claimed 113th place in 1:53.98.

“It was a good finish to the trip,” said UML head coach Gary Gardner. “Mike and Jayani ran solid second races for the weekend. Emily and Basit had their fastest openers ever. Graham had an illness and lost 10 pounds last week so we are very pleased with his race.”

Women’s lacrosse

In Lowell, senior Macy Shultz (Adams, N.Y.) posted a team-high five points, but UMass Lowell fell 16-10 to the Bryant Bulldogs in the team’s first home conference game of the season.

“A bit of a broken record here,” said UML head coach Lisa Miller. “We are competing. We had players who made and were trying to make plays. We need to keep scrapping, trying to come up with draw control and clear the ball. We are playing good defense and scoring consistently. Need to find a way to generate more offensive possessions.”

Shultz, who finished with three goals and two assists, was one of six River Hawks (4-7, 0-2 AE) to record at least a goal in the contest. Senior Grace Lydon (Rowley) collected two goals and two assists, while junior Bronwyn Hilbert (Lancaster, Pa.) added three points off a goal and two assists.

Junior Chloe Bowers (Whitefish Bay, Wis.) added a pair of goals, while sophomore Georgia Ruscitti (Toronto, Ontario) and redshirt freshman Chiara Pompei (Catonsville, Md.) each tallied a goal.

The River Hawks went straight to work, as Hilbert found Shultz open for the first goal of the contest just over a minute in. Only a few minutes later, the hosts struck again, this time with Lydon finding the back of the net off a Hilbert assist, putting her squad in front 2-0. The Bulldogs retaliated with haste, though, scoring four straight to take a 4-2 lead into the second quarter.

The River Hawks will visit the Binghamton Bearcats next Saturday.