Blue Hill seeks new settlement date on GSA properties

Board also sets date for public hearings on recreational marijuana sales and takeover of Toddy Pond dam

By Tricia Thomas

BLUE HILL—The Blue Hill Select Board announced on September 15 that settlement on the town’s purchase of two properties owned by George Stevens Academy, including one on Tenney Hill being considered for a new fire station, has been pushed back a week, to September 26.

Board chair Ellen Best said that the town still needs to complete a written description of the properties, which relies on the results of recently completed surveys, before the closing can proceed. Closing on the $1.8-million purchase, approved by voters at a special town meeting on August 28, had been scheduled for September 19. The extension is the second the town has sought this month.

“Typically, the seller is responsible for getting a description of the property but, in this case, we’re doing the description, and there’s been a delay in making that happen,” Best said. “I waited [to do it] until after we actually knew we were going to buy the property…and we were waiting for the one, full-time surveyor who works on this side of Hancock County [to complete the needed survey].”

Blue Hill Town Hall. Photo by Tricia Thomas.

Deb Ludlow, chair of GSA’s board of trustees, did not respond to an emailed request for comment. Trustees had approved an earlier town request to extend settlement to September 19.

The select board also set a date of October 22 for a public hearing on two issues facing voters on November 4.

The first question involves a plan to create a watershed management district to take ownership of a concrete dam at Toddy Pond, which falls within the borders of Blue Hill, Orland, Penobscot and Surry. The state’s Department of Environmental Protection has approved a petition from the current owner of the aging dam, AIM/Bucksport Mill LLC, to abandon it. The company also plans to abandon similar dams at Alamoosook Lake in Orland and Silver Lake, a primary water source in Bucksport. The three lakes, which drain into each other, were first dammed more than a century ago to provide water for a now-shuttered paper mill. The mill and its assets, including the Toddy Pond dam, were sold to AIM/Bucksport Mill in 2014.

If approved by voters on November 4, the Toddy Pond Watershed Management District will assume ownership of the dam, and split the cost of its repair and ongoing maintenance with homeowners living along its shoreline. The proposed warrant also seeks approval of $780 for Blue Hill’s share of the district’s estimated first-year costs.

Select board member D. Scott Miller read a draft of the proposed warrant, and asked the board to review and approve it at its next regular meeting on September 22. Town clerk Dana Goettler said the warrant may be available for public review next week.

“Referendum question 1, article 2 is ‘Do you favor the establishment of, and the town’s participation in, the Toddy Pond Watershed Management District, and the appropriation of $780 to provide the town’s share of the estimated budget for the first year of operation of the Toddy Pond Watershed Management District,’” Miller said.

Miller also announced that the town had been notified of a dispute between AIM/Bucksport Mill LLC and Bucksport Generation LLC, a former owner of the mill’s power generation assets, over  whether the dams can be sold. 

“Bucksport Generation has to approve any transfer by Bucksport Mill, the owner of the dam, and there is now a fight. As of right now, there is no permission for the transfer,” Miller told the board. “There is no telling how this thing is going to unfold, other than it is going to take some time.”

Miller added that, although the dispute may delay the sale, it likely will not halt it.

“It doesn’t change the [need for a town] vote. Our view is that, ultimately, Bucksport Mill is not going to want to own this property in the long term. They just don’t want it. So, we’re going to need this [watershed] district at some point, whether it’s this fall or next summer or two years from now,” Miller said. “We establish it and get it up and running, and then we’ll be ready to take over the dam.”

Voters also will weigh whether a recreational marijuana dispensary can be sited in the town. Sedgwick resident Brian Sherwell, who was born in Blue Hill and grew up in Brooklin, obtained enough signatures from town residents to get the question placed on the ballot.

In a separate and lengthy interview with The Rising Tide to be published in the coming days, Sherwell said he’s been working with a realtor on purchasing a property suitable for the dispensary, and said such a store would be welcomed by peninsula residents who now must travel to Bangor to purchase recreational marijuana.

Sherwell said he is happy to have the matter vetted at the October 22 public hearing, and is not concerned about both the marijuana and Toddy Pond dam issues being discussed at the same time.

“The more people show up from all walks of life, the better,” Sherwell said. “I think it will help, and I’m looking forward to the discussion.”

The October 22 public hearing will begin at 6 p.m. in the town hall auditorium.

The board also announced following an executive session on September 15 that it had approved the hiring of a town treasurer. Morgan Cousins, a Blue Hill resident and financial manager at a local newspaper, will begin work as treasurer on September 29, they said.

In other business, the board accepted a donation in kind from an anonymous local donor who wants to improve an ongoing erosion issue at Mountainview Cemetery on Tamworth Farm Road. Mitigating a steep slope in one part of the cemetery will provide needed space for more grave plots, two of which would be owned by the donor, Miller said.

“They would level out a strip that is 18 feet wide and 100 feet long, add gravel and loam, and build it up,” Miller said.

After a brief discussion, the board unanimously voted to accept the donation, with the caveat that work be approved and overseen by select board member Ben Adams.

Finally, the board said it will formally notify resident Rex Florian that construction-related activity at the South Blue Hill town wharf last weekend, including bringing heavy equipment by barge to a property he owns on Long Island, was conducted without town permission.

Florian had requested, and was permitted, one-time use of the wharf from July 19-22 to transport equipment and materials by barge. The operation, conducted at high tides, involved moving and then replacing municipal floats and private moorings to make way for the transport. At the time, Florian was required to notify boaters and other wharf users, and provide a launch service to help people get to their boats.

Miller said a visit to the South Blue Hill wharf last weekend revealed that Florian was again transporting equipment or materials, and moving aside floats and moorings, but had not obtained permission from the town to do so.

“I noticed that there were a whole bunch of dump trucks there, and the floats were not in their places,” Miller reported. It also was unclear if a launch service was being provided.

Miller said he spoke with Florian about the matter, and suggested that temporary code enforcement officer Martin Conant follow up with him on permissions needed for future transports.