This guest column, written by Robert Webster, was originally published in the Daily Bulldog.
Last month, residents of Hidden Circle Mobile Home Park in Jay signed an agreement to buy their own park. All 31 families will now own both their homes and the land beneath them as a cooperative.
This wouldn’t have been possible without Hannah Pingree. She was a central figure in creating the Mobile Home Park Preservation Fund that made this purchase possible.
Here’s why this matters. Mobile home residents own their homes but lease the land underneath. Moving isn’t an option. It costs around $10,000 if your home can even be moved at all. Investment firms know this. They’ve been buying up parks and jacking up rents because residents have nowhere else to go. Many of these families are older Mainers on fixed incomes.
Hannah helped create two solutions: giving residents the right to purchase their park before it’s sold to investors; and funding to make those purchases possible. The Preservation Fund has already helped families in Brunswick, Bangor, and Monmouth do the same thing.
Hannah Pingree saw people being taken advantage of and built real tools to protect them. She didn’t just talk about affordable housing—she helped create solutions that are working right here in western Maine.
That’s the kind of leadership we need. Hannah Pingree is a former Speaker of the Maine House who gets things done for working families.
I’m voting for Hannah Pingree for governor. I hope you will too.
