FOA President and CEO Eric Stiles. (Photo by Lily LaRegina/Friends of Acadia)

BY ERIC STILES

On a beautiful day in mid-December 2023, Acadia Superintendent Kevin Schneider, Friends of Acadia board members Lili Pew and Margaret Jeffrey, Friends of Acadia Chief Financial Officer Jason Irwin, and I gathered at the Dane Farm property in Seal Harbor for a ceremonial groundbreaking to kick off the construction of housing for Acadia’s seasonal employees.

This was a significant moment in Friends of Acadia’s history.

The property (which used to be a gravel pit used for equipment and storage) is located within Acadia’s boundary. Friends of Acadia purchased the land last fall from Seal Harbor Properties, LLC, to add critical housing for Acadia’s seasonal workforce .

As we celebrated this milestone, it occurred to me that by the time the park hires its 2025 seasonal staff next year, eight more of Acadia’s seasonal employees will have housing!

Even more exciting, if you add those eight units at Dane Farm (available in the summer 2025) to the 13 bedrooms we added in 2023, plus the seven RV pads we’re renting for the park short-term, when the 2025 season kicks off, at least 28 more seasonal employees will have housing!

Friends of Acadia doubled down on the challenge of helping to create seasonal workforce housing for the talented men and women who work at Acadia National Park in 2023. But this momentum would not be possible without the foundational work that came before.

For several years, the lack of affordable seasonal workforce housing on Mount Desert Island and surrounding communities has been a key factor in Acadia’s inability to fill its seasonal positions. And now, a tight labor market on top of the housing crisis is making it even worse.

The work to plan and assess how best to address Acadia’s seasonal housing crisis began in the fall of 2020 when the Friends of Acadia board and staff established the Seasonal Workforce Housing Task Force. The task force worked to better understand the challenges, to explore what role Friends of Acadia might take to support the park, and how our efforts could complement the work of others.

In 2022, we developed a comprehensive housing strategy with the goal of adding 130 bedrooms for Acadia and its partners over the next decade.

The plan called for short-, mid-, and long-term actions, such as renovating existing park units;
purchasing commercial facilities like B&Bs or motels; constructing new housing on carefully selected sites within park boundaries; and adding more RV trailer pads to Acadia’s campgrounds.

In March of 2023, Friends of Acadia funded the renovation of three bedrooms in existing park housing, and also purchased the Kingsleigh Inn – formerly a B&B in Southwest Harbor – to provide an additional 10 bedrooms. We acquired the Dane Farm parcel in September and, prior to that, worked with residents of the Seal Harbor community to answer questions and get input on project design.

This progress over the years has taken commitment, resolve, and resilience. It involves our great
partners at Acadia National Park, our dedicated staff and board, community partners, support from congressional leaders, and, of course, Friends of Acadia members and donors.

By helping solve the seasonal housing crisis, we are providing places for people who work in the park to live – an essential commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion in the workforce.

Together, we are raising the roof and making a difference, one bedroom, one park ranger at a time.