ARUNDEL — From organizers to local lawmakers, many in Maine are working to lessen the impact of the state’s housing crisis — and town officials in Arundel are among them.
During a select board meeting on Oct. 23, the board members heard from Town Manager Keith Trefethen, who broached the idea of working with a developer to construct affordable housing on town-owned land located on Bergeron Drive.
During an Arundel Select Board meeting on Oct. 23, Town Manager Keith Trefethen broached the idea of working with a developer to construct affordable housing on town-owned land located on Bergeron Drive. Dan King photo
Trefethen outlined the project, saying “we could offer — to a developer who wishes to work within specific guidelines we provide within a written contract — land that he could develop and use (toward) affordable housing.”
The select board signaled that they wanted more information, and Trefethen promised to return with a more sketched out proposal.
Town Planner Lee Jay Feldman, another person working on the project, floated the idea before the Arundel Planning Board on Tuesday. Speaking to the Kennebunk Post the day before, he emphasized that discussion of any affordable housing project was preliminary. “We’re getting a reading on the temperature in the room,” he said.
Conversation at the select board meeting on Oct. 23 focused on how Bergeron Drive is a less than ideal place for a developer to build. “A contractor would have to do a lot … to make (the property) manageable for housing,” Trefethen acknowledged, adding that two town-owned parcels on the road are very “ledge-y.” But he also said that the town had few options when it comes to large tracts of municipal land where housing could be built. Bergeron Drive is off of Mountain Road, roughly a mile away from the Arundel Town Fire Department.
A project on Bergeron Drive would also require water monitoring. There is currently a transfer station on Bergeron Drive where residents can dispose of household waste and recyclables in dumpsters. According to select board chair Jason Nedeau, as of a few years ago, Bergeron Drive had a landfill where trash would pile up on the ground, allowing for easier contamination of the soil.
“We covered it over with soil and put the proper ventilations in there,” said Nedeau, explaining the town’s compliance with state-mandated clean up efforts in a phone interview this week. “The state requires us to monitor surrounding properties to make sure contaminants (aren’t) seeping into well water. And if (they are), the town would be reliable to mitigate any chemicals or disturbances in the well water,”
At the Oct. 23 meeting, Nedeau said he had reservations about the location on Bergeron Drive, citing the need to monitor groundwater and that each house would need a well. Houses constructed in this area would not be able to use water from Route 1, the only established water line in Arundel, according to Nedeau.
But challenges aside, he said, the board is largely in agreement that the town needs more affordable housing.
Numbers from the Southern Maine Planning and Development Commission substantiate Arundel’s need for housing for families with lower incomes. According to a report issued a few years ago, Arundel ranked among the top most unaffordable communities in York County in 2020 when looking at multiple metrics. For example, the median income earner in Arundel in 2020 brought in roughly $36,000 less than they would need in order to afford the median home price that same year.
Trefethen shared during the select board meeting that his family has been impacted by high housing prices. “My daughter just moved back from South Carolina and is looking for a house to purchase, they’re in the $450,000 to $500,000 range,” he said at the meeting. “That’s a tough pill to swallow.”
Trefethen’s daughter is far from the only person who has been impacted by the housing crisis. In June, an anonymous person on the Biddeford + Saco Community Group Facebook page put out a request for an empty yard where they could pitch a campsite while they continued their search for housing.
“I can offer you $200/week or negotiate some kind of bartering. We are looking for an apartment but have had no luck whatsoever finding something in our price range even looking with roommates has been challenging. We have to leave our apartment this Friday and the campsites around here are all completely booked out for the holiday weekend and the one that isn’t wants $500/week which I just can’t afford,” they wrote.
“Posting anonymously (because) this situation is embarrassing and I know a lot of people in this town.”
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