Developer Amy Cullen speaks during a Harris campaign event in front of a housing project on Douglass St. in Portland Thursday. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer
Two state lawmakers and the developer of an affordable housing project joined the Harris campaign in Portland Thursday to promote the Democratic presidential nominee’s plans to lower housing costs and ease a nationwide housing shortage.
“Talk to nearly any Mainer across the state looking to buy a house or rent, and you’ll know there’s more work to do,” said Sen. Teresa Pierce, D-Falmouth, at a press conference outside Douglass Commons, an affordable housing project under construction in the city’s Libbytown neighborhood.
“We need leaders like Vice President (Kamala) Harris and Tim Walz who have made clear that building up the middle class will be a defining goal of their administration and who have a track record on lowering costs and solving big problems,” added Pierce, who co-chairs the Legislature’s Housing Committee.
The Harris campaign said it organized the event Thursday to call attention to one of the most pressing issues on Mainers’ minds as the November election approaches.
In a Critical Insights on Maine poll released in June, 15% of people polled identified housing and affordable housing as a top issue in Maine, ahead of the economy and the cost of living. The poll surveyed 609 people across the state in April and has a 4% margin of error.
Harris has announced plans for her first 100 days in office that she said would bring down costs for American families, including housing costs.
Harris has called for the construction of 3 million new housing units in the next four years. Her plans include a new tax incentive for homebuilders who build starter homes sold to first-time homebuyers, expansion of an existing tax incentive for businesses that build rental housing that is affordable and a new $40 billion innovation fund to help local governments find solutions to build housing, finance construction and help with the design and build new housing.
Harris has also proposed up to $25,000 in downpayment support for first-time home buyers and has said she would work to expand rental assistance by enforcing fair housing laws and cracking down on surging rent prices by corporate landlords.
A spokesperson for Republican Donald Trump’s campaign pointed to high costs of rent, gas and groceries under the Biden administration in a statement Thursday in response to the Harris campaign’s event in Portland, and said Harris cannot be trusted to fix the housing affordability crisis.
“President Trump can be trusted to restore the American Dream because he has a real plan to defeat inflation, bring down mortgage rates, and make purchasing a home dramatically more affordable,” said Karoline Leavitt, Trump campaign national press secretary, in a statement.
“He will rein in federal spending, stop the unsustainable invasion of illegal aliens which is driving up housing costs, cut taxes for American families, eliminate costly regulations, and free up appropriate portions of federal land for housing.”
Amy Cullen, vice president and project partner at the Szanton Company, which is building the Douglass Commons project along with Maine Cooperative Development Partners, said at Thursday’s press conference that the biggest barrier to building more affordable housing right now is money.
“Over the years, money for affordable housing has been gutted,” Cullen said. “We’ve had a little bit of an influx recently under the Biden administration, and we’d like to see that continue.”
Rep. Traci Gere, D-Kennebunkport speaks during a Harris campaign event in front of a housing project on Douglass St. in Portland Thursday. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer
Douglass Commons includes 63 apartments currently under construction that will be available to families making less than $75,000 per year and that are expected to open in August 2025. Future phases of the project will include 20 units set aside for affordable home ownership and another 42 units of affordable rentals, Cullen said.
She said Harris’ plans would help facilitate similar projects.
“Vice President Harris knows housing is too expensive and the American dream of homeownership is still out of reach for too many families,” Cullen said. “That’s why she’s making affordable housing a priority in her future administration.”
Rep. Traci Gere, D-Kennebunkport, House chair of the Housing Committee, said the state has worked hard to increase funding for affordable housing but more is needed.
She said the $40 billion innovation fund proposed by Harris would help with construction as well as with “finding new and creative ways to reduce the cost of housing.”
It would also help states and local governments find ways to reduce regulations and policies that are preventing them from meeting their development goals, she said.
“This is a very important initiative we’ve been working on in the Housing Committee and working on with communities across Maine, and the funding in that part of the Harris plan would really help,” Gere said.
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