Westbrook officials approve plan for Maine's first Asian-American community center
Rendering / Courtesy, Acorn Engineering
A project to build Maine's first center serving Asian-American and Pacific Islander residents was unanimously approved by the Westbrook Planning Board this week.
A proposal to build Maine's first center serving Asian-American and Pacific Islander residents was unanimously approved by the Westbrook Planning Board at its meeting Tuesday night.
The project by Khmer Maine, in partnership with Watt Samaki Temple, is part of an overall development of a new Cambodian Buddhist worship hall and temple on over 30 acres of forested land.
As part of the overall site development, Khmer Maine planned to build the center.
The community center "will be a hub that will help the city tap into the economic and cultural potential of Maine’s Asian American and Pacific Island community,” Marpheen Chann, Khmer Maine’s executive director, told the board.
Will Savage and Brad Kaden of Acorn Engineering, Steve Weatherhead of Winton Scott Architects in Portland, and Savy Kuch, a board member of Watt Samaki Temple, also attended the meeting.
With the project approved, Khmer Maine is now raising funds for the $5 million project.
Khmer Maine is a nonprofit that works to improve the social and economic well-being of Cambodians in Maine through cultural exchange, community building and civic engagement. The group also partners to support members of Maine’s Southeast Asian and Pacific Islander communities and strives for solidarity with Black and Indigenous communities.
“Looking forward, as more migration happens, as the communities continue to grow and have families and buy homes and build businesses, an Asian American and Pacific Islander community center made sense,” Chann told Mainebiz earlier this year.
The land is owned by Watt Samaki, a nonprofit Cambodian Buddhist temple. The parcel is at 00 Cumberland St. in Westbrook. An official street address is pending.
The temple acquired the land last year with the goal of creating a new temple facility, because the community outgrew its current location on 8.6 acres at 128 Back Nippen Road in Buxton.
Construction of the center is expected to begin in the summer of 2025 and to wrap up two years later.
The vision for the center is to house organizations helpful to AAPI Mainers and increase accessibility to legal services, translation, citizenship support and other community resources.
As of 2022, Maine’s Cambodian community was just over 2,000. In total, Maine’s Asian American and Pacific Islander population numbered over 26,500 people, including those who are multiracial.
In the past two decades, the largest population growth has been focused in Cumberland, York and Penobscot counties.
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