Editorial: York County's growth warning sign for state
Portland Press Herald, April 16, 2007
All it takes to see why York County is Maine's fastest-growing county is to look at a regional map.
Calculate the driving time to Boston and compute the nearest location with a substantial amount of developable land. Maine's southernmost tip almost glows with the potential that people south of the Piscataqua River can discern with a casual glance.
In fact, by one measure, a full third of Maine's population growth since 2000 has put down roots in York County. With nearly 20,000 more residents than it had in 1999, the county's 10.6 percent growth rate is triple the statewide average of 3.7 percent.
While such growth has its clear benefits in tax receipts and valuation increases, it also impacts local schools, highway networks and water and waste disposal systems in ways that aren't easy to absorb.
The impact is particularly sharp in the county's smaller towns, where a large amount of open land offers newcomers opportunity for development.
The fastest-growing town in the fastest-growing county is tiny Newfield, where the 472 new residents who have arrived since 2000 resulted in a 35.5 percent growth rate.
Other towns picking up residents at double-digit rates include Limerick, 26.8 percent; Waterboro, 23.6 percent; Acton, 22.6 percent and Ogunquit, 19.9 percent. Only the last has any ocean frontage. For the rest, and other fast-growing towns such as Berwick, Hollis and Shapleigh, the lure is land.
That trend isn't happening in York County alone. As the Brookings Institution report on Maine's economy noted in 2006, the state's historic image as a rural haven has given way to suburban-style development along I-95 from Kittery to north of Bangor.
That inevitably comes in conflict with what Brookings identified as the state's principal attraction: "As the search for quality places grows in importance," the report said, "Maine possesses a globally known 'brand' built on images of livable communities, stunning scenery and great recreational opportunities."
While individual communities try to deal with this trend with stopgap measures such as growth caps and ever-larger minimum lot sizes, those efforts inevitably will fall short and leave other communities vulnerable to the effects of unplanned growth.
The figures out of York County verify this Brookings conclusion: "The combination of Maine's intensely local planning system and the absence of sufficient support and incentives for municipal and regional planning efforts has left most Maine towns and regions susceptible to sprawl that further weakens town centers and degrades rural landscapes."
In other words, York County -- and all of Maine -- needs serious help from the state to handle what's going on before it overwhelms the "globally known brand" that brings so many here.
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