CALAIS – Entrepreneurs and small-business owners Down East whose work is oriented to tourism can join a new 15-month business training program called the Experiential Tourism Incubator Without Walls.

The mostly federally funded program will provide technical assistance, business counseling, financing and networking opportunities to help tourism-related businesses collaborate with one another in order to grow their operations and create jobs.

Coordinated by the small-business office of the Washington Hancock Community Agency, the project will serve the St. Croix region of eastern Washington County and the Hancock County region including the Blue Hill peninsula, Deer Isle and Stonington.

The program is funded primarily by a $195,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Community Services. The federal money will fund 53 percent of the cost of the program.

The agency is now accepting applications from small-business owners who wish to participate – at no charge.

Business owners will receive limited access to marketing resources such as graphic designers, marketing planners, and funds for printing and publicizing the resulting partnerships and packages.

“The program will provide business owners with the information and encouragement they need to form partnerships with other tourism-oriented businesses,” said Keith Small, director of small-business programs for the Washington Hancock Community Agency.

“We will guide and assist these business partnerships as they create and market collaborative destination packages.”

The course comes on the heels of the FERMATA project, for which Gov. John Baldacci last year hired consultants to study three regions of Maine and how their tourism efforts can be improved. Washington County, the Katahdin area and the western mountains were the three regions the FERMATA group focused on over 10 months.

The phrase “experiential tourism” has been put into play at the state and local levels to enable rural communities to take advantage of regional heritage, culture and natural resources. The intent is to maximize the financial gains from tourism while minimizing environmental impact.

Goals for the Incubator Without Walls program include:

. The creation of 20 tourism-sector jobs.

. Increased knowledge and skills of local business owners.

. Greater levels of business collaboration.

. Increased visibility of tourist packages in the two respective regions.

Harold Clossey, a small-business coordinator with the agency, will offer two evening workshops per month over 15 months in the greater St. Croix Valley region.

Those workshops will address issues such as business problem-solving, marketing, building Web sites and conducting Web searches. Local economic trends, regional tourism trends, partnership agreements and commercial insurance also will be covered.

The program’s kickoff event will be Wednesday, Feb. 8, at the Down East Heritage Museum in Calais. Jim Thompson, the museum’s executive director, will discuss the museum’s role in Washington County tourism.

Space is limited, so interested parties are encouraged to sign up for the training soon. Contact coordinator Harold Clossey at 454-3915 or by e-mail at hclossey@whcacap.org.