All stories by Dick Jarrett

    The citizens of Limington enact our local laws, but are the laws that protect us being enforced or even followed?  Several recent decisions of the Planning Board and Appeals Board lead one to wonder just who is "watching the store" here in Limington.  When the laws are ignored, people, their property values, local business, wildlife, and the environment can all be hurt.  The short stories that follow document some disturbing incidents where from a lack of attention to detail all the way to outright contempt for our local laws is hurting us all.

    Recently there have been two cases where the Resource Conservation District was seriously compromised.  And the special section of the zoning ordinance designed to ensure protection of critical wildlife not only was not followed, but was completely ignored during the review process of two separate applications.

    The Planning Board is also soliciting input on how the laws should be changed in a whirlwind five hour meeting scheduled for Saturday September 9th.  The townspeople should bear in mind that for the most part we currently have pretty good laws and there already are some proposals for change on the table.  But just following the laws already enacted by the townspeople would do wonders towards protecting the values that are cherished by the townspeople of Limington.

    Months ago at the June 8th Planning Board meeting, Dearborn Brothers Construction was told that they needed to show the shoreland zoning boundaries and Resource Conservation Zone on their site plan.  Although there were many meetings where this information should have been made public, Dearborn Brothers Construction waited until the August 10th meeting before presenting pretty colored maps showing their interpretations of the zoning boundaries.  Waiting until the Planning Board was so tired of hearing this application that the board would pass anything just to get rid of it, Dearborn Brothers Construction apparently tried to pull a fast one on the Board and the public by drawing in boundaries far from the legal lines.  They judged the Board's attitude correctly because the Board announced at that meeting that the Board would accept no more public input on the project, input that could have shown where the real lines should have been drawn.  Contrary to common sense and actually contrary to the law, the Board allowed only one side the opportunity to present its information.

    Contradicting their own directives, on August 14th the Board did accept into evidence a letter from the DEP demonstrating that the boundaries supplied by the out of town developer excluded significant sections of the Resource Conservation Zone around Boyd Pond.  But the Board still refused any public comment even though this new evidence was submitted.  And to add insult to injury, the Board then selectively solicited testimony from various gravel pit operators and allowed a resident of the Millturn Road to speak.  If only the turtles who will be crushed beneath the tires of the Dearborn Construction Company trucks could appeal the Board's decision, they would easily win; Maine case law clearly requires that all parties to a decision receive notice of new information and be given an opportunity to respond.  But unfortunately while there are plenty of opportunities for gravel pit operators to say their piece, there is no one to speak for the turtles, for the environment, or for the town laws.

    Incredibly, even after the DEP demonstrated beyond any doubt that the maps supplied by Dearborn Brothers Construction were outright false, one member of the board complimented the out of town company on its integrity.

    Back in 1994, the Maine Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) imposed State minimum shoreland zoning on the Town of Limington and a zoning map was drawn up.  In 1999, reacting to pressure from White Brothers Inc., the DEP changed the zoning map to eliminate from the state minimum requirements one Resource Conservation Zone in a wetland in their gravel pit in South Limington.  No other changes to the map were to be made.  The Resource Conservation Zone is signified by a series of dots in the shoreland areas.  Somehow, out of the tens of thousands of dots on the map, a handful of dots fell off when the new map was printed.  These five dots represent an area of approximately 250 feet by 400 feet in the Dearborn Brothers Pit.

	1994 DEP Shoreland Zoning Map and area specified by text of Limington Zoning Ordinance		1999 DEP Shoreland Zoning Map with Missing Dots on east side of pond

    Fortunately for the citizens of Limington, the town's zoning ordinance specifically includes the original area in the text of the ordinance.  Unfortunately for the citizens of Limington, the Planning Board tends to ignore the ordinance if the DEP regulations are more lax.  Although the local ordinance specifically states and the DEP has stressed to the Board that if two regulations contradict each other, the Board must follow the most stringent, the Board invariably chooses to follow (quite illegally) the least stringent "because we need to follow state shoreland rules".  For example, the DEP pointed out that the contractor only owns to the high water mark of Boyd Pond.  While the DEP would allow the operator to excavate up to 100 feet from the pond in certain areas, the ordinance enacted by the voters of Limington requires gravel excavations to keep back 150 feet from a property boundary, including such shorelines.  The Board has ignored the voter enacted requirement and is allowing the operator to excavate within 100 feet of this property line.

    On August 15th, the Limington Board of Appeals struck a further blow to the safety of our local volunteers who serve the townspeople on the fire and rescue departments.  At issue was a 250 foot long driveway on a steep slope located off of the Doles Ridge Road in the Rural Zone.  This is on a lot in the same subdivision that has plagued the town with legal problems for the past six years after the Planning Board illegally declared that the 1983 zoning ordinance was unenforceable and approved a two acre lot subdivision in the minimum three acre lot zone.

    Nine years ago, the Limington Comprehensive Plan called for the town to establish an economic development committee to study ways to bring desirable business into town as a way of increasing the tax base without increasing local taxes.  The Town of Limington is now plagued with new proposals that have a high negative impact on local taxes or on the lives of the residents but bring in few tax dollars.  In contrast, Limington is having trouble attracting business such as new machine shops and light manufacturing, companies which bring in both jobs and economic benefits.  One reason may be the aggressive optional tax collecting policies instituted by the selectmen.  Manufacturing companies usually invest a lot of money in machinery.  These high capital expenses are multiplied when the owners must pay a percentage of the machinery value year after year to the town in the form of business personal property taxes.  Most small towns want to attract businesses and as a result only collect a small portion of these funds or give a tax break like Hollis did for the Poland Spring bottling plant.  On the other hand, cities like Portland usually charge the full tax burden, a policy that Limington has copied.  As a result, towns like Hollis get the high revenue bottling plant while Limington gets the low-income housing project that will supply the minimum wage laborers to the Hollis plant.

    What are some of these recent high-impact, low-revenue projects that are coming to Limington?  Read the list below and see if you think this is the type of development that will be the best in the long term interest of the Town and the taxpayers.

Low-Income Housing:
    This project will bring twenty new low-income families to Limington, placing a burden on our schools, police, rescue, and public assistance programs.  The projected revenue from property taxes is minimal and will be far less than the actual costs to the taxpayers.  The result: the existing Limington taxpayers will have to make up the difference.

Gravel Pits:
    This industry is probably one of the most disruptive commercial activities that can occur in a residential area.  The noise and dust from the excavations permeate the air of the surrounding properties.  Heavily laden trucks pound down our local roads, roads that must be repaired at taxpayer expense.  The current $50 per year CEO pit renewal fee covers minimal code enforcement.  Many of the gravel contractors are from out of town so that Limington does not even receive the excise taxes on their trucks.  And the wildlife habitat that the people of Limington cherish is bulldozed under a cloud of choking dust.  The residents and the wildlife receive all of the negative impacts, the local taxpayers bear the expense of the roads and enforcement, and the gravel operators end up returning very little to the town.

Cell Towers:
    Here is a new business that may return some tax revenue and service to the local community.  However, if done carelessly, it will have a highly negative impact on existing business such as our local airport.  Limington's rural character, which is the number one priority specified by the residents in the Comprehensive Plan, could be forever changed by poorly thought out development in this field.  Visual and wildlife impacts will be greatest if tall lighted towers start popping up all over town.

Paintball Operations:
    Paintball operations do not require permanent structures so that as a result they will return very little tax revenue.  They may bring in a small amount of economic benefit if refreshments are purchased locally.  They can have a high negative impact on neighboring properties, roads, law enforcement, and wildlife if not monitored closely.  In one case, a four hundred acre parcel currently in the tree-growth program will be used for this commercial activity.  The tree growth program allows landowners a tax break for low intensive activities such as tree farming and open space uses, uses that require very little town services.  The selectmen can determine if the tax break, subsidized by the remaining taxpayers, will continue once this commercial activity begins.

Dick Jarrett