T-Mobile call center lures staff statewide

OAKLAND – Three months after opening, the T-Mobile USA call center has nearly 300 employees, some of whom live more than an hour’s drive away.

The call center at the FirstPark business park opened in early August with plans to eventually have more than 700 workers.

The wireless communications company says it now has 297 employees in Maine who come from 67 towns and cities.

While more than 100 of those employees come from Oakland and the neighboring communities of Waterville and Winslow, workers also come from Bangor, Appleton, Portland, Auburn, Dexter, Dixmont and Etna.

The call center’s apparent drawing power is raising questions about whether the perceptions of flat or negative population growth in this part of central Maine should be re-examined.

Leonard Dow, FirstPark’s executive director, said he doesn’t see FirstPark’s development being hindered by lack of worker availability. T-Mobile is the largest tenant at the business park, where 16 of 22 lots have yet to be filled.

“We did projections for [the point] when FirstPark’s build-out is complete in 20 years. It would have 2,500 to 3,000 employees,” he said.

Last November, T-Mobile’s decision to build a call center at FirstPark sparked L.L. Bean’s decision to abandon its plans to build a call center of its own at the business park. Bean officials said they were concerned there wouldn’t be enough workers for its call center and T-Mobile.

In its economic forecast issued in September, the State Planning Office projected very modest population growth for Kennebec, Somerset, Waldo and Franklin counties.

Kennebec County is projected to grow from 120,000 to 125,000 people between 2004 and 2020. Waldo County is projected to grow from 39,000 to 45,000 in the same period. Somerset and Franklin counties would grow by 0.3 percent or less.

The projections could change based on new development in the region.

“I think it’s correct to think that the demographic projections could change if new business comes to an area and the economy changes in some fundamental ways, whether it’s T-Mobile or the expansion of the Marketplace in Augusta,” said State Economist Catherine Reilly.