Since I have a couple of emails asking, I just want to triple ensure that everyone knows that the Bar Harbor Story doesn't respond to comment as Admin. That's Stephen Coston's account, which is why he's also signed his comments with his name. Stephen is not an administrator of the Bar Harbor Story. It's just his Substack id.
Currently, the only accounts that represent the Bar Harbor Story are this one (Carrie Jones) and Shaun Farrar's. Shaun's is also labelled with his own name.
I totally agree with the letter. As stated in my recent letter to the editor in MDIslander, after a recent trip to the Galapagos, I was so impressed with how they have protected their natural resources. We have a magical island and town and need to preserve its beauty and its livability.
We need to stand up to the business interests who will use legal gambits and intimidation to maximize their profits at the expense of preserving the town’s future for our schools, affordable housing, and the next generation.
The town council now needs to extend the moratorium and stand up to those who seek only profits for themselves.
Ever studied basic economics? A moratorium simply makes each hotel- motel room way more valuable / expensive. 1. You are helping the people you despise get even richer, 2. You are making it so only people who either have a trust fund or a very high paying job able to come and visit BH.
How are "business interests"--the ones that employ the majority of what working age people are left here, and represent most of what upward income mobility opportunities actually exist on this island--operating "at the expense" of "the next generation"?
Couple other questions:
-Do you currently work at all? If so, on this island? I do, and I employ hundreds of others who do.
-Are you from here? I am.
-How much have you pledged to the new school? I'm at $100,000.
-Stephen Coston, "user of legal gambits and intimidation to maximize profits"/local person who grew up here and stayed here by starting a local business employing other local people
"Recently, we were in Camden and Belfast, and noticed once again how charming and thriving these downtowns are. They have struggles with traffic in the summer season, but we were struck by the fact that there are hardly any hotels to be found in the downtown area. The difference with Bar Harbor was striking. I asked a shopkeeper how that was possible, and she replied, “It’s in our zoning and regulations. We don’t want hotels downtown.”"
Uh....you sure you've been to Camden? I count 305 hotel rooms in Camden in the core downtown area, located within 1 mile of the intersection of Main & Elm streets at the center of downtown. If Camden's zoning has sought to prevent hotels downtown, it has done a terrible job of it; the vast majority of hotel rooms that exist in Camden are in the downtown area.
305? Okay, how many does Bar Harbor have downtown.
One thing I’ll agree with the letter writer about — Camden has a lot more charm than Bar Harbor. Downtown Bar Harbor is quite ugly and half the shops and restaurants are selling/serving absolute garbage.
Bar Harbor has a lot more hotel rooms than Camden in general, both in its downtown and outside its downtown. Camden doesn't have a National Park and isn't nearly the draw that Bar Harbor is. But none of that is the point. The point is, the writer of this letter states that Camden's zoning has prevented Camden from having hotels in its downtown, which is plainly not true--almost all the hotel rooms that Camden has are located in its downtown area. I get that you're very obviously set in your position and thus you're sympathetic to the author, but facts matter, and when it comes to facts there's a whole lot wrong with this letter.
Excellent letter! Two other places in Bar Harbor that I know of that evicted year round residents for hospitality industry workers were the on Pleasant Street off of Ledglawn Avenue and on a side street off of Route 3 near Sweet Pea farm. When I and my husband raised concerns about our residents being squeezed out of their affordable housing, and forced to travel to many towns in a search for anywhere to live, the biggest employer’s attorney essentially accused us of racism in his legal briefs to the courts. I mention this because the the uber players in the lodging industry will go to any lengths to preserve their profits, and they will try to denigrate anyone who suggests their development agenda is less than anything wonderful for the community.
In spite of these nasty, and clearly untrue personal attacks, I agree that all levels of tourism development is beyond the pale in BH. I am encouraged a broader group of year round residents are speaking out clearly and effectively that there is almost nothing left of their town that reflects the pace of small town living.
I have moved to another popular destination for tourists, but towns here, both official government bodies, annual town meetings , citizens, and the business community seem to understand the importance of year round community. yes, there is an affordable housing crisis, but local towns actually work together to address this problem: across the street from me is a 62 unit affordable apartment complex going up, with adequate on site parking in a former administrative bank building. This is a mixed residential commercial zone, one of eight in this town of 6800. There are no big hotels in town, a scattering of B and Bs, a few motels, maybe an inn or two, and many vacation rentals. Most of the town is zoned residential, and only recently, has there been proposals to limit VRs in some way which have been defeated at annual town meetings. It is a beach culture, and the VR industry has been here for decades, if not a century. No cruise ships here per the shoals and lack of deep water.
At least I can walk on the sidewalks, and have adequate parking, and my resident permit stickers allow me parking at all the beaches and town landings. Non residents must pay dearly for their stickers which are usable only at certain beaches. The Cape Cod National Seashore has provided Eastham residents only parking at certain popular beach sites such as Nauset Light during high season. Obviously, Eastham values its year round residents.
I point these factors out simply to illustrate that some small towns have prioritized year round living versus just an endless free for al for corporations to do what they please.
I hope you keep letting your concerns be known, and the powers that be , take you seriously and do something.
We all live on a very small and very beautiful island that attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors each year. Cruise ships, for all the hysteria devoted to them, are a small part of the total visitors. Aside from Jax and MDI Hospital, tourism is the only major viable industry on this island. What other major industry could MDI support?
A limit has been reached. Venice is another small island popular with tourists and its beauty is entirely made by humans over a couple of thousand years. To preserve their beautiful surroundings Venetians have taken to limiting tourism. The same is happening in other popular tourist destinations. MDI must do so as well. Hundreds of workers are employed here in seasonal jobs either to serve tourists or to protect our natural beauty from over use and climate change, or to maintain the infrastructure that supports tourism. Those employees need housing that they can afford on the limited incomes offered by seasonal work.
Steps are being taken to manage and limit the visits. Bar harbor has drastically reduced cruise ship visits. Acadia National Park has instituted a reservation system for visits to the summit of Cadillac Mountain. There are rumors that visits to Sand Beach, Jordan Pond, and Thunder Hole will be restricted as well. These steps are necessary to protect our natural beauty and to limit the degradation of the visitor experience. Other popular national parks are limiting visitors so as not to spoil the natural beauty that makes them so popular.
Employers are working to house the employees who are so necessary for MDI's economy. With the help of Friends of Acadia, the National Park Service is expanding its own employee housing so that workers needed to protect and preserve its natural beauty can be attracted to our relatively remote location. Other employers are engaged in similar moves to attract and retain employees by providing affordable housing. The Acadia Gateway Center in Trenton will enhance public transit options for visitors and relieve summer traffic on the only road connecting MDI with the rest of the state. Many of those who must work on MDI if we are to have a vibrant economy and preserve our natural beauty must live off the island and thereby contribute to the heavy traffic on that single road.
It is clear that major interests in this area are developing and implementing plans to managing visitation. The writing is on the wall. Now is not the time to expand lodging options on MDI, especially in downtown Bar Harbor.
One last comment I would like to make is that- if the residents are so concerned about the lodging owners gobbling up houses, apartments downtown- then they should be required to build housing at their lodging facilities. I’m pretty sure Stephen Coston does this- and his employees do not pay 1 single cent to stay there. In addition, I’ve heard from some of Coston’s employees- including a college student from Slovenia - that she was extremely grateful for the opportunity to work for Stephen this past summer. She was paid very well, treated with respect, and had comfortable living accommodations.
Currently (December) we are housing 25 people. These 25 people are employed in Bar Harbor year-round and have no rent or utilities expenses. For the most part they live at the properties they work at in housing we've built either at or in the hotels.
Personally, if the Town wants to require a housing component for new lodging uses I don't really care. My pending application had housing included anyway--three apartments.
The lodging industry isn't the obstacle to affordable housing that it's made out to be. People just say that because they want Bar Harbor to function as their own exclusive retirement community. They're elitists that dislike the visitors that they themselves were prior to moving here in retirement. Now they stump for "year-round community" while villifying year-round local businesses as they spend the winter in Florida.
So their homes sit dark while they blame our businesses for the dark houses. Can't make it up. LoL.
That’s 25 people that can be easily exploited because they depend on you for both housing and employment. They are not able to take a job elsewhere without also finding housing. That means even if they were unhappy with their job they’d be less likely to look elsewhere for work.
Year round employees should be able to secure housing in the community that doesn’t tie them to a single employer.
Unfortunately too much housing has been converted to short term rentals and housing for seasonal workers. Now employers such as yourself and Jax are proving year round housing by necessity, but it is not ideal.
I'm exploiting people who are employed at will and live for free in buildings I've bought and paid for? Good grief. Out of curiosity--aside from cease to exist, is there anything I could do that you'd approve of? How about the hundreds of thousands of dollars I've given away in the community? Is that exploitative too?
I said they can be exploited, which is true of someone dependent on their employer for housing. I have no reason to think you are exploiting then. However, it’s hard to leave a toxic work environment if it also means becoming homeless. This is true for Jax housing as well.
And I don’t fault you for providing housing for your employees. It’s a necessary reality now, but ideally year round workers living in our town full time would be able to find housing that doesn’t tie them to a single employer.
When I was on the Town Council I crafted and got passed a motion with several bullet points to address zoning obstacles to affordable housing--density, height, etc. The Planning Board shot it down instantly.
This town is full of NIMBYs who value green space over affordable housing, which implies more people per square foot. When you force people to pay for more real estate than they need or want--which is exactly what land use regulations in Bar Harbor do--you make it artificially expensive to live here. Simple as that. I'm one of only a few who've ever actually tried to change that, yet I get blamed for helping cause the "housing crisis." Lmao.
This Town's entire discourse and outlook are broken. The Town perpetuates the very problems it claims to be seeking to solve, and goes on blaming precisely the wrong people.
Bar Harbor is too crowded. We don’t need more transient lodging. If people can’t find accommodations they’ll vacation elsewhere or a different time of year.
No, they won't. They'll stay in new big box hotels in Ellsworth and drive everywhere instead of leaving their car at the hotel and walking.
I am shocked I have to actually ppint this out, but people aren't going to not come to a place that keeps getting voted the most beautiful place in the nation just because you and a bunch of other people who want said place to function as an exclusive retirement community don't want them to.
How many hotels can Bar Harbor accommodate? When is enough enough?
Actually, a retirement community is the last thing I want for Bar Harbor. I’d rather have a thriving year round community not entirely dependent on tourism.
As the one suggesting Bar Harbor shouldn't/can't accommodate any more hotel rooms, shouldn't you be the one to determine how many it can accommodate?
This is just like the never-ending income tax conversation--everyone says "the rich don't pay their fair share," but if you ask them "what would constitute a fair share?" nobody ever actually has an answer. People say "Bar Harbor can't accommodate any more hotels," but they have no supporting data and no alternative plan to address the many negative externalities of shutting off development within the community's most significant economic center.
Hollow rhetoric--that's what this letter is, that's what the comments are, etc. until someone actually articulated and begins to execute a plan for a thriving year-round community not dependent on tourism.
I can't think of one thriving year-round community in coastal Maine whose economy isn't primarily tourism. Can you?
Coastal Maine communities minus tourism = destitution and poverty. Take a quick drive up route 1 and have a look.
Bar Harbor is a very small town - and a highly desirable place to live. In fact, the Dailymail UK and the Boston Globe both just had articles about how BH is the best small US town to visit. Anyone with a little common sense- like Economics 101- can clearly understand that when a place is HIGHLY desirable- and the number of places to live - own, rent, stay at on a vacation is unable to grow due to several factors - this causes a massive supply shortage- because the demand is so high. When things are ‘rare’- their value increases significantly.
The other thing I would like to mention is that even if a person had a massive trust fund, or a crazy good paying job- and could afford to buy a house- the taxes are going through the roof as well. This is due to all of the property tax payers subsidizing the parasitic ‘non-profits’. JAX brings in over 1.5 Billion dollars a year from selling mice. Everyone can clearly see that the massive infrastructure work on lower Main Street was being done for the benefit of the giant mouse factory . When is the JAX going to cough up money to help build the new school? The only kids left in BH will basically be the children of the 7 figure earners down there- yet we are all expected to build a brand new school for them .
I did some research- and the 1.5 billion was what I found- therefore I was not purposely trying to mislead the public.
Now that we’ve straightened that out- how about your ‘organization’ ( you obviously have some sort of vested interest due to your defensiveness ) cough up some real money ( not the insultingly low figure JAX currently gives- isn’t it under 100 grand?!?! ) to take some of the burden off of the local taxpayers.
The lower Main Street project- which has been going on for ages… is obviously for the benefit of JAX and JAXville which still has stages 2 and 3 to come. Oh joy!
I’m not affiliated with JAX, however I have looked at their publicly available tax filings which show under 700 million in revenue and less than 500 million in mouse and genetic resources sales.
I’m curious as to where you got your 1.5 billion number.
Hi, everyone!
Since I have a couple of emails asking, I just want to triple ensure that everyone knows that the Bar Harbor Story doesn't respond to comment as Admin. That's Stephen Coston's account, which is why he's also signed his comments with his name. Stephen is not an administrator of the Bar Harbor Story. It's just his Substack id.
Currently, the only accounts that represent the Bar Harbor Story are this one (Carrie Jones) and Shaun Farrar's. Shaun's is also labelled with his own name.
I totally agree with the letter. As stated in my recent letter to the editor in MDIslander, after a recent trip to the Galapagos, I was so impressed with how they have protected their natural resources. We have a magical island and town and need to preserve its beauty and its livability.
We need to stand up to the business interests who will use legal gambits and intimidation to maximize their profits at the expense of preserving the town’s future for our schools, affordable housing, and the next generation.
The town council now needs to extend the moratorium and stand up to those who seek only profits for themselves.
Philip Brooks
Ever studied basic economics? A moratorium simply makes each hotel- motel room way more valuable / expensive. 1. You are helping the people you despise get even richer, 2. You are making it so only people who either have a trust fund or a very high paying job able to come and visit BH.
How are "business interests"--the ones that employ the majority of what working age people are left here, and represent most of what upward income mobility opportunities actually exist on this island--operating "at the expense" of "the next generation"?
Couple other questions:
-Do you currently work at all? If so, on this island? I do, and I employ hundreds of others who do.
-Are you from here? I am.
-How much have you pledged to the new school? I'm at $100,000.
-Stephen Coston, "user of legal gambits and intimidation to maximize profits"/local person who grew up here and stayed here by starting a local business employing other local people
"Recently, we were in Camden and Belfast, and noticed once again how charming and thriving these downtowns are. They have struggles with traffic in the summer season, but we were struck by the fact that there are hardly any hotels to be found in the downtown area. The difference with Bar Harbor was striking. I asked a shopkeeper how that was possible, and she replied, “It’s in our zoning and regulations. We don’t want hotels downtown.”"
Uh....you sure you've been to Camden? I count 305 hotel rooms in Camden in the core downtown area, located within 1 mile of the intersection of Main & Elm streets at the center of downtown. If Camden's zoning has sought to prevent hotels downtown, it has done a terrible job of it; the vast majority of hotel rooms that exist in Camden are in the downtown area.
-Stephen Coston
305? Okay, how many does Bar Harbor have downtown.
One thing I’ll agree with the letter writer about — Camden has a lot more charm than Bar Harbor. Downtown Bar Harbor is quite ugly and half the shops and restaurants are selling/serving absolute garbage.
Bar Harbor has a lot more hotel rooms than Camden in general, both in its downtown and outside its downtown. Camden doesn't have a National Park and isn't nearly the draw that Bar Harbor is. But none of that is the point. The point is, the writer of this letter states that Camden's zoning has prevented Camden from having hotels in its downtown, which is plainly not true--almost all the hotel rooms that Camden has are located in its downtown area. I get that you're very obviously set in your position and thus you're sympathetic to the author, but facts matter, and when it comes to facts there's a whole lot wrong with this letter.
Excellent letter! Two other places in Bar Harbor that I know of that evicted year round residents for hospitality industry workers were the on Pleasant Street off of Ledglawn Avenue and on a side street off of Route 3 near Sweet Pea farm. When I and my husband raised concerns about our residents being squeezed out of their affordable housing, and forced to travel to many towns in a search for anywhere to live, the biggest employer’s attorney essentially accused us of racism in his legal briefs to the courts. I mention this because the the uber players in the lodging industry will go to any lengths to preserve their profits, and they will try to denigrate anyone who suggests their development agenda is less than anything wonderful for the community.
In spite of these nasty, and clearly untrue personal attacks, I agree that all levels of tourism development is beyond the pale in BH. I am encouraged a broader group of year round residents are speaking out clearly and effectively that there is almost nothing left of their town that reflects the pace of small town living.
I have moved to another popular destination for tourists, but towns here, both official government bodies, annual town meetings , citizens, and the business community seem to understand the importance of year round community. yes, there is an affordable housing crisis, but local towns actually work together to address this problem: across the street from me is a 62 unit affordable apartment complex going up, with adequate on site parking in a former administrative bank building. This is a mixed residential commercial zone, one of eight in this town of 6800. There are no big hotels in town, a scattering of B and Bs, a few motels, maybe an inn or two, and many vacation rentals. Most of the town is zoned residential, and only recently, has there been proposals to limit VRs in some way which have been defeated at annual town meetings. It is a beach culture, and the VR industry has been here for decades, if not a century. No cruise ships here per the shoals and lack of deep water.
At least I can walk on the sidewalks, and have adequate parking, and my resident permit stickers allow me parking at all the beaches and town landings. Non residents must pay dearly for their stickers which are usable only at certain beaches. The Cape Cod National Seashore has provided Eastham residents only parking at certain popular beach sites such as Nauset Light during high season. Obviously, Eastham values its year round residents.
I point these factors out simply to illustrate that some small towns have prioritized year round living versus just an endless free for al for corporations to do what they please.
I hope you keep letting your concerns be known, and the powers that be , take you seriously and do something.
We all live on a very small and very beautiful island that attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors each year. Cruise ships, for all the hysteria devoted to them, are a small part of the total visitors. Aside from Jax and MDI Hospital, tourism is the only major viable industry on this island. What other major industry could MDI support?
A limit has been reached. Venice is another small island popular with tourists and its beauty is entirely made by humans over a couple of thousand years. To preserve their beautiful surroundings Venetians have taken to limiting tourism. The same is happening in other popular tourist destinations. MDI must do so as well. Hundreds of workers are employed here in seasonal jobs either to serve tourists or to protect our natural beauty from over use and climate change, or to maintain the infrastructure that supports tourism. Those employees need housing that they can afford on the limited incomes offered by seasonal work.
Steps are being taken to manage and limit the visits. Bar harbor has drastically reduced cruise ship visits. Acadia National Park has instituted a reservation system for visits to the summit of Cadillac Mountain. There are rumors that visits to Sand Beach, Jordan Pond, and Thunder Hole will be restricted as well. These steps are necessary to protect our natural beauty and to limit the degradation of the visitor experience. Other popular national parks are limiting visitors so as not to spoil the natural beauty that makes them so popular.
Employers are working to house the employees who are so necessary for MDI's economy. With the help of Friends of Acadia, the National Park Service is expanding its own employee housing so that workers needed to protect and preserve its natural beauty can be attracted to our relatively remote location. Other employers are engaged in similar moves to attract and retain employees by providing affordable housing. The Acadia Gateway Center in Trenton will enhance public transit options for visitors and relieve summer traffic on the only road connecting MDI with the rest of the state. Many of those who must work on MDI if we are to have a vibrant economy and preserve our natural beauty must live off the island and thereby contribute to the heavy traffic on that single road.
It is clear that major interests in this area are developing and implementing plans to managing visitation. The writing is on the wall. Now is not the time to expand lodging options on MDI, especially in downtown Bar Harbor.
One last comment I would like to make is that- if the residents are so concerned about the lodging owners gobbling up houses, apartments downtown- then they should be required to build housing at their lodging facilities. I’m pretty sure Stephen Coston does this- and his employees do not pay 1 single cent to stay there. In addition, I’ve heard from some of Coston’s employees- including a college student from Slovenia - that she was extremely grateful for the opportunity to work for Stephen this past summer. She was paid very well, treated with respect, and had comfortable living accommodations.
Currently (December) we are housing 25 people. These 25 people are employed in Bar Harbor year-round and have no rent or utilities expenses. For the most part they live at the properties they work at in housing we've built either at or in the hotels.
Personally, if the Town wants to require a housing component for new lodging uses I don't really care. My pending application had housing included anyway--three apartments.
The lodging industry isn't the obstacle to affordable housing that it's made out to be. People just say that because they want Bar Harbor to function as their own exclusive retirement community. They're elitists that dislike the visitors that they themselves were prior to moving here in retirement. Now they stump for "year-round community" while villifying year-round local businesses as they spend the winter in Florida.
So their homes sit dark while they blame our businesses for the dark houses. Can't make it up. LoL.
That’s 25 people that can be easily exploited because they depend on you for both housing and employment. They are not able to take a job elsewhere without also finding housing. That means even if they were unhappy with their job they’d be less likely to look elsewhere for work.
Year round employees should be able to secure housing in the community that doesn’t tie them to a single employer.
Unfortunately too much housing has been converted to short term rentals and housing for seasonal workers. Now employers such as yourself and Jax are proving year round housing by necessity, but it is not ideal.
I'm exploiting people who are employed at will and live for free in buildings I've bought and paid for? Good grief. Out of curiosity--aside from cease to exist, is there anything I could do that you'd approve of? How about the hundreds of thousands of dollars I've given away in the community? Is that exploitative too?
I said they can be exploited, which is true of someone dependent on their employer for housing. I have no reason to think you are exploiting then. However, it’s hard to leave a toxic work environment if it also means becoming homeless. This is true for Jax housing as well.
And I don’t fault you for providing housing for your employees. It’s a necessary reality now, but ideally year round workers living in our town full time would be able to find housing that doesn’t tie them to a single employer.
When I was on the Town Council I crafted and got passed a motion with several bullet points to address zoning obstacles to affordable housing--density, height, etc. The Planning Board shot it down instantly.
This town is full of NIMBYs who value green space over affordable housing, which implies more people per square foot. When you force people to pay for more real estate than they need or want--which is exactly what land use regulations in Bar Harbor do--you make it artificially expensive to live here. Simple as that. I'm one of only a few who've ever actually tried to change that, yet I get blamed for helping cause the "housing crisis." Lmao.
This Town's entire discourse and outlook are broken. The Town perpetuates the very problems it claims to be seeking to solve, and goes on blaming precisely the wrong people.
Well, I’m a YIMBY when it comes to dense year round housing development
How much is enough?
Bar Harbor is too crowded. We don’t need more transient lodging. If people can’t find accommodations they’ll vacation elsewhere or a different time of year.
No, they won't. They'll stay in new big box hotels in Ellsworth and drive everywhere instead of leaving their car at the hotel and walking.
I am shocked I have to actually ppint this out, but people aren't going to not come to a place that keeps getting voted the most beautiful place in the nation just because you and a bunch of other people who want said place to function as an exclusive retirement community don't want them to.
How many hotels can Bar Harbor accommodate? When is enough enough?
Actually, a retirement community is the last thing I want for Bar Harbor. I’d rather have a thriving year round community not entirely dependent on tourism.
As the one suggesting Bar Harbor shouldn't/can't accommodate any more hotel rooms, shouldn't you be the one to determine how many it can accommodate?
This is just like the never-ending income tax conversation--everyone says "the rich don't pay their fair share," but if you ask them "what would constitute a fair share?" nobody ever actually has an answer. People say "Bar Harbor can't accommodate any more hotels," but they have no supporting data and no alternative plan to address the many negative externalities of shutting off development within the community's most significant economic center.
Hollow rhetoric--that's what this letter is, that's what the comments are, etc. until someone actually articulated and begins to execute a plan for a thriving year-round community not dependent on tourism.
I can't think of one thriving year-round community in coastal Maine whose economy isn't primarily tourism. Can you?
Coastal Maine communities minus tourism = destitution and poverty. Take a quick drive up route 1 and have a look.
Bar Harbor is a very small town - and a highly desirable place to live. In fact, the Dailymail UK and the Boston Globe both just had articles about how BH is the best small US town to visit. Anyone with a little common sense- like Economics 101- can clearly understand that when a place is HIGHLY desirable- and the number of places to live - own, rent, stay at on a vacation is unable to grow due to several factors - this causes a massive supply shortage- because the demand is so high. When things are ‘rare’- their value increases significantly.
The other thing I would like to mention is that even if a person had a massive trust fund, or a crazy good paying job- and could afford to buy a house- the taxes are going through the roof as well. This is due to all of the property tax payers subsidizing the parasitic ‘non-profits’. JAX brings in over 1.5 Billion dollars a year from selling mice. Everyone can clearly see that the massive infrastructure work on lower Main Street was being done for the benefit of the giant mouse factory . When is the JAX going to cough up money to help build the new school? The only kids left in BH will basically be the children of the 7 figure earners down there- yet we are all expected to build a brand new school for them .
Jax’s total revenue, including grants, is less than 1 billion dollars so they certainly don’t bring in 1.5B from mouse sales.
Then what is the amount that JAX brings in annually from mouse sales?
Last I knew, their total revenue, including NIH grants, is around 600 million so mouse sales would be less than that.
Before you make up numbers like 1.5 billion you should look up public tax filings, which are released publicly.
I did some research- and the 1.5 billion was what I found- therefore I was not purposely trying to mislead the public.
Now that we’ve straightened that out- how about your ‘organization’ ( you obviously have some sort of vested interest due to your defensiveness ) cough up some real money ( not the insultingly low figure JAX currently gives- isn’t it under 100 grand?!?! ) to take some of the burden off of the local taxpayers.
The lower Main Street project- which has been going on for ages… is obviously for the benefit of JAX and JAXville which still has stages 2 and 3 to come. Oh joy!
I’m not affiliated with JAX, however I have looked at their publicly available tax filings which show under 700 million in revenue and less than 500 million in mouse and genetic resources sales.
I’m curious as to where you got your 1.5 billion number.