League of Women Voters Downeast Forum at the Jesup Highlights Housing Visions and Infrastructure
May 13, 2026
The Bar Harbor Story is generously sponsored by Paradis Ace Hardware.
BAR HARBOR—Six of the seven Town Council candidates were able to attend a League of Women Voters–Downeast forum at the Jesup Memorial Library on Monday, May 11.
Council candidate Paul Saltysiak did not attend.
On April 15, Tammy Richards, an eighth candidate, announced that she would not run due to an unexpected family health issue. Saltysiak had said he would not attend the forum.
The rest of the seven candidates running for three available Town Council seats answered two previously known questions that they could prepare for ahead of time and then fielded questions collated from the audience by the Mount Desert Islander and Bar Harbor Story. Both papers also co-sponsored the LWV’s event.
Students from Mount Desert Island High School participated as timers in the event, which had approximately 30 in attendance while others watched via ZOOM.
After Moderator Ann Luther read the candidates’ short bios, the questions began in a cordial forum that focused mostly on town infrastructure and budget, but also delved into leadership styles as well as town interactions with federal law enforcement and the candidates’ vision for Bar Harbor in ten years.
Vice Chair Maya Caines and Councilor David Kief are running for reelection.
They’re challenged by Bryce Lambert, Paul Saltysiak, Charles Sidman, Deborah Vickers, and Nathan Young.
Candidates had two questions they knew of ahead of time. The rest of the questions came from the League and then the audience. The program was also presented via Zoom.
WHAT WILL BAR HARBOR BE LIKE IN TEN YEARS
Charles Sidman said he imagined Bar Harbor would be visually similar to today, but the town has challenges that if are not addressed, the town will be hollowed out and become more of a theme park for visitors exclusively.
“I think our serious issues, and the way I believe we have to work towards, is to balance the perspectives and the interest of the different members of our community, and do so in a way which is financially, fiscally sustainable,” Sidman said.
He praised everyone on the panel running and said each had a lot of affection for the community.
“But we talk in generalities too much and we don’t make active decisions enough,” he said. “So we kick cans down the road and then the problems get worse and worse. And so while things look excellent and attractive on the surface, I think we have to dig deeper.”
Maya Caines said she saw Bar Harbor as a community that feels balanced and as a place where year round residents could also thrive.
“In 10 years, I see Bar Harbor as a community that feels balanced and a place where year-round residents go to third spaces. Those are places that they can visit without having to spend money and can just be that weren’t their work or their home,” she said. “I want to see the people that live here excited when summer rolls around and the tourists come, and I want the tourists to see this as an eco-tourism destination where they really have a great appreciation for the natural beauty that’s around us.”
She would like it to be a place that invites new people in and where those who want to stay are able to, a place where people can start a family and live without being priced out. She added that she understood it was naïve to say that these things will all happen in just 10 years, but would like the town to feel like it’s on track toward those goals.
Nathan Young said the town is almost a year into its Comprehensive Plan and the implementation part of that plan needs to be followed as a template where the town needs to be. The Tourism Task Force seems to be doing great work.
“What I want to see is an affordable town. I’ve seen too many people leave here,” he said because they couldn’t afford to live here. They can’t keep up with their tax bills.
“The town needs to get its expenses under control and recognize that fiscal responsibility is not with an inflation rate of 36% and the town spends 106% over the last 10 years, and that doesn’t even include debt service. That’s alarming to me, and it should be alarming to many,” Young said.
David Kief said he wasn’t sure what the town should look like. He’s apprehensive about what it will look like.
“We’re trapped by this theme park that we’ve developed that made the tourist industry our most driving force, our biggest economic force,” he said and that there isn’t a diversity of employment.
“It’s not a town for locals any more,” he said and added that there needs to be a revenue stream developed to take pressure off the residential property owners.
Deborah Vickers said she’d like Bar Harbor to look like it looks like now.
“One of my favorite phrases to people is ‘we live where people vaction.’ How great is that? That we live in this place that people want to come here and experience and enjoy what we do every day?” she asked. “How do we keep a fine balance? That’s tricky and right now we’re in a quagmire and we have to figure this out: how to have a good balance, to have nice streets, nice pavements, public restrooms, but also balance having guests who come into this town and want to visit and want to experience what we experience.”
“This is our town, and to get there, we have to come together and be more unified, hopefully stop hearing us against them,” Vickers said.
Bryce Lambert said the forward-looking question makes him nostalgic.
“I grew up here. My mom worked at Miguel’s back in the ‘90s and I just remember there being a year-round community then. Even weekdays in the winters, you could go to a restaurant and see 25, 30 people that you knew, and we don’t have that year-round community anymore,” Lambert said.
In 10 years, he’d like to see people at Jax choosing to and being able to live on Mount Desert Island.
“I’d like to make it possible for people that live and work on the island to live and work on the island, to do both, not choose one or the other,” he said.
THINKING ABOUT HOUSING IN THE COMMUNITY, IF YOU HAD THE POWER TO CREATE HOUSING UNITS, WHAT TYPE WOULD YOU BUILD AND WHERE?
Kief said there is limited housing in Bar Harbor.
“There’s quite a few people, retirees, that would like to move into something a little more manageable. And if there was a source of housing for retirees that they could stay in the community without as much upkeep, that could free up some housing options,” he said. “Obviously, we’d have to try to have some incentive for the sellers or whatever to sell to you people or people that want to live here and make a life here.”
Vickers said that housing was an issue even when she tried to move to town in December 2005.
“I would like to just see more middle-income housing. We need housing for everybody, but there’s such high rates in the town, for even property, for teardowns,” she said.
It’s happening all across Maine she said and it needs to be focused on.
Lambert said he wasn’t sure where he’d place it, but he’d like to see more multi-family, apartment-style housing.
“If you have multiple people moving into these types of buildings, you can spread the cost out a little bit more,” he said.
More densely packed apartments would be helpful for younger people who can’t currently afford a mortgage. He stressed that he knew multiple people working multiple jobs to survive.
Young referenced the recent housing legislation meant to decrease zoning restrictions so that more affordable housing can be built. He was concerned about lot consolidation and minimum lot sizes being decreased.
“The minimum lot size that we have in place right now are there for a reason and a well balanced reason,” Young said.
The increase in housing being built in Ellsworth and Hancock via apartment buildings and mobile home parks’ expansions worries him because of traffic, and increased traffic volume coming onto MDI.
Like Lambert who said he didn’t know if he could ever buy a home in town, Young said he’d grown up being told, “You’re not going to be able to afford to live here.”
“It’s never been any more true than it is now,” he said. Regaining housing that the town has lost is a monumental task, he said, and requires regional work.
“If I could wave a magic wand, I think I would build a variety of units,” Caines said. “We would have apartments, multi-family homes, giant houses with yards. And I would require new construction to also have housing on top of them. So, when there’s a bank being built or a shop, there should housing associated with that. Same with transient accommodations,” she said.
She also stressed that Bar Harbor has approximately 1,000 housing units, which she said, is double what it needs, but most are unoccupied or underutilized.
“So my question is how do we incentivize people to use that housing year-round?”
she asked.
Sidman said the town has the power to be practical and realistic.
“We can’t ignore the laws or the realities of economics,” he said. “Wealthy people have second homes here. I don’t see us motivating them or incentivizing them to give those up for the general housing stock.”
He suggested more rental housing as apartment buildings or small community clusters. He also suggested following Mount Desert’s model. He also advocated for smaller homes.
OTHER QUESTIONS
Other questions focused on the town’s infrastructure, pay-as-you-throw garbage fees, changing how commercial garbage operators use the town’s dump, downtown congestion, leadership style, dealing with potential ICE activity in town, and the greatest barriers to building across divides.
All seemed to agree on changing how commercial garbage operators use the transfer station and eventually creating a pay-as-you-through system for residential users. Most expressed frustration that the state legislators consistently deny local option sales tax requests, which could potentially greatly ease the burden of Bar Harbor property tax payers who have to support the infrastructure for the tourism industry while the state gathers the sales tax from those tourists.
When it came to the budget and town infrastructure costs such as road and water main reconstruction, and the school rebuild, there was a bit more division. Caines, Kief, and Vickers spoke to costs that occur because of deferred maintenance. Sidman mentioned that as well, but along with Young, said there could be more whittling away of some expenses in the budget, noting what he said was a doubling of the town’s vehicle fleet, new positions, and employees who are not department heads having take-home vehicles.
All also seemed to agree that using the current amenities such as the Island Explorer and Acadia Gateway Center in Trenton, as well as advocating for their use and the Explorer having longer hours were good options. Some spoke of a need for a centralized parking garage or dedicated bike lanes. Others spoke to the difficulty of getting people who drive to the island to not use their cars while on the island.
Multiple candidates consistently spoke of balancing needs throughout the approximately two-hour discussion.
You can see the candidates’ full responses at the video posted below.
To read our Town Council candidate profiles, head here.
To read our Warrant Committee candidate profiles, head here.
To see all of our election coverage, head to our dedicated tab here.
All photos: Shaun Farrar/BHS
HELP SUPPORT THE BAR HARBOR STORY
When we started The Bar Harbor Story, we didn’t know if anyone would read it. But you showed up. You shared. You sent tips. Now—over 400,000 views every month later—it’s clear: people here care about their community and each other.
We’ve kept everything free because news should never be out of reach, but every one of our stories takes time to write, and your support keeps The Bar Harbor Story going.
If you value our work, please consider a paid subscription, a founding membership, or a sponsorship.
It truly helps us cover one more meeting, tell one more story, shine one more light.
Even $5 a month makes a difference. Click here to become a one-time supporter now.
Thank you so much for being here.
Founding member information can be found here.
Have questions about sponsorships? Just send Shaun an email at sfarrar86@gmail.com, he’d love to hear from you.
Discover more from Bar Harbor Story
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.