Maine Department of Transportation Project Manager Deane Van Dusen speaks during a meeting Monday, June 6 about the department’s plans to place a conservation easement on more than 130 acres around Sherman Marsh. (Maia Zewert photo)
The Maine Department of Transportation has postponed its plans to place a conservation easement on more than 130 acres around Sherman Marsh and expressed willingness to negotiate certain details with property owners.
Edgecomb and Newcastle property owners voiced their concerns and frustrations about the project during a meeting with DOT and Army Corps of Engineers officials Monday, June 6 in the community room of the Newcastle Fire Department.
The Sherman Marsh Wetland Bank, as the project is known in the DOT, would place conservation easements on 16 properties in Edgecomb and Newcastle totaling about 130 acres, DOT Project Manager Deane Van Dusen said. The site was chosen when the state was presented the “unique opportunity” to enhance and restore the salt marsh after the dam breached in fall 2005, Van Dusen said.
By placing the conservation easement, the DOT would also be creating a wetland “bank” site that could be used to offset the impact of transportation projects on wetlands in the region.
In 2015, the DOT hired an independent appraiser to assess the value of the individual properties and a negotiator to notify the property owners of the department’s offer of compensation. In the event the property owners did not accept the offers, the state planned to take the land by eminent domain.
The DOT originally gave property owners a deadline of Tuesday, June 7 to agree to the compensation offer, however, the DOT moved the date after residents came forward with concerns about the process, Van Dusen said.
“With the concerns they had about how the decisions were made and the buffer widths were decided, it just made sense for us to postpone it until we could provide these details,” Van Dusen said.
Forty people, including property owners, Newcastle town officials, and state representatives, attended the meeting. Van Dusen was joined by DOT Senior Property Officer Andrew Johnson and Ruth Ladd, of the Army Corps of Engineers.
One of the major concerns of the property owners was the buffer zone that would be placed around the easement. Ladd said an interagency review team working with the project asked for 100 feet of buffer on each property, however, due to cost and the shape of some of the lots, this was not possible.
The buffer was decreased to 25 feet, however, some properties, like those owned by Justin Wood and Marva Nesbit, have larger setbacks. Ladd said there is concern about pollution from the animal waste generated by the cattle Wood keeps on his land.
Lee Straw, a Newcastle farmer who owns the cattle on Wood’s land, said Wood’s property has been farmland for years, and he would be willing to put up a fence to keep the cattle from entering the marsh if that is the concern.
Another concern voiced by many of the property owners was regarding restrictions about what owners can and cannot do on their own land once the easement takes effect. Although she is still able to mow the area within the buffer zone, Nesbit said she was told she would no longer be able to keep her kayak rack or dock.
“It’s not enough that the buffer zone you’ve created comes right up to my porch, but you’re also impacting my quality of life,” Nesbit said.
Nesbit said the DOT should have restored the lake when it originally blew out, a statement a majority of the crowd voiced support for.
Ladd said the interagency review team studied the properties from an aerial map to determine where the buffer lines would be drawn.
Martha Gaythwaite asked if the review team would be willing to negotiate with property owners regarding where the buffer zone falls on their land.
“Surely the owners could come up with better lines than what was drawn on the photograph,” Gaythwaite said. “They know their land.”
Ladd said she would speak to the review team about renegotiating the buffer widths.
Ken Dodge asked whether the agreement he had signed with the state is still in effect.
“We wanted to settle with you, and signed a letter saying we wanted to settle with you, so where are we now?” Dodge asked. “We’re in the process of trying to sell our home, but now the compensation is being held back.”
Johnson said all the settlements that had been worked out previously were put on hold to allow the DOT to hear the concerns of property owners.
“We’re kind of starting over with a clean slate,” Van Dusen said.
An additional meeting is scheduled for Monday, July 18. Ladd said she hopes members of the interagency review team, as well as representatives from the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, will be able to attend the meeting and answer questions.
Van Dusen said he felt “guardedly optimistic” leaving the meeting Monday evening.
“Once we showed we were willing to negotiate and work with the property owners, it seemed like people were willing to meet us halfway,” Van Dusen said. “I hope we can come to a compromise that everyone is OK with so we can get the Sherman Marsh Wetland Bank in place for future transportation projects.”
The DOT encourages anyone with comments, concerns, or questions about the project that they would like officials to address at the next meeting to submit those comments to the Newcastle town office, which will forward the information to DOT.
The next meeting to discuss the project is tentatively scheduled for July 18 at 6 p.m. in the community room of the Newcastle Fire Department.
