🔒Roccy Risbara is building homes at the Downs and beyond

Rocco “Roccy” Risbara III is president of Risbara Brothers Construction Co. and a principal in M&R Development, the firm behind the 577-acre Downs community in Scarborough. Between the two businesses, and his roots in his parents’ earlier construction company, he’s had a hand in a significant number of housing and multi-use developments in southern Maine. More projects are underway beyond the Downs, in Freeport and Windham. Mainebiz: How did you get started in development, and what’s the relationship between your two entities? Roccy Risbara: My parents started R. Risbara Construction Co. when they moved to Scarborough from Portland in 1968. I don’t know what made them think they could do this. They were 25 years old with three little kids. I think they did it because they didn’t know they couldn’t. My brothers William and Marc and I started getting involved when we were in high school, and we formed Risbara Brothers Construction Co. in 1992. We now have a team of 40. Between my parents’ and our companies, I think we’ve built 20% of the homes in Scarborough. My brothers and I joined with Peter and Dick Michaud to start M&R about 12 years ago. They had developed a snack food company that they eventually sold, and did well for themselves. That business started in the garage of their childhood home. We grew up together, none of us came from money and we worked hard and have been successful. Before the Downs, we did projects in Portland, Gorham, South Portland and in Westbrook, where we developed Blue Spruce Farm in 2015. That was about 256 apartments and 60 houses. Risbara Brothers does some of the construction at the Downs, but we partner with as many local builders as possible, including Shaw Brothers and Landry/French. The Risbaras and Michauds are also co-owners of Maine Properties, Dirigo Architectural Engineering and Southern Maine Remodeling, all based in Scarborough. MB: There’s been some discontent in Scarborough over the pace of growth; it’s one of the fastest-growing towns in the state. Development at the Downs alone has added more than 700 housing units and over 50 businesses, with more of both planned. How have residents reacted to the project? RR: There are people in town who don’t care for what we’re doing. But we’ve added 1,500 jobs and, in 2025, our project generated $4 million in tax revenue for the town of Scarborough. The Downs is contributing to the tax base and part of the reason our mil rates remain low is because of this project. Many neighboring communities are experiencing extremely high property tax increases. We can’t get people to recognize that, or maybe to admit it. The town is 54 square miles, the largest in Cumberland County. There are 140 miles of road that the town takes care of and 8,500 dwelling units. We’ll eventually have 2,000 dwelling units, two million square feet of commercial space on eight miles of roads; that’s pretty efficient for the town to maintain. The Downs contributes far more than it takes. The development has also added very few children to the schools — there has actually been a decline in school enrollment in the last year. We do mostly one- and two-bedrooms, so we have very few children living at the Downs. For the size that three-bedroom units take, you can’t get that much more for them. And the market seems to like the one- and two-bedrooms. Development is a mathematical equation. A developer has to make a profit or we’re not going to do the project. Costs have definitely leveled off, but it’s never going back to where it was pre-COVID; it never goes back. It’s also important to note that we’re following the town’s comprehensive plan’s guiding principles for development, to a tee. We’re delivering what our own residents have called for. The town put the zoning in place to do exactly what we’re doing — so we’re just following the town’s lead. MB: There have been a lot of concerns about traffic in Scarborough. RR: Traffic is moving much better than the perception; it’s 25% better than it was when we started. M&R has invested $17 million in traffic improvements over the last five years. The state kicked in $3 million of that and the town kicked in $1 million, which came from impact fees collected from previous development projects; not taxpayer money. The majority of traffic for the Downs doesn’t come off of U.S. Route 1. It’s coming from Haigis Parkway and Payne Road, to get to Costco. Scarborough isn’t going to go back to the 1950s and people do need to recognize that we are all moving forward together. MB: You’re developing housing projects beyond the Downs, in Freeport and Windham. What do you look for in a project? RR: We look for pieces that seem like they can be done, where the town and the zoning is right and where there is an active and updated comprehensive plan. Developers are not villains, we’re rule followers. Our first assessment on any project is always zoning and comp. plan review to let the municipality and residents guide our work. Windham is a perfect example; the zoning was right and the property was available. That’s a project where we’re partnering with Graiver Homes; Loni Graiver brought that to us. MB: What’s next? RR: Windham and Freeport are all we’ve got cooking right now, but we’re constantly looking at other things. There will be life after the Downs for Risbara Brothers and M&R development. We always try to do a wide price range to appeal to a wide range of households. There’s no one demographic, except that everyone has a pet. A lot of towns have figured out that you’ve got to have people in the town for more than just the business day. They were rolling up the sidewalks at 6 p.m. in Freeport. There’s still pent-up demand for housing, but it’s not as crazy as it was a few years back when people were moving in the day after we finished. MB: You’ve built a lot of housing. Do you think Maine is on target to meet its goal of building 84,000 new homes by 2030? RR: That, frankly, is not going to happen. There isn’t enough land available that’s zoned properly and there’s too much opposition from people who don’t want their towns to change. We’re trying though! Everybody wants a home to live in but nobody wants things to change where they live. Everybody ought to have an opportunity to live where they want to live. Maine is such a great state; the greater Portland area is just amazing, and people want to live here. We’ve tried to meet a need, and we have a lot of satisfied customers.