Maine
Getting back to business
Putting the coast of Maine back together will take know-how and patience
After two back-to-back, record-breaking storms in Maine, there may not be any getting back to normal. According to a webinar offered by the Island Institute in Rockland, Maine, normal is over.
The Gulf of Maine has risen 7.5 inches in the last hundred years, and that rate is expected to increase, with a rise of 1.5 feet in the next 26 years. Things are expected to get worse and the public and private owners of the coastal infrastructure that needs rebuilding are getting the message. “We need to overbuild,” says Mark Zaccadelli, owner of Ocean’s Edge Marine Construction in Bristol, Maine.
The waves have laid down, the storm surge has receded, and slowly on the coast of Maine, fishermen and wharf owners are coming to terms with the challenges of rebuilding.
“As I understand it the DEP [Maine Department of Environmental Protection] is going to let people rebuild piers and shoreside stabilization on the original footprints. And they can raise the piers by four feet,” says Zaccadelli. “Right now, it you rebuild on the original footprint, you can get a permit by rule, which takes two weeks. But if you make changes, like raising the height, it would usually require an NRPA, which can take six months to a year, and you have to work with the DEP and the US Army Corps of Engineers.”
On permitting, Zaccadelli has found the process so time consuming that he contracts it out to Gartley & Dorsky, an engineering and surveying firm in Camden, Maine. But the Maine Legislature’s Environmental Committee voted in favor of the fast-track permit by rule process for wharf owners who want to build stronger structures.
Zaccadelli was fully booked before the storms and now he’s helping people get their bearings on where to go.
“I’m getting calls,” he says. “People trying to figure out what to do. The days of driving piles with a backhoe or pushing them in with a crane are over. We have a pneumatic pile driver that can get pilings down to the clay, the hardpan that’s going to hold them, and that’s what has to be done now.”
Zaccadelli has looked at some wharves that need to be rebuilt and where necessary he is advising owners to start from scratch. “We can pull or jet out older pilings that are not going to last, and we have to rethink the bracing,” he says, noting that trying to save a dollar could end up costing more if storms like January’s are truly the new normal.
“I like to think my rates are reasonable,” says Zaccadelli. “Marine construction is a different beast than construction on land. You have wind and tide to deal with.” Not to mention often working blindly. “A lot of the coast is ledge,” he points out. “From the low water up, we can drill and pin pilings, but in deeper water it gets more difficult.”
Zaccadelli notes that the high cost of hiring a well-equipped marine construction company like his, or Prock Marine Company in Rockland, or several others, not to mention their limited availability, will compel many people to do their own work.
He believes the pile drivers used Downeast for building herring weirs could do a reasonable job. “Those are similar to what I have, just slower. As long as you’re getting a 1/4 inch of movement with each hit, keep going. I usually do ten more drops when I see no movement, just to make sure you’re not up against a rock or somthing.”
Zaccadelli recommends southern yellow pine for pilings. “Or steel, though that requires maintenance. But the oak days are over,” he says.
It’s clear, based on the messaging coming from the Department of Marine Resources, the science being presented by the Island Institute, and what Zaccadelli point out is common sense, that Maine needs to build back stronger in order to have a resilient working waterfront. But with inflation and a high demand for material and workers, especially skilled workers, the rebuild will obviously cost more.
While many wharf owners want to build back quickly, many foresee a lot of ‘skiffing.’
“You know, fishermen will have to load all their product and things into a skiff to land it,” says Amity Chipman of Chipman’s Wharf in Milbridge.
According to Gabrian McPhail of Resilient Communities on Vinalhaven, there is funding available, but primarily for the public sector. For example, Governor Janet Mills has proposed using $50 million from the state’s rainy-day fund to help communities rebuild, and federal money may be coming.
“I’m less familiar with private sector funding sources that are short-term, response-type options,” says McPhail. “Business grant programs and low-interest loans through USDA and the Economic Development Administration are longer term funding mechanisms. Long term public funding options that can also benefit private infrastructure are FEMA Hazard Mitigation Grants.”
McPhail suggest that one way for private companies to learn about available funding is to contact their regional planning organization, which she believes should be able to talk to them about funds that it administers or connect them to more information and resources. She adds this link to all the regional planning organizations in the state:
“You can also add the Sunrise County Economic Council to that list,” McPhail says. “The Island Institute also has a list of financial resources for rebuilding the working waterfront. As does the Maine Coast Fishermens’ Association and the DMR.
So far the Island Institute has awarded 14 grants of up to $5,000 to working waterfront businesses that in total impact, 96 full-time employees, 102 part-time employees, and more than 640 fishing boats or aquaculture operators who rely on these facilities. These grants are a drop in the bucket of what will be needed, but they’re a start.
FALMOUTH, Maine (WABI) – The now former commissioner of the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife has a new role.
Judy Camuso has been selected as the new president of Maine Audubon.
She will take over Andy Beahm’s position.
Beahm will be retiring next month.
Camuso will become the first woman to lead the environmental organization.
She became the first woman to become commissioner of the MDIFW back in 2019, a position she held for seven years.
Copyright 2026 WABI. All rights reserved.
TOPSFIELD, Maine — Jenna Stoddard is not sure where her son will spend his days when he starts preschool next fall.
Sending him to East Range II School would be convenient and continue a legacy. Stoddard lives just down the street and her husband graduated eighth grade there in 2007, one in a class of three. Topsfield’s population has dropped since then. The school now has five students, two teachers, few extracurricular activities and nobody trained to teach music, art, gym or health.
Stoddard’s son is too young for her to worry about that now. But the school may not be open by the time he is ready to go. Topsfield, a town of just 175 residents, will vote on whether to close the school on April 30. If it closes, the boy would likely be sent to preschool up to 30 minutes away in Princeton or Baileyville.
“That’s a pretty fair distance for a kid, a 4-year-old, who is now on a bus all by himself,” she said. “[If] school starts at [7:45 a.m.], what time is the bus picking 4-year-olds up here? And what time is he going to get home at?”
Topsfield is an extreme example of how an aging, shrinking population and rising property taxes are forcing Maine towns to make difficult choices about their community institutions. Just over a dozen people came to a Wednesday hearing on the idea of closing the school. The crowd was mostly in favor of it.
“It is emotional to close the school in a town,” Superintendent Amanda Belanger of the sprawling Eastern Maine Area School System said then. “But we do feel it’s in the best interest of the students in the town.”
Teacher Paula Johnson walked a reporter through the building, which is small by Maine standards but cavernous for its five students. It has four classrooms, a small library, and a gymnasium. There is also a cook and a custodian for the tiny school.
A hallway trophy case serves as a reminder of when the school was big enough to field basketball teams. Topsfield’s student population has never been large, but the school’s population has dropped dramatically over the past few years. It had 25 students in 2023, with many coming from nearby Vanceboro, which closed its own school in 2015.
As the student population dwindled, the cost of sending students to Topsfield climbed. With fewer students to defray the costs, Vanceboro officials realized they would be paying $23,000 per student by the last school year. So they opted to direct students to nearby Danforth, where tuition was only $11,000 per student.
East Range lost seven students from Vanceboro, bringing its enrollment below 10. Under Maine law, that means the district may offer students the option to go elsewhere. Parents of the remaining students in grades 5 through 8 took the option and sent their kids to Baileyville. This school began the year with eight students; three have since pulled out.
In Topsfield, Johnson teaches four of the remaining five, holding lessons for pre-K through second grade in one classroom. Another one down the short hallway is home base for the other teacher. She focuses on the school’s lone fourth grader and occasionally teaches one of Johnson’s first graders, who is learning at an advanced level.
The other teacher, who holds a special education certificate despite having no students with those needs, plans to leave at the end of the school year. If the school stays open, that will leave Johnson responsible for educating Topsfield’s youngest students, though the school will need to budget for a part-time special education teacher just in case.
After 11 years at the school, Johnson is not sure what she will do if voters shut it down.
“We’ll see what happens here,” she said.
Topsfield’s school board, which operates as a part of the Eastern Maine Area School System, is offering its residents a choice: continue funding the school only for students between preschool and second grade at an estimated cost of $434,000 next year or send all students elsewhere, which would cost less than $200,000.
At Wednesday’s hearing, the attendees leaned heavily toward the latter option. Deborah Mello said she moved from Rhode Island to Topsfield years ago to escape high taxes.
“It’s not feasible for the town of Topsfield,” she said. “We cannot afford it and it’s not like the children don’t have a school to go to.”
Others bemoaned the burden of legal requirements for the small district, including the need to provide special education teachers even if they don’t need one. Board members also mentioned that in 2028, the district will become responsible for educating 3-year-olds under a new state law. That adds another layer of uncertainty to future budgeting.
“It sounds like we’ve been burdened something severely by this program and that program by the Department of Education, to the point where a small school can’t even exist,” resident Alan Harriman said.
“And that’s been happening for a long time,” East Range board chair Peggy White responded.
Daniel O’Connor is a Report for America corps member who covers rural government as part of the partnership between the Bangor Daily News and The Maine Monitor, with additional support from BDN and Monitor readers.
BANGOR, Maine (WABI) – Good morning and Happy Sunday everyone. Skies are cloudy with fog across much of Maine this morning. Rain has entered locations along the interstate and to the northwest. Temperatures vary from the upper 30s to mid 40s. Winds are out of the SE between about 5-15 mph.
Today will be a wet and impactful day with rain and even snow anticipated as a large cold front passes through Maine. Skies will be cloudy with plenty of fog lasting through the morning. Rain will expand across the interstate by the late morning hours, reaching Downeast locations by midday/the early afternoon.
By the early to midafternoon, temperatures will start to drop across northwestern locations as the cold front passes through Maine. This will result in rain turning over to mixed precipitation and eventually snow across the Western Mountains, Moosehead region, and Northern Maine. Rain will continue steadily and at times heavily across the foothills, Interstate, Coast, and Downeast. A few thunderstorms are even possible closer to the coast.
Snow will expand across areas to the northwest of the interstate this evening, reaching all the way down to Interior Midcoast communities, the Bangor region, and Interior Downeast areas by sunset and into the start of the night. Precipitation will taper off across Western Maine shortly after sunset, before exiting the entire state around midnight tonight. High temps today will vary from the low 40s to low 50s with SSE to NW gusts reaching 20-25 mph.
Snowfall totals will vary under 2 inches across Western, Northern, and Interior Downeast locations. However, a few pockets of 2-4 inches are possible, mostly in higher elevations across the mountains. Rainfall totals will accumulate around a half inch to three quarters of an inch when all is said and done.
Precipitation will be out of Maine by midnight tonight, with cloudy conditions giving way to mostly clear skies by sunrise. Lows overnight will dip back below freezing across much of the state, from the low 20s to mid 30s tonight, so cover up any plants or flowers outside. WNW gusts will reach 20-25 mph. A Small Craft Advisory is expected offshore.
Skies will be partly to mostly sunny across the interstate and coast on Monday morning. However, by the late morning to midday hours, clouds will build with a few scattered rain and snow showers in spots. Conditions will remain on the cloudier side in the afternoon before clearing up around sunset into the start of Monday night. Highs will be chilly on Monday, from the low 30s to upper 40s. WNW to SW gusts will be a bit breezy, reaching 20-25 mph, which will add to the wind chill factor.
High pressure will build on Monday night, remaining overhead on Tuesday. Skies will be sunny in the morning, becoming partly to mostly sunny in the afternoon. Highs will remain cool, in the 40s across the board with North to SW gusts only reaching 15-20 mph.
A weaker low-pressure system could bring showers across Maine on Wednesday and Thursday. There is a bit of model uncertainty on exactly when it will impact Maine. The GFS has impacts on Wednesday, while the EURO, GRAF, and GDPS models have most of the impacts on Thursday. We will continue to monitor this system and potential impacts. All it looks to provide as of now are cloudier skies and rain showers, with some snow shower chances farther to the North.
By Friday and Saturday, conditions are trending on the drier side with sunshine and average temperatures returning to the forecast.
SUNDAY: Highs from low 40s to low 50s. Cloudy with AM fog. Rain becoming widespread throughout the day, turning over to snow to the north & west during PM. SSE to NW gusts reach 20-25 mph.
MONDAY: Highs from low 30s to upper 40s. Partly to mostly sunny early. Developing clouds with scattered rain/snow showers by midday/afternoon. WNW to SW gusts reach 20-25 mph.
TUESDAY: Highs throughout the 40s. Sunnier AM. Partly to mostly sunny PM. North to SW gusts reach 15-20 mph.
WEDNESDAY: Highs from low 40s to low 50s. Mostly cloudy with a few rain showers. Few AM snow showers possible North. SSE to SSW gusts reach 20-25 mph.
THURSDAY: Highs from mid 40s to mid 50s. Cloudier skies with rain showers possible. Some AM snow showers possible North. NW gusts reach 20-25 mph.
FRIDAY: Highs from upper 40s to mid 50s. Partly cloudy. NNW gusts reach 20 mph.
Copyright 2026 WABI. All rights reserved.
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