Maine has outlawed floating camps in state waters after years of wrangling over how to regulate the usual structures.
Officially designated "nonwater-dependent floating structures" resemble small homes or camps on a raft moored offshore.
The floating camps have proliferated in recent years and raised alarm from neighbors, environmental groups and state agencies.
Critics argue the structures carry the risk of pollution and pose safety and navigation problems. They also restrict people's access to public lakes, ponds and shorefront.
However, the structures fell through regulatory loopholes, since no single state agency had jurisdiction over them. Structure owners could dodge municipal attempts at permitting by simply moving to another location on the same water body and outside of town authority, said Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife spokesperson Mark Latti.
A stakeholder group put together to tackle the problem considered a new bureaucracy to regulate the structures but ultimately opted to stop the practice, he added.
"We really felt that that wasn’t the solution to this and it really didn’t address the issue of the public’s right to the water, so really a ban was felt to be the best way to deal with this," Latti said.
There are about 200 of the structures registered as boats in Maine, Latti added. New floating camps are prohibited, but structures that existed before this January can apply for state permits.
Susan Gallo with advocacy group Maine Lakes said floating structures are a bigger problem in other states. But considering Maine's high standards for fresh water resources environmental risks posed by the phenomenon were unacceptable.
"It isn’t a big problem right now because this is just starting to take off in Maine, so this was a really good time to nip it in the bud," Gallo said.
