Leaving Frenchboro Harbor. FILE PHOTO: TOM GROENING

Working Waterfront

Listening led to harbor dredging funds

Last month, Sen. Susan Collins secured $500,000 in federal funding to dredge Frenchboro’s Lunt Harbor. The small island eight miles off Mount Desert Island relies on marine transportation and fishing for survival, so a safely navigable harbor is critical for the island’s everyday function. The harbor, the main point for… SEE MORE

Lubec's Main Street. FILE PHOTO: TOM GROENING

Working Waterfront

Climate change impacting property insurance

Coastal property owners may be in for a surprise when their home insurance is up for renewal. Damages to homes from this winter’s high winds, storm surges, and driving rain has meant higher premiums and canceled policies in some zip codes. Roger Quirk of Lubec learned that one company no… SEE MORE

Monhegan School. FILE PHOTO: TOM GROENING

Working Waterfront

The wonder and work of island schools

Teaching a handful of students, each in a different grade, in a quaint one- or two-room school overlooking the harbor on a remote Maine island accessible by ferry that runs intermittently in the winter might sound like complete nuttiness to one person, an interesting puzzle to figure out to another,… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Funding is ending for affordable internet program

Brenda Hunt lives in a shipping container on her five acres of land in Blue Hill. But her rugged dwelling is equipped with fiber optic cables, which are expected to be able to deliver highest-speed internet for many years. The internet has reached more people in the U.S. now than… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Women of the waterfront

Facilities manager. Juggler. Mediator. First responder. Diplomat. Code enforcer. These are some of the roles harbormasters fill, as revealed during a panel discussion hosted by Midcoast Women on March 13 at Rockport Public Library. Kathy Given has been Belfast’s harbormaster for 30 years. She’s not sure whether she was Maine’s… SEE MORE

“The J. O. Brown Boatyard, North Haven” (2012) by Seaver Leslie; transparent watercolor, 11-inches by 14 inches.

Working Waterfront

Seaver Leslie pays tribute to Brown Boatyard

Leslie painted at the boatyard in the spring and summer of 2009 and 2010, focusing on the interior, with a series of detailed drawings preceding the watercolors. SEE MORE

The Pemaquid Light fog signal bell shown on a postcard dating to about 1905. PHOTO: MAINE MARITIME MUSEUM

Working Waterfront

Centuries-old infrastructure laid bare

Coastal Maine continues to reel from the effects of back-to-back January storms that caused long-lasting damage to working waterfronts, homes, areas of leisure, as well as cultural heritage sites. By nature of their location, lighthouses and their supporting structures are especially vulnerable to the destruction caused by extreme winds, surf,… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

The new shape of water

How does water shape communities? I think about this as I load onto the Sunbeam on my way to Frenchboro, an island community off the coast of Mount Desert Island. It is a beautiful blue-sky morning, deceivingly sunny for my weather app to be reading 20 degrees. Working and living… SEE MORE

The Oliver’s Ridge workforce housing project on Deer Isle, shortly after construction concluded.

Working Waterfront

‘Attainable’ housing: lessons learned

Deer Isle and Stonington and Mount Desert Island are separated by a short hop across Blue Hill Bay. But if housing shortages are to be addressed, those two regions should tailor their work differently, and consider solutions within the context of a micro-region. That was one of the takeaways from… SEE MORE

Hotel housekeeping workers in Southport.

Working Waterfront

Feds make more work visas available

Sens. Susan Collins and Angus King announced that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Labor (DOL) are expected to make an additional 64,716 H-2B temporary nonagricultural worker visas available for fiscal year 2024 on top of the congressionally mandated 66,000 H-2B visas that are available each… SEE MORE