About 40 people packed into the meeting room at the town office in Nobleboro on March 3 for a meeting about shoreland zoning with the Board of Selectmen and the Code Enforcement Officer.
Although the ordinance that governs shoreland zoning passed last year, the town has yet to publicly approve a map.
At the March 3 meeting, Code Enforcement Officer Stanley Waltz presented the proposed map, which includes 26 changes to individual lots from the zoning approved last year. This affects 18 landowners, Waltz told the crowd.
“We did what we could to make this as permissive as possible,” Waltz said.
The state mandates that the town protect the shoreland area – 250 feet – around all ponds and wetlands greater than 10 acres, rivers and saltwater bodies.
Within that 250-foot buffer, lots get different designations based on the composition of the land and the conservation value of the wetland.
In every place they could, Nobleboro made property in the shoreland zone limited residential zoning, rather than resource protection, Waltz and the board said.
Resource protection is a more restrictive designation that requires developers to get special permits from the Planning Board or take special precautions for many uses like new agricultural use and road construction.
Some things, like clearing vegetation other than timber harvesting, are prohibited entirely in resource protection zones.
In total, about 175 lots in Nobleboro are affected by shoreland zoning, but only 26 have been added with the new map this year.
The new shoreland land map does not reflect changes in state law. The laws protecting high to moderate value wetlands for inland wading bird and waterfowl habitat have been in place since 1989, the state just didn’t have the technology to identify all the protected areas, according to a fact sheet handed out at the meeting.
“What it sounds like is that we pay taxes to the state. They use that money to buy newer technology to better map our land, and then come down to tell us what we can do on our property,” Nobleboro resident Bob Nelson said. “If it wasn’t for GPS, we wouldn’t be here.”
Although many of the landowners present at the meeting were dissatisfied with the map, there’s really nothing they can do, Waltz and the board told them.
“If we don’t accept this map, the state will make us adopt their map, which puts all the lots back into resource protection,” Waltz said.
Individual lot owners will have an opportunity to appeal the decisions made about their property. The proposed map is on display at the town office, and anyone who thinks their lot has been zoned improperly should contact Waltz, he said.
The biggest complaint raised at the meeting was that the zoning devalues property without compensating for it in taxes.
“Will the land be assessed at market value?” landowner Oliver Libby asked, by which he meant $0 per acre. “If I get lucky and my taxes go down, someone else has to pick up the tab.”
Several people called for the town to reimburse residents for the taxes they’ll have to pay on land they can’t use and ask the state to reimburse the town for the lost tax revenues.
“They’re taking it like eminent domain, but in eminent domain you get reimbursed,” Libby said.
“I agree with you, but I really don’t think it’s going to happen,” Waltz said.
On all lots within the resource protection zones, a two-acre house lot will be left as limited residential. That land can be developed with limited restrictions.
However, any property within 250 feet of a high or moderate value wetland that’s not part of the house lot will be designated resource protection.
“So if 60 percent of my property is designated resource protection, my taxes should go down by 60 percent, right?” Nelson said. The answer was no. “Well at least I can watch the wading birds.”
The town will vote on the new map on March 19.
