HOULTON, Maine — Four years after Houlton took ownership of the tourist information center off Interstate 95, outside funds are flowing into town to help support its operations.
“Things are progressing slowly, but we are making progress,” Town Manager Butch Asselin said last Tuesday, speaking of the center, which offers maps, brochures and other information about Houlton, Aroostook County and the rest of the state. “We really want to keep this facility open and offer it to a developer to keep it on the site.”
Houlton has spent approximately $43,000 to finance the center in the past year, according to Asselin, on top of $125,600 since 2011. Most of the expenses have been for maintenance and grounds costs.
Asselin said, however, he has secured funding from other sources to assist with the costs of the center, including the Maine Office of Tourism, which is granting $30,000 a year. Aroostook County allocated $15,000 last year, and the Maine Department of Transportation is providing $10,000 annually.
County Administrator Doug Beaulieu said Wednesday the town has only requested $3,000 for maintenance of the Tourist Information Center for this upcoming fiscal year.
“I don’t foresee that there will be any problems with that request,” he said.
In 2009, the Maine Department of Transportation announced it was considering closing the center in order to save money and to prevent the duplication of services.
The state felt closing the rest area wouldn’t affect travelers, as a convenience store and restaurant a short distance away is open 24 hours per day, so visitors could stop there to use the restrooms and buy food and other items.
A number of community members spoke against the idea of closing the center, as it also is near a popular area to walk in the summer and winter and offers restrooms, free Wi-Fi and a pet-walking area.
Town officials were concerned about the impact of a closure on the community and county as a whole, as well as the first impression on visitors if they arrived to find a boarded-up tourist information center.
The towntook over the property in 2011, at the time believing it would cost approximately $6,000 to $8,000 annually to maintain the buildings and the grounds.
After former Town Manager Doug Hazlett inked the deal, however, officials learned the figures were inaccurate, leading to the much larger annual figures cited by Asselin.
Because of this and financial cutbacks, the center no longer is open 24 hours but just five hours during the day. An outside firm performs maintenance work.
Asselin said the money is being used to make repairs at the facility and for maintenance costs.
Ted Talbot, spokesman for the Maine Department of Transportation, explained Wednesday why the department was still interested in spending money on the Tourist Information Center even though they considered closing it in 2009.
“We were only considering closing it if the town did not take over interest in it,” he said Wednesday. “But we let the town operate it, and they are doing a nice job, so they asked us for $10,000 a year to assist them and we agreed to grant them the money to use for that purpose.”
Asselin said he believes county and state officials recognize the beauty in the facility.
“I think people at MDOT and The County see what a jewel the tourist center really is, and they would hate to lose it,” he said. “It is a key economic development source for this community and for The County. It is a good way to get people alerted about our downtown area and the stores we have here.”
Asselin said the overall goal is to keep the facility operating but in a developer’s hands, so it could provide property taxes.
