BREAKING NEWS: Bar Harbor voters defund chamber support for cruise ships
BAR HARBOR, June 6, 2023 - The town meeting voted overwhelmingly tonight to strip all funding for cruise ship assistance in the town’s annual grant to the Chamber of Commerce in reaction to the chamber’s recent decision to join the business group suing the town over its cap on cruise ship passengers.
The vote was 128-49 in favor of an amendment to the FY24 budget proposed by former Warrant Committee member Cara Ryan to deduct $60,000 from the grant, leaving the chamber with $15,760 for July 4 celebrations, $6,000 for Village Holiday Decorations, $6,000 and $1,500 for Seaside Cinema.
The $60,000 in budget was to help cruise ship passengers find their way around town.
Cara said the town and the chamber have been working “at cross purposes” and the proof was “when they joined APPLL, the plaintiffs in a lawsuit costing taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars.”
The QSJ reported on May 26 that the chamber board voted in a 7-2-1 decision to join the Association to Preserve and Protect Local Livelihood, which was formed to sue the town over the citizens ordinance adopted last November to cap daily cruise ship visitation at 1,000 persons, as opposed to 5,500 now.
Another speaker who identified herself as Bo Greene received repeated ovations when she said, “How on earth can we be supportive of an organization that is actually using the taxpayers’ money to sue the town? It doesn't make any sense to me.”
She said the chamber was “literally in bed with business owners who extract what they can from this beloved community without regard for the future.”
Resident Anna Durand said she found APPLL’s slogan “Bar Harbor Welcomes All” and adopted by the chamber to be offensive, as if cruise ship passengers suffer the same kind of discrimination as the country’s protected class of citizens.
“No cruise ship passengers had to risk their lives in the fight for their civil rights to disembark as tourists. No cruise ship passenger has survived lynch mobs, water cannons, bomb threats or discrimination in housing and civic participation because they arrived somewhere on cruise ships.
“Misappropriating the struggles of social justice movements, as an adjunct, belittles their historic importance. Cruise ship passengers are not as a constitutionally protected class. The chamber and APPLL have chosen to endorse this absurd and cynical slogan.”
She received a loud applause.
Gary “Bo” Jennings, president of the chamber, told the QSJ on May 25, “The Chamber Board did deliberate for a few months on joining APPLL (and if it was something we should do), in which we ultimately did, in support of their Bar Harbor Welcomes All campaign.”
“The Chamber Board made it clear to APPLL that the Chamber is not affiliated with the lawsuit, as the suit was filed several months before we joined. We were assured by the APPLL Board that the Chamber is not a part of the lawsuit. The Chamber Board also noted (during our vote to join APPLL's Bar Harbor Welcomes All efforts) that we would be evaluating our membership quarterly, as a checks and balances to a new organization.”
“I even told the APPLL Board, when they presented this campaign, that I was mad they came up with it first. That would be an amazing campaign for Visit Bar Harbor! But more importantly than that, Bar Harbor Welcomes All should be the town slogan. The town is a welcoming place for all regardless of race, religion, physical ability, gender preference, or means of arrival, and we should always work to remain as such.
Whether the 128-49 vote at the town meeting is a marker for next week’s town elections is unknown.
But it was not a good night for the chamber and the local cruise ship supporters.
Carrie Jones of the Bar Harbor Story will have a more complete report tomorrow.