Meeting Oct. 5, the Damariscotta Planning Board Monday delayed the Great Salt Bay Sanitary District’s plans to sell a three-acre lot to the town’s assistant fire chief in order to permit neighbors to comment on the deal.
The action came as the board considered the GSBSD’s request to change the boundary line in a subdivision created last month on land known as the Storer farm. The planning board will act on the request in October.
The sanitary district asked the planning board to enlarge a two-acre lot into a 3.2-acre lot.
In January, Damariscotta Assistant Fire Chief Jon Pinkham agreed to purchase the two-acre lot for $20,000. The lot, including three buildings, is located near, but not in, the Little Pond watershed, officials say.
At the Sept. 16 district board of trustee meeting, at the request of William H. Brewer, the board treasurer, trustees voted to enlarge the two-acre parcel to 3.2 acres, but the price remained the same – $20,000.
According to the meeting minutes, John D. Gallagher who seconded Brewer’s motion to sell the land to Pinkham said Pinkham “(will) be a good neighbor and take care of the land.”
Gallagher said the trustees were more interested in preserving the quality of the watershed than the price of the lot. “The price did not matter,” he said.
Also according to the minutes, GSBSD Supt. Mary Bowers urged the trustees to get an appraisal for the property before selling it.
“Bowers said that she would like to go on record that we should get an appraisal on the property before selling,” trustee minutes said.
The board did not obtain an appraisal for the lot before voting to sell it to Pinkham. There was no advertised public sale of the property.
Although towns are required by law to follow strict legal guidelines to sell properties they determine are not needed, they must determine the fair market value of properties and advertise them for sale to the highest bidder.
The water district is not bound by these regulations.
Evelyn deFrees, a spokeswoman for the Maine Public Utility Commission, said although the state commission regulates local water utilities, there are no regulations or processes governing the sale of land.
“Traditionally, water utilities do not off-load any land they might use to protect water supplies,” she said.
The commission will look into water district transactions only if 10 customers complain to the PUC, she said.
The sanitary district purchased the 180-acre Richard Storer property for $750,000 in 1999. A $337,500 federal grant provided part of the purchase price and the district sold $412,500 in bonds to fund the rest. A rate hike to the district’s water customers covered the cost of the bonds.
Part of the Storer property retained by the district drains into the watershed for Little Pond, a 77-acre pond that has been the source of the town’s drinking water since 1896.