MOUNT DESERT – Acadia National Park will begin paying the town for sewer service to Jordan Pond House after getting a free ride for 25 years.

Officials for the park and the town confirmed Wednesday that although talks continue between the parties, Acadia already has agreed to make an annual contribution toward the cost of the service.

How much the fee will be and how long it will take the park to get federal funding for it is unclear, park Superintendent Sheridan Steele said Wednesday.

“I think in principle we’ve agreed we should be paying” for the service to Jordan Pond House, Steele said. “We think it’s certainly fair that [an annual] payment be made … but I don’t know where the money will come from. There could be a delay in funding.”

Jordan Pond House is one of the most popular destinations at Acadia. It features a full-service restaurant famous for its popovers, a gift shop and meeting space – not to mention public toilets.

The park has never paid the town for the sewer service, according to Town Manager Michael MacDonald.

“The town has absorbed the cost for 25 years or better,” MacDonald said Wednesday.

An annual payment by the park “will certainly go a long way toward including them in the community,” he said.

In addition to Jordan Pond House, the park is negotiating with town officials over how much it will pay for continued sewer service to Blackwoods Campground.

The annual fee presently ranges from $22,000 to $35,000, depending on volume, MacDonald said.

The park and town entered into a contract some 30 years ago for the Otter Creek village plant, which services the campground. At that time, the park had two choices: pay 37 percent of the cost of the new town plant or build its own facility to take care of the campground waste.

About 80,000 campers use the campground annually, according to park statistics.

Under pressure from the state, the town now is poised to spend almost $6 million to close the Otter Creek facility and rebuild the Seal Harbor plant to accommodate both villages.

Residents already have raised $4.4 million for the work, but are being asked for $1.5 million more to cover added costs and inflation since the original cost estimates were made in 2001.

Voters will decide whether they want to cover the additional cost at a special town meeting Dec. 8.

The park is being asked to pay not only an increased fee for Blackwoods, which will reflect the new investment in the system, but also a contribution toward the $6 million construction costs, MacDonald said.

“I fully expect we’re going to reach an accommodation on this that both parties will not like,” the manager said, noting that the park wants to pay the lowest amount possible, while the town wishes to collect the highest fee possible.

MacDonald said the town hasn’t proposed any specific numbers yet. The park and town are exchanging “information, thoughts and ideas,” MacDonald said, and will meet in two weeks to continue negotiations.

“The negotiations are going well,” he said. “This is not an adversarial negotiation by any means.”