PenBayPilot.com has circulated questions to Midcoast Senate and House of Representative candidates seeking election to serve in the Maine Legislature. As candidates return their responses, we are posting them on the Pilot's front page, and then they will reside on the Elections 2026 Voter Resource Page, which also includes letters, opinions, information about local referendum questions, and more, so that voters can be prepared for the November 3 polls.

Josh Gerritsen, D-Rockport, is seeking to represent Maine House District 41. The district comprises Camden and Rockport. He is running against Cory Raymond, R-Rockport.

Please provide a short biography of yourself, and explain why you are running for office.

My name is Josh Gerritsen and I’m running for the State House to represent Camden and Rockport. I grew up in Camden and I’m proud to have attended our public schools all the way through high school. I left for a decade, but came back to start a farm and serve my community.

I served on the Lincolnville Select Board, Waldo County Budget Committee as chair, Lincolnville Broadband Committee as chair, Mid-coast Solid Waste Board, our Citizens Recycling Committee as chair, and helped save the historic Mary E. Taylor building, my former middle school, from being demolished. I was also the vice-chair of the Rockport Harbor Strategic Task Force. We came up with an innovative plan to protect our working waterfront and parks from climate change.

I’m running because the cost of housing, healthcare, and electricity is out of control. We’re in a housing crisis and I want to ensure residents can continue to live in their homes, and our community can continue to thrive.

2) What issues are emerging from your conversations with the public as you go about your campaign, and what actions and/or solutions do you envision?



As I’ve knocked on countless doors in Camden and Rockport, housing is the number one issue that comes up.

I believe we should tax second homes for out-of-state residents at a higher rate, and to use the additional revenue to lower property taxes for year-round residents. The purpose is to raise more revenue from people who can afford to pay a little more, and to incentivize future homes for sale going to people that want to live here year-round.

To be clear, this proposal would only affect out-of-state residents. Maine residents with a second home would NOT be affected.

If a second home is a seasonal property for an out-of-state resident (no heat, no insulation, seasonal road, seasonal water), this should be exempt from the higher tax.

If the second home is a long-term rental, that should also be exempt from the higher tax because it contributes to the local housing market.

I believe that we should regulate short-term rentals that are separate from primary residences. This means that if a Maine resident is renting out their home, a room in their home, or a unit on their property, that would be exempt. And if the home is a seasonal property, it should also be exempt.

The purpose of this regulation is to disincentivize businesses from buying up single family homes for the sole reason of running a short-term rental business.

My wife and I made the decision to keep our former home in Lincolnville so we could add to the year-round housing stock. We rent it to a working couple who needed housing and are now a part of the community. We could have sold the property to cash out or make more money doing short-term rentals, but decided adding year-round housing was more important than profit.

3) Are there any specific issues affecting your particular district that you want to address in the Legislature?


In addition to housing, I believe in universal health care, and I will fight for a single payer system here in Maine, while exploring working with other states in the North East. Most people don’t know this, but Canada’s national health care system started regionally as well. We have to start somewhere.

I believe the fundamental flaw of the Affordable Care Act was not including a public insurance option. I look forward to working with Hannah Pingree on giving Mainers a public option now and fixing what the ACA didn’t do, while planning for a single payer system in the future.

A hyper-local issue that I want to address has to do with distressed animals in vehicles. Back in August, a good samaritan (and a nurse, no less) let a visibly distressed dog out of an unlocked vehicle. There were multiple witnesses that agreed the dog was distressed, but local police on the scene did not take action. She let the dog out and was charged with burglary of a motor vehicle. Luckily the charges were dropped.

As a dog owner and animal lover, I would have done the same thing as her, even if I had to break the window to let the dog out. Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Vermont have “Good Samaritan” laws that give citizens civil and criminal immunity to forcibly enter a vehicle to rescue an animal in distress, provided they follow strict protocols. I will sponsor or co-sponsor legislation in Maine that does the same thing.

4) A recent AARP poll indicates affordability is the top issue for older voters, with concerns about Social Security, health care and rising utility costs shaping their decisions. What will you do to address their concerns?



Affordability is the top concern for almost every resident I speak to, and that’s even more true for older voters on fixed incomes. On the federal level, we should be applying the payroll tax to all income above $250,000 to keep Social Security solvent deep into the future. On the state level, my housing proposals above would help keep property taxes from rising too quickly for year-round residents. We should also raise the homestead exemption.

In terms of utilities, I believe that buying out CMP and returning our electric grid to local control is ultimately the best solution for our unreliable and outrageously expensive electric grid.

On average, public power customers pay 13% less than customers of other utility types. Why? There is no profit margin, they are typically exempt from federal income taxes, they have lower overhead, and any surplus revenue is reinvested directly into grid reliability. In the short term, we need to hold CMP and our Public Utilities Commission more accountable.

5) Property owners throughout most of Maine are watching their property tax bills increase on an annual basis. What would you do, as a legislator, to help relieve the financial load on property-owning taxpayers?

Tax second homes for out-of-state residents at a higher rate, use the additional revenue to lower property taxes for year-round residents, and raise the homestead exemption. We also need to change the state education funding formula so it’s not so heavily based on property taxes. A large percentage of homeowners in Camden and Rockport have seen their home values almost double while their wages have not kept up. The funding formula must be more heavily weighed by income instead.

6) How will you maintain our strong economic and cultural ties with Canada?

Our relationship with Canada is incredibly important to Maine in a number of ways. Hundreds of thousands of Mainers share Franco-American heritage and Canadian tourism is an enormous driver of our economy. Our economies are also intertwined by lobster, seafood processing, forestry, and lumber workers. I will work closely with other legislators to attempt to undo the damage the Trump Administration has done to our essential relationship with Canada.

7) Do you think the state should prohibit state and local law enforcement from entering into formal contracts with federal immigration authorities? (For example: An Act to Enhance Public Safety in Maine by Defining the Relationship Between Local and Federal Law Enforcement. That bill did not make it out of committee last year, but the issue remains.)



Yes, I think the state should prohibit state and local law enforcement from entering into contracts with ICE. They have different roles and it should stay that way. Keeping our community safe requires trust and respect between local law enforcement and the community they are sworn to protect. When they cooperate with ICE and federal immigration authorities, that trust is broken and it takes a long time for a community to re-build that.

8) What legislative committees would you like to serve on and why?

I would like to serve on the Energy, Utilities, and Technology Joint Standing Committee. I have had a lifelong passion for renewable energy, sustainability, recycling, and all things technical. Diving into issues such as Net Energy Billing and the intricacies of how it works is my idea of a fun time! I believe that my passion for the subject matter will allow me to make a meaningful contribution to the committee.

First-term legislators rarely get two committee assignments, but if I got a second, I would like to serve on the Housing and Economic Development Joint Standing Committee. Housing is the number one issue facing our community, and I believe that serving on the committee that deals with the issue would be beneficial to Camden and Rockport.

9) Maine’s environment is fundamental for its outdoor economy. Does the state do enough to protect its natural resources?

Maine has a legacy of conservation dating back to the 1800s, but we aren’t doing enough to protect our natural resources. Climate change is here and we are already feeling the effects in our community. I support more funding for the Land for Maine’s Future program, accelerating our transition to clean energy with wind, solar, and grid-scale battery systems, and holding polluters accountable for PFAS contamination.

10) What is your position on the siting and construction of data centers?



Assuming we are specifically talking about AI data centers, I don’t support the siting and construction of them in our state. Period. The more I read about them, the more they look like a bad deal for any community they are built in. AI data centers are incredibly unpopular with the American people. They are hated by Democrats and Republicans by large majorities in every state.

And there is a reason for it. AI data centers are incredibly loud, enormously water-intensive, can spike local energy prices, and only generate a handful of jobs once they are constructed. Go ahead and google how loud an AI data center is. Do you think any Mainer should have to live next to that?

12) How would you define "good state government?”



I define good state government as passing balanced budgets, being responsive to the voters that elected them, and getting along across the political aisle. Our best days as a state are ahead of us if we learn to work together again.

On the local level, we still work well together, regardless of political party. I have seen it on every board and committee I have been a part of. But that’s not the case in Augusta. President Trump has made insulting and disparaging people you don’t agree with “great” again. When he is no longer in office, we will need to heal as a nation and come back together if we want to accomplish big things in the future. And we can start that healing right here in Maine.

13) What are the qualities and attributes of Maine that you want to enhance and cultivate?

Affordability. Spending my childhood in Camden and moving back a decade ago, there is so much I love about Maine. But I really just want to make living here affordable again for the working class. It was affordable for all walks of life when I was a child here in the 1990s.

The cost of housing, healthcare, electricity, and so many other basic needs has gone up dramatically and frankly threatens the stability of our community. If more of the people that work in Camden and Rockport can’t afford to live in Camden and Rockport, we will continue to see a degradation of basic services that we all rely on for a thriving community.

14) Is there any other topic or issue you'd like to talk about here? Have at it!



For as long as I can remember, I wanted to help people. In second grade, I told my parents I wanted to be a therapist when I grew up. I see elected office as a way to help people and make their lives better. I have always been distressed by income inequality and how hard the working class struggle to get ahead. It has never felt fair to me. And I want to do something about it.

That is at the heart of why I’m running to represent you in the State House. I have spent the last decade serving my community on countless boards and committees to make our region and our state better. I hope to keep serving you as your next Representative in Augusta.