Bar Harbor Council Chair Stresses Unity Around Comprehensive Plan
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BAR HARBOR—Making sure that the town’s comprehensive plan stays first and foremost in the town’s actions was a key talking point during the Bar Harbor Town Council’s September 2 meeting.
That comprehensive plan was enacted by voters in June 2025 and is meant to be a broad vision that steers the town’s future. The discussion touched on how the document, which is over 100 pages long and years in the making, would do that.
“My understanding is that the council oversees the implementation of that whole comp plan,” Town Council Chair Valerie Peacock said, but she wondered who was overseeing that and plotting out the goals and how the council’s own goal setting aligns with the comprehensive plan.
“Part of that is by bringing staff in. This is where Michele’s department becomes very relevant to the conversation,” Town Manager James Smith said, referring to Planning Director Michele Gagnon.
The Bar Harbor Comprehensive Plan has been state approved, voter approved, and found consistent with the state’s growth-management law, tested and formed in multiple public interactions, engagements, surveys, and listening sessions. It was created by planning staff, consultants, and a committee of citizens.
Now that the plan has been enacted, in conjunction with the council’s goals, part of the review process, Smith said, is having enough flexibility that when the town defines its goals and actions, the town can also track down solutions that are actionable. Seeing how those goals fit into a policy framework that sets the vision that the council says it wants for the community and then determining if that all aligns is part of the process, Smith said.
Peacock said the comprehensive plan was “amazing.” She wanted to be sure that the work being done was communicated to the public, and that the council’s next goal setting had the comprehensive plan “present and tied in and active” and that they “were all rowing for the same shore together.”
There is a 22-page implementation plan that was created along with the comprehensive plan.
“Does that still align with that comp plan which is supposed to be flexible and open and help articulate that vision?” Smith said was a question councilors need to think about when they look at previous council goals. “Every year it’s a new council and they set that priority based on your campaigns and what you’ve told the public and what the public has told you they want to see.”
Making all that fit, he said, needs to have the staff part of the process as early as possible.
“Every council is a new council. They are not bound by previous decisions. The community’s temperament for things may shift and slide a little bit,” Smith said.
The work, he said, can take years before a final result is achieved. In Bar Harbor, much of the recent discussion has been about the current lodging moratorium which pauses all construction or extensive renovation of hotels, housing availability, sustainable tourism, and cruise ships.
Putting goals into capital improvement programs, searching and applying for state aid, and planning for those goals becomes a collaborative effort that looks both to the short and long term, Smith said.
The meeting also saw Smith give the council a year-in-review, praising the work that the town staff does that people often don’t notice.
The council also decided to have a workshop potentially during the week of September 15 for goal-setting .
The objective, Smith said, is to bring staff into a conversation space earlier and populate the calendar with updates and a work plan related to the council’s goals.
SPECIAL AMUSEMENT PERMITS
Multiple special amusement permits were approved during the meeting. Those included the Atlantic Oceanside, Bar Harbor Club, Table Salt, and The Travelin’ Lobster.
Businesses that serve alcohol must apply for a permit to play music each year according to state law. There are different classes of permits for music.
The only public comment was about the parameters of the class 1 special amusement permit for Table Salt, which is located on Main Street.
Brad Ipsan said that he lived in the area and asked if it was an indoor or outdoor permit. “We already have several places nearby that do outdoor performances. We listen to them all day long and we are not especially interested in listening to them to ten o’clock at night if the applicant chooses to have the performances in their outdoor dining space.”
Town Clerk Liz Graves said Table Salt’s application is for the class of permit that has no amplification and that it specified the musician would be in the dining room. It only allows one musician to play.
COUNCILORS’ COMMENTS
During the councilors’ comments portion at the end of the meeting, David Kief said he really enjoyed the summer and wondered if there was a way to spread out people in Acadia.
“We’re an international destination, a resort town. I think the sustainable tourism is an important part of trying to preserve what we’ve got now. There are places that are so overcrowded and other places where you can get away from everybody,” Kief said.
Earl Brechlin worried about public access to town meetings. He suggested putting the town’s content out on other platforms, such as YouTube, which is used by Tremont and Mount Desert, to make it easier for people.
Peacock said her family has a boat they keep out on the bay as well as recreational lobster licenses. Recently, when they were pulling traps, a kayak tour group came by. The kayakers cheered when the Peacock family pulled out a lobster from one of the traps.
“All these people from away and we live here and do this all the time, you know. How crazy beautiful it is and how special it is to be here,” Peacock said. “We live here. This is the place that we live. It’s such a beautiful place and even when it’s busy, it’s super beautiful. I make this joke all the time that I go to Bar Harbor for my summer vacation every year . . . but I do.”
Councilor Steve Boucher had an excused absence.
LINKS TO LEARN MORE
Implementation Plan (September 2024)
State statute and rules about comprehensive plans
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