King, Collins: Acadia employees need affordable housing

Photo / Laurie Schreiber Acadia National Park has received the backing of U.S. Sens. King and Collins in its efforts to develop affordable housing options on Mount Desert Island.

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By Staff

Acadia National Park employees need affordable housing.

That was the message from U.S. Sens. Angus King, I-Maine, and Susan Collins, R-Maine, in a letter to U.S. Department of the Interior Secretary David Bernhardt, according to a news release.

Specifically, the letter calls on Bernhardt to establish public-private partnerships that would open up seasonal housing options in the area for Acadia employees.

Allowing Acadia to form public-private partnerships to construct and maintain co-housing opportunities would not only be beneficial to the park, but to local business partners and community members who also struggle with housing shortages, the senators said.

“If successful at Acadia, this model could be utilized at other NPS sites with similar seasonal housing concern,” they wrote.

Acadia employees, along with many hospitality and service employees, face “unique” and growing seasonal housing challenges on Mount Desert Island, they added.

Neighboring Bar Harbor is also wrestling with how to tackle the affordable housing shortage.

A national concern

While seasonal housing for National Park Service employees is a growing concern at other parks, Acadia faces “an exceptional shortage given its geographic constraints,” Kings and Collins said.

Acadia employs approximately 165 seasonal employees each summer and many are dependent on National Park Service-provided housing. Short-term rentals are nearly impossible to find in the summer, as the housing market near Acadia is increasingly dominated by second homes and vacation rentals, the senators noted.

Currently, the park agency has 33 housing units scattered around Acadia in varying conditions, they wrote.The full letter can be downloaded here.

Acadia is continuing its legal and policy review to determine how to implement the legislative authority that allows a public-private partnership to develop employee housing on park land, the park's public affairs specialist, Christie Anastasia, told Mainebiz earlier this week. If Acadia is successful in using that authority, it would be the first National Park Service unit to do so.