LIMESTONE ‹ An independent commission's decision to keep open and expand the Defense Finance and Accounting Services center in Aroostook County likely came as a surprise to many in Maine.
The perception of "The County" as a place of woods, potato fields and moose is common around the state. And the continued loss of jobs and people since Loring Air Force Base closed in 1994 hasn't exactly challenged that image.
But to Aroostook residents and those more familiar with the county, the commission's decision to expand the finance center was not only common sense, it was just the latest bit of good economic news.
"The DFAS announcement reiterates what we already know about The County, that it's a good place to work, it's a good place to have a business," said Walt Elish, executive director of the Aroostook Partnership for Progress. "The DFAS story, at this point, (reflects) the feeling of a lot of people in the business community there's a lot of good things happening in The County."
"There's always room for improvement, as with any area you can hear that from Portland to Aroostook County," he said, "but I think to go from where we were when (Loring closed) to where we are today. . . I think we've come a long way."
From the reconditioning of Army vehicles to the construction of massive signs for businesses around the globe, jobs are growing in Aroostook and anecdotal evidence suggests the overall economy seems to be stabilizing.
The closure of Loring has hung over central Aroostook as a vote of no-confidence by the federal government. The DFAS decision, on the other hand, is seen by many as an economic validation of the region.
However, just as there are many "Maines," there are many "Aroostooks," and it's hard to make sweeping economic statements that reflect the whole county. Throughout Aroostook, resource-based industries like forestry and potato farming are still key, but there are also a number of economic enclaves in this vast 6,672- square-mile county, each independent but subtly intertwined.
DISTINCT REGIONS
In the St. John Valley at the top of Aroostook, the prosperity of Fort Kent is built around the University of Maine at Fort Kent, Northern Maine Medical Center and an MBNA call center. Ambitious winter events such as international biathlons and a prestigious dog sled race also have been a boon.
In Madawaska, the economy is dependent on the Fraser Paper mill and the close ties to the Canadian city of Emundston across the border.
Southern Aroostook is dominated by the potato sector and the support industries of trucking, agriculture supplies and others, and Houlton is also the county seat of government and northern terminus of I-95.
Potato farmers have had a tough run of harvests in recent years, but are optimistic that this season will be a good one. Throughout North America, there are fewer acres being farmed with potatoes, so prices should be a bit better this year, according to Tim Hobbs of the Maine Potato Board.
There's continued retail growth in central Aroostook's Presque Isle, including the opening of a Super Wal-Mart, drawing people from around the county to visit the store and the region's only real mall. And residents of Caribou, Presque Isle, Fort Fairfield, Limestone and other communities are particularly affected by progress at the Loring Commerce Centre, which is the redeveloped air base, home to DFAS and other growing ventures.
In fact, while there is great economic variety in the county, the still-developing Loring saga is emblematic of Aroostook's fall and subsequent slow rise.
The closure of the air base more than a decade ago entailed the loss of 1,100 civilian jobs and 4,000 military personnel, and the buying power those thousands represented. Throughout the county, scores of businesses closed, the housing market imploded and population loss accelerated.
According to Census figures, Aroostook's population dropped by 13,000 from 1990 to 2000, and is about 74,000 today. The unemployment rate in July was 6.3 percent; the state average was 4.5 percent.
But the center has been successful in attracting companies to the old base.
There are 1,450 people working at Loring, more than the civilian work force there when the base was active. The DFAS center employs 353 and will expand to at least 600, bringing the total at Loring to roughly 1,700, said Carl Flora, chief executive officer of the Loring Development Authority.
The existing DFAS building can easily handle a single shift of 600 workers, said Flora. If they were to add 70,000 square feet to the building, they could have DFAS shifts of up to 1,000 people, he said.
There are other white-collar jobs at Loring besides DFAS positions, such as 250 call-center jobs at Sitel, a provider of outsourced customer support services based in Omaha, Neb. Flora said the Base Realignment and Closure Commission's vote of confidence in the region would help attract other, similar professional-services jobs.
"This is certainly a major component of a sales pitch we might make to a company like that," he said.
The DFAS decision also increased the urgency of several projects under way, said Flora. Businesses looking to open operations at Loring have moved up their schedules after the commission's decision, he said, now that questions about the area's future have been resolved.
Some of the projects still on paper include a private company's plan to revamp the base's power plant to sell electricity onto the grid and provide steam for industrial uses at the center, and another by Irving the family-owned conglomerate based in New Brunswick to create a value-added wood products plant.
One of the success stories at Loring has been the Maine Military Authority, which refurbishes military vehicles for the National Guard and active military.
The authority started in 1997 with seven people, quickly growing to 27 that same year. Today, they have 538 people working to restore mostly Humvees, running in two eight-hour shifts that finish more than 200 vehicles each month.
The authority is always going after new contracts and may look to diversify further into refurbishing school buses and other vehicles that local governments use, said Gary Cleaves, general manager. Cleaves said he could see the work force at the authority double to more than 1,000.
The DFAS decision was a continuation of good news for Aroostook, said Cleaves, and the same labor force strengths dedicated, skilled and loyal workers benefit the authority and the finance center.
Cleaves believes the exodus from the county has slowed thanks to employers like the authority, DFAS and others, but not stopped entirely.
The economy of the area is stronger than it was when Loring was active, in some respects. At that time, the military was a major, single employer.
Today, though the GIs are gone, the economy is much more diverse, Cleaves noted. Accountants, mechanics and sign makers are all working at different jobs, for different employers.
"Everyone you've got here is a little bit different," he said.
A LIVING WAGE
On the floor of one of the authority's huge work bays, Rich Makepeace of Caribou and Butch Tardy of Limestone were working on components that will go into a waiting Humvee. They considered what the recent DFAS decision means to them. "More jobs is better for the community, better for northern Maine," said Makepeace, an inspector.
Makepeace is an example of what Flora and others in economic development call the underemployment of Aroostook. The average county wage was $26,363 in 2004, compared to $31,897 statewide. So a lot of people work two or more jobs to make a living.
Makepeace worked a variety of jobs, from driving a tractor-trailer to construction work and mechanic work. But the job at the Military Authority is steady, and pays a living wage like jobs at DFAS and other new employers that allow county residents to trade up and get better positions.
Tardy, for instance, was a potato farmer. "That wasn't a very good deal, farming," he explained.
Aroostook potato farmers have struggled in recent years with depressed prices and a blight that ruined crops. Last year's season proved disastrous, with growers selling potatoes for 60 to 65 cents per 10-pound bag.
Having employers that pay higher wages forces other businesses to pay their employees more to retain their workers, said Ed Nickerson, director of business development at the center and executive director at the Loring Applied Technology Center, a business incubator. That, he said, raises the standard of living for everyone.
Because the authority pays mechanics well, for instance, employers around the county have to pay their people better or risk losing them.
"It's become a vocation, not slave labor, to be a mechanic," he said. "It's brought the bar up."
'TURNING POINT'
The Pattison Sign Group is another employer on the former base that is adding to the area's prosperity. It's part of the Jim Pattison Group, the third largest company in Canada.
The division opened in February of 2004 and today employs 50 people, making huge, illuminated signs as large as 15 feet by 60 feet the kind you'd see outside any large business by the Maine Mall, for instance.
The assistant production manager at the site, Bill Ossenfort, was originally stationed at Loring. He lived in the county but had to leave a decade or so ago for lack of work. He worked as a consultant for Boeing in Saudi Arabia and returned in 2002 to work for Telford Aviation, another business at Loring.
Not only was Ossenfort able to return to the county for a job, he was able to leave that job for another one at Pattison.
The area's economy has grown slowly, said Ossenfort, and if Loring can make even better use of the aviation facilities like the huge runway, more expansion is possible, he suggested. One of the projects Telford is working on in Limestone is an unmanned surveillance blimp. More work like that could be in Loring's future, Flora said.
Aroostook has a strong, growing base of business, and the DFAS decision really represents a "turning point," said Nickerson.
"I think we've turned a corner, I think a lot of positive stuff is going to come out of this," he said.
That's exactly what the Aroostook Partnership is trying to create, said Alain Ouellette, director of economic and community development at the Northern Maine Development Commission, part of the partnership. Ouellette said the business partnership is trying to encourage the investment of at least $50 million in the county, and the creation of at least 1,500 new jobs in four years.
"Not only do we feel that they are valid and attainable, but we are also beginning to see signs of those goals being met," said Ouellette.
In the next few weeks, said Ouellette, the partnership hopes to announce a business expansion that will have a significant impact on the region's job growth, and will also ensure the retention of existing jobs. The business is a value-added enterprise that works in both the agriculture and forestry sectors, he said.
In addition, said Elish, the partnership has hired a professional consulting firm to study the idea of a resort in the county.
The DFAS decision has made Aroostook a slightly easier sell for business development, and Ouellette and Elish plan to bring the story along with them when they visit businesses in the Chicago area this fall. But there are still challenges.
"Let's be realistic about this, we know where we're located. Those of us who live here think it's a great place and it is but for a business person, when they think of Aroostook County, one of the things they probably think of is the distance from the markets. We have to overcome that," said Elish.
One way that can be addressed is by targeting value-added types of businesses that would buy raw products in Aroostook and process them precook and package potatoes, for instance before shipping them out.
Another is to go after white-collar sorts of business, where a physical product isn't the end result. The DFAS work, for example, is all intellectual process. ATX Forms in Caribou makes accounting software for small businesses work that can be done anywhere, and transportation costs aren't a factor.
In some ways, the loss of the military air base at Loring may have forced Aroostook to "right-size" itself. The population loss may have brought the county to a healthy, fighting-trim point where the number of jobs in can almost support the number people almost.
In fact, said Elish, with more job growth, the exodus may even be reversed.
"We may not get back to 100,000 people, but we might either maintain our population base from 73,000 to 75,000 or grow it," he said. |
