A Knox County town is considering a new set of rules that would bar people from permanently living in recreational vehicles as the practice has grown more common amid an ongoing housing shortage in the region.
There are now an estimated seven or eight people living in campers in the town, according to Code Enforcement Officer Chris Packard, who started his role last year.
Given the health and safety risks of living in vehicles that are not made for permanent residence, officials are sending an ordinance to voters at the annual town meeting on June 10 that would ban the use of campers as permanent living quarters. Under the proposal, any new ones could not be hooked up to permanent utility systems, such as water, sewage, electricity or gas.
“The issue is safety and health. If campers aren’t hooked to a septic system, then what are they doing with their waste?” Packard said during a public hearing last week. “Also, do they have safety measures inside the camper?”
Officials pointed to an incident from January in the neighboring town of Warren, in which a fire started in a camper and then spread to an adjacent house.
But the proposal has received pushback from some residents, who argued that it’s overreach and that it would unduly burden poorer people who are struggling to find housing.
The debate has highlighted the difficulties that communities across Maine face as the state gets less affordable, particularly in more desirable areas near the coast, with a housing shortage that has forced people to find alternative forms of shelter.
“We are in a crisis now with housing, and I am sure that there are a lot of people out there that we don’t know about who are living in campers,” resident Karen Poulin said at the hearing. “I understand the safety aspect, but … if that’s the only place they have to go, if they can’t afford rent or a house…do you have a way of helping these people to get into permanent housing?”
Union is sending two other proposals to voters that, in varying ways, also deal with safety and availability of housing in the community. One of them would require the owners of short-term rentals to register them with the town. Another would require that newer homes be equipped with systems for making house keys available to firefighters in the event of an emergency.
At the same time, the Select Board is also considering implementing a registry for camper vehicles in the town, which officials argue would make it easier for them to be located by first responders in the event of a fire or other emergency.
Officials noted that the proposed new rules going to voters at town meeting would include some exemptions. They would allow people to stay in campers on otherwise developed lots, and to live in them for up to 90 days while they are building a permanent dwelling.
They would also allow people previously temporarily living in campers to be grandfathered in with specific rules, such as having working smoke detectors and fire extinguishers, and be connected to a power source by a licensed electrician working for an established company.
The proposal would also require campers and other non-permanent structures to be at least 75 feet from streams, and 100 feet from lakes or wetlands.
