In June, voters in the town of Camden will decide the fate of the iconic Montgomery Dam, located in the coastal community’s bustling downtown just above where the Megunticook River empties into Camden Harbor.
Camden citizens will weigh the environmental, economic, flood risk, historic preservation, and aesthetic pros and cons of removing the dam. It is the latest in a series of often contentious debates playing out in communities across the state, from Yarmouth to Ellsworth to Dover-Foxcroft.
When glaciers retreated 17,000 years ago, they left Maine endowed with abundant inland waterways—31,752 miles of rivers and streams to be precise, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service—many of which eventually spill into the Gulf of Maine.
When they began arriving in the 1600s, one of the first things European settlers did was to harness power from those rivers, building dams for grist mills and sawmills and, later, manufacturing and hydroelectric generation. Today, man-made dams block about 90 percent of the historic river access.
Some 667 dams are regulated by state or federal agencies, with another 420 known dams that are unregulated…
The era of textile, paper, and other mills that relied on river power has largely ended in Maine. In 2023, 109 federally licensed hydroelectric dams produced about 31 percent of the electricity generated in the state. But most of the dams on Maine rivers generate no electricity and, in fact, no longer serve any purpose at all.
Some 667 dams are regulated by state or federal agencies, with another 420 known dams that are unregulated, according to Tara Ayotte, dam safety administrator with the Maine Emergency Management Agency (MEMA). An unknown number of smaller dams across Maine are not inventoried by the state.
Camden’s Montgomery Dam is illustrative of the complex and competing issues that swirl in the waters. Originally built as a grist mill in 1771, its primary attribute today is as a focal point in the picturesque village’s motif. Diners at the Camden Deli look out over the impoundment pond. Tourists boarding windjammers in the harbor gaze up at the frothy cascade of river water dropping 40 feet from the spillway.
Some locals view the dam as fundamental to the very character of the town.
And yet, after more than two years of fact finding, consultation with technical experts, and public engagement, a nine-member citizens advisory panel appointed by the select board recently recommended the removal of Montgomery Dam.
The advisory group’s charge was to assess and make recommendations for all seven dams located along the river’s three-and-a-half-mile run from Megunticook Lake to the harbor. The group focused first on Montgomery Dam since whatever happens there will determine the options available for upstream dams.
A starting point for deliberations was that given its condition, doing nothing to Montgomery Dam is not a viable option. Members exhaustively analyzed three potential options:
• restoration of the existing structure
• partial restoration and the addition of a fish ladder
• removal.
From one end of Maine to the other, towns with dams within their borders are wrestling, or soon will, with local versions of the issues the Camden group considered: flood risks, historic preservation, river water quality, fish passages, and financial burdens.
A driving rationale for removal of Montgomery Dam is that restoring a free-flowing river at that spot will improve the odds of securing grant funding for removal of three privately owned dams immediately upstream. Federal, state, and private grants are available for dam removals and fish ladders that preserve or restore fish passages.
Across Maine, there is increased focus on restoration of passages for sea-run fish, such as alewife and blueback herring (collectively referred to as river herring), as well as Atlantic salmon, sea-run trout, elvers, and rainbow smelt. Such anadromous species spend most of their life at sea but return to freshwater to spawn. These species are pivotal elements of the food web and, by transporting nutrients upstream, contribute to the health of river and Gulf of Maine ecosystems. They also help control insects and algae, while attracting predators like eagles, osprey, otters, and seals.
Water in dam impoundments tends to be warmer and contain less oxygen than that found in a natural pond or free-flowing river.
The decline of sea-run fish is directly tied to the collapse of a once-thriving inshore cod population along the Maine coast. Alewives, meanwhile, continue to represent an important commercial fishery, primarily for use as lobster bait.
Efforts to regulate dams to protect sea-run fish date back to a 1741 law—“An Act to Prevent the Destruction of the Fish Called Alewives and Other Fish”—that requires anyone erecting a dam across a river used by spawning fish to make allowances for fish passage. However, the statute went unenforced, and its utility diminished quickly.
“Once a dam was built, everything up above it didn’t matter,” says Jeff Pierce, founder of Alewife Harvesters of Maine.
Over time, pollution from industrial and municipal sources made many rivers too dirty to support migrating fish even if they could find their way upstream. But thanks to the Clean Water Act and other environmental regulations, our rivers are now healthier.
“There is momentum and enthusiasm for fish passages that wasn’t there 20 years ago,” says Landis Hudson, executive director of the Yarmouth-based nonprofit Maine Rivers, which advocates for free-flowing rivers. Maine, she adds, “has a unique opportunity—and responsibility—to restore fish run passages, given that so many of our rivers connect to the Gulf of Maine.”
The benefits of dam removals and free-flowing rivers can extend beyond fish.
Water in dam impoundments tends to be warmer and contain less oxygen than that found in a natural pond or free-flowing river. Impoundments often attract more invasive species and cause silt buildup, creating inhospitable conditions for all riverine life.
With increased and more intense precipitation, dam removal proponents also point to the value of improving resilience against flood risks. Restoring floodplains, wetlands, and natural buffers, they say, help rivers better absorb heavy rain events and, in turn, protect property.
Of the dams monitored by MEMA, 75—including three along the Megunticook River in Camden—are classified as “high hazard,” a designation that means failure could lead to significant economic, environmental, or infrastructure damage, or even loss of life.
Camden voters will make their decision based on an estimated one-time expense of $1.7 million to $2.8 million to remove the dam. That compares to $3.5 million to $6.5 million to restore Montgomery Dam (throw in a fish ladder and the price tag rises to $10.8 million), plus ongoing maintenance costs.
Town officials believe that much of the cost of removal, and potentially all of it, could be covered by grants. Those who favor preserving Montgomery Dam warn that federal grant money for dam removal and fishway restoration is liable to dry up, and if that happens, Camden taxpayers will be on the hook for the full cost.
Pro-removal advocates counter that while there are no guarantees of grant support, Camden taxpayers would likely bear the entire cost of restoration and future maintenance.
“Given the significantly lower costs, minimized maintenance, and long-term savings after the initial investment, full dam removal presents the most financially responsible choice,” according to the Camden citizens advisory group’s report. “This option would also unlock grant funding that could pay, possibly in full, for dam removal not only for the Montgomery Dam but also for the three private dams as well as fish passage at the three upper dams.”
The full-river approach makes sense to Landis from Maine Rivers, who says that policymakers are beginning to think more holistically.
“In the past, we looked at dams one at a time. As we’ve become more thoughtful about the impact of dams, we look at how a series of dams affect a waterway as a system.”
