![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/43534285_20260408_buildings9089.jpg\")
\t\t\tPortland Museum of Art purchased the building at 110 Free St. in Portland, on the right as seen from Spring Street. (Shawn Patrick Ouellette\/Staff Photographer)<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tPortland Museum of Art purchased the building at 110 Free St. in Portland, on the right as seen from Spring Street. (Shawn Patrick Ouellette\/Staff Photographer)<\/p>\n
The Portland Museum of Art has finalized its purchase of an office building and two adjacent parking lots in downtown Portland from MaineHealth.<\/p>\n
The $14 million sale closed on March 20, PMA officials confirmed Wednesday. The parties announced the deal<\/a> in November, and it took about four months to close. Officials from the museum and MaineHealth said the move will pave the way for changes to the museum\u2019s footprint and save building costs for the health system.<\/p>\n MaineHealth plans to move about 300 workers in early 2027 from its administrative offices in the building at 110 Free St. to an existing location in Westbrook, according to a news release from the health system. The PMA plans to move administrative offices to the Free Street building, which is next door to the museum, freeing up space for more galleries, museum officials have said.<\/p>\n The purchase is a \u201cvital investment in our city\u2019s future,\u201d Marcie Parker Griswold, head of communications and audience engagement for the PMA, said in a statement Wednesday.<\/p>\n \u201cThis acquisition is a milestone for PMA, allowing the next generation of our institution to grow in place in the Arts District,\u201d Parker Griswold said. \u201cSecuring these neighboring properties enables us to turn a long-term vision into reality: creating a more accessible and cohesive home for the arts in the center of Portland.\u201d<\/p>\n The move from the Free Street location will save MaineHealth \u2014 which operates Maine Medical Center in Portland and seven other hospitals in the state \u2014 $1.5 million annually in operating costs, according to the news release from the health system.<\/p>\n \u201cThe pandemic really changed the way people in administrative roles work,\u201d Kelly Elkins, chief operating officer of MaineHealth, said in a statement. \u201cPeople are working from home more when it makes sense to do so. This has led to an under-utilization of our Free Street offices.\u201d<\/p>\n The health system\u2019s Westbrook offices, located at 1 Riverfront Plaza, currently house MaineHealth\u2019s information technology department and some behavioral health workers.<\/p>\n The PMA is also planning to build a new museum wing<\/a> at the site of the former Children\u2019s Museum and Theatre of Maine building at 142 Free St. The museum\u00a0demolished that building<\/a>\u00a0in September.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Portland Museum of Art purchased the building at 110 Free St. in Portland, on the right as seen…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":573000,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[228,226,227,229,88],"class_list":["post-572999","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-design","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572999","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=572999"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572999\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/573000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=572999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=572999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=572999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}