When the Medomak Mobile Home Cooperative board of directors heard a suggestion, last summer, that the 32-unit affordable housing community off Bremen Road in Waldoboro create a community garden, treasurer Linda Norwood took action.
Norwood, who has lived at the park since 1995, went next door to the Hannaford supermarket to research the cost of a salad, pricing out lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers and onions. When she compared the result against what it would cost to grow the vegetables at home, she asked the board for support. With the help of the Damariscotta-based Genesis Fund and contributions from businesses and individuals in Waldoboro and surrounding towns, the community built six raised beds, filled them with soil and planted seeds and seedlings, learning how to use organic methods to increase the health benefits reaped from their gardens.
The project was just one of many ways the park works to build a close-knit community.
“It’s been a mobile home park for a long time,” Liza Fleming-Ives, associate director of the Genesis Community Loan Fund in Damariscotta, said Aug. 10. “The previous owner was Midcoast Maine Community Action (MMCA), also known as Coastal Economic Development.”
In 2006, as the nonprofit MMCA was considering selling the park, Genesis was looking at a model that had helped residents of approximately 25 New Hampshire mobile home parks purchase the land on which they lived.
Medomak Mobile Home Cooperative was the first resident-owned park in Maine. Under the cooperative model, residents hold private ownership of their dwellings. The house lots and common land are owned by the community. Today, there are more than 100 cooperative mobile home parks in the Granite State. The 63-unit Greystone Mobile Home Park in Veazie is Maine’s second cooperative.
Many of the households at Medomak are the same families that were there in 2006. Some people have been living there for much longer, Fleming-Ives said.
“It is very affordable housing, but it is also a community that people are choosing to live in,” Fleming-Ives said. She said there are families with young children, but the majority of residents are older.
“In addition to financing, the Genesis Fund entered into an agreement with the co-op to provide support to the board of directors,” Fleming-Ives said. “Every household in the park has one membership share and gets one vote in the co-op.”
According to the co-op’s limited equity agreement, members pay a one-time fee of $50, that is returned if the household leaves the co-op. The monthly lot rent of $240 provides the income that the co-op uses to run the park and pay for water, sewer, taxes, common maintenance and other expenses.
The board prepares a budget, which members approve at their annual meeting, along with any changes to bylaws and park rules. Although the park functions as a nonprofit, it is not exempt from municipal property taxes. The park cannot be sold by its members for a profit. Should a time come when the group wants to dissolve the cooperative, ownership would have to be transferred to another nonprofit entity that provides affordable housing.
In order to avoid difficult relationships that can form between neighbors in a cooperative living situation, the board hired Lash Realty to collect rents and pay the community’s collective bills.
Standards in the park rules govern unit maintenance, as do state and municipal building codes.
Fleming-Ives said park members recognize that some housing units are old and difficult for their owners to maintain. She mentioned the Community Housing Improvement Project (CHIP) Inc. in which more than 100 volunteers work in what the website at chipinc.org describes as ” an ecumenical effort to help area residents who do not have sufficient resources or the ability to make basic repairs to their homes.” CHIP Inc. sponsors Community Cares Day each year on the first Saturday after Labor Day.
Last year, co-op members worked side-by-side with CHIP volunteers on repair projects to improve the safety of individual homes.
In addition, residents host work days, approximately once a month, to maintain the grounds, clear abandoned home sites and make improvements to common facilities.
“There’s tremendous community-building,” Fleming-Ives said. At the end of a work day residents gather for a community meal.
“People live busy lives,” Fleming-Ives said. “Many in the park work multiple jobs, all kinds of shifts, have young children or are elderly.” In spite of the efforts residents undergo just to make ends meet and take care of basic responsibilities, they work hard to meet the challenges of community living, she said.
Norwood said the formation of a cooperative has meant that residents take a greater interest in the well-being of their neighbors. She said MMCA was not responsive to requests for rules changes or enforcement of rules that were already in place.
“Now we can improve it,” she said. “Now we can control who can come in here.” She said new households are interviewed before being accepted and must submit to credit and background checks to “make sure we bring people in here who are family-oriented, can pay their bills and are willing to be part of the community. We don’t want drug dealers in here, or riff-raff.” She said the community is especially aware of the need to protect children from potential abuse, because Medomak Mobile Home Cooperative is adjacent to the Miller School.
“Since the co-op has taken over, there’s been a big change,” said John Flaherty, a veteran who serves as cooperative president and has lived at Medomak since 1996.
Both Flaherty and Norwood said the community is still dealing with speeding cars, primarily those belonging to visitors to the park.
“Where it’s privately owned property, it’s almost impossible to enforce speed limits,” Flaherty said. When there were speed bumps in the roads, drivers would go around them, damaging lawns and further endangering residents.
In addition to the 32 households now at the park, the community is licensed for 13 more lots, four of which are ready to lease.
Using land that is too wet for mobile homes, and consulting with long-time residents, she chose a location for the community gardens. Samuel Kaymen, founder of Stonyfield Farms and the father of Genesis’ office manager met with the community to offer advice on materials and methods. After Kaymen donated $500 to get things started, Norwood sought donations of lumber and plants. She used the cash to buy tomato cages, sticks, twine, chicken wire and marigolds, a natural protection against some garden pests.
“Everything else has been donated – and happily donated,” she said.
Seedlings came from Moose Crossing, along with more advice and support. The first six households began their gardens. A signboard, next to the plant beds, lists 17 sponsors who helped make the gardens a reality.
“They grew like you couldn’t believe,” Flaherty said. Next year the community hopes to have 18 raised beds. He said he plans to have two beds next year, so that he can grow food to give away to his neighbors.
“I’m happy just sitting on a stool with a jar of mayonnaise and a loaf of bread in the cucumber patch,” said Norwood, who is now head of the Garden Committee. In addition to the salad vegetables that were part of the original plan, individual gardeners planting snow peas, okra and other more specialized crops.
When Flaherty was hospitalized, early in the summer, Norwood and other neighbors kept an eye on his house and watered his garden. For his part, Flaherty brings a daily basket of cherry tomatoes to a couple who do not have a garden. Norwood said that is emblematic of changes in the community since residents took over ownership.
“The corporate people didn’t care if people were fighting,” she said. “All they cared about was collecting rent. Here, we care about everybody. Everybody owns this now. People take care of what they own.”
“That’s what this is all about,” Flaherty said.
