Planning Board Approves YWCA'S Hamilton Station

18 Studio Apartments On Their Way

Nov 29, 2024

The Bar Harbor Story is generously sponsored by Side Street Cafe’s New Year’s Eve Party.

BAR HARBOR—It’s a go! The YWCA of MDI’s Hamilton Station project was unanimously considered complete the day before Thanksgiving. It was also considered compliant with the town’s standards.

“I think it’s a wonderful project,” Planning Board Vice Chair Ruth Eveland said. “The YWCA has done a phenomenal job in pulling this together.”

The approval was met with applause from those attending. Planning Board Chair Millard Dority recused himself because he is helping the YWCA of MDI with the project.

The plan for the site off Route 3 calls for 18 one-bedroom (studio) apartments. It has access off Route 3 and calls for dividing a 26.8-acre parcel into two lots.

In an email to YWCA supporters on Wednesday, Jackie Davidson, the YWCA’s executive director, said she was “very happy.”

The work is meant to begin six months from all conditions of approval being met and be substantially complete 18 months after that. Extensions can be granted.

The YWCA hopes to raise $250,000 from 10 donors with gifts of $25,000 each to support the project. According to a Mount Desert Islander article, three donors have come forth with that level donation.

“It’s a great project with a lot of hard work from a lot of people to come to this point,” Greg Johnston of G.F. Johnston & Associates said.

There was no public comment about the project, which had been inspired by a housing summit organized by the Musson Group, a YWCA representative said Wednesday.

“We knew what we wanted to do,” Jackie Davidson, the YWCA’s executive director said at the planning board meeting.

What they wanted to do was help increase housing on Mount Desert Island.

The YWCA’s Hamilton Station steering committee worked with a team of professionals for months on formulating a plan to meet the overwhelming need for year-round rental housing on Mount Desert Island.

“We want to do this right,” said Steering Committee Chair Allie Bodge last June. “One of the most important things to the YW is that an array of community members’ needs are met. Our dream is that the renters have a great sense of neighborhood with community gardens and walking trails that will also be open to the public.”

The YWCA of MDI purchased the property in 2023 after looking for an opportunity to be a part of the solution to what many believe to be one of the biggest problems and challenges facing the island: finding homes.

“We started thinking small,” said YWCA Board President Ann Worrick. “Originally, we were thinking of purchasing an existing two to three unit building and making it available to year-round people who did not qualify for subsidized housing but who did not earn enough to purchase a home in the escalating market. This group is referred to as the ‘missing middle’ in housing discussions. Suddenly, we had the opportunity to make a much larger and impactful statement with the purchase of Hamilton Station and the Board embraced it and all agreed it was time.”

“I have been so impressed by how quickly and well this has come together,” said Planning Board member Teresa Wagner.

Conditions of approval included merging a small lot into another lot and a fire marshal approval letter is received. It also requires that the plat shows the easement location for cemetery access and is found acceptable to the Department of Public Works; that a capacity letter from the Public Works Department has been received and all conditions, if any, are met; the Maine Historic Preservation Commission has cleared the project; that the central Subsurface Sewage Disposal design was approved from the Maine Department of Health and Human Services; and a Maine DEP stormwater permit and Maine Drinking Water Program was approved.

According to the motion, the “planning board approves the request of modification of standards, allowing for one entrance instead of two as required in section 125-67G(2)(h) because ‘high traffic counts of Route 3 limit the number of allowed entrances onto Route 3 to minimize conflicts with traffic. Two entrances for this development would create unsafe vehicle patterns. For emergency access, a second access does exist on the westerly parcel,’ as it is necessary to address particular site characteristics and it does not have the effect of nullifying the purpose.”