CARRABASSETT VALLEY – Voters here gave a hearty thumbs up to financing a new clubhouse for the Sugarloaf Golf Course, which is owned by the town.

In a referendum vote Thursday, residents voted 121-32 to spend up to $800,000 for a new clubhouse just off the 10th tee with Crocker and the Bigelow mountains in view.

The town will pay 62.5 percent of the debt service for the $800,000 note, with the remaining 37.5 percent coming from Sugarloaf Mountain Corp under an amended golf course lease.

Based on an estimated maximum interest rate of 4.47 percent over 20 years, the estimated costs are $800,000 in principal and $328,408 in interest for a total debt service of $1,128,408.

“This community recognizes the tremendous value of the Sugarloaf Golf Club. We have the No. 1 rated course in Maine and New England, and this new clubhouse will enhance the overall Sugarloaf experience,” said Scott Hoisington, Sugarloaf’s director of golf, in a press release.

The town would own the clubhouse. According to conceptualized design plans, it would be 5,500-square-foot facility including a pro shop, bathrooms/day locker area, kitchen, dining room/lounge, screened-in porch and outdoor patio. The dining room/lounge is designed to hold around 60 people indoors or 100 people, including the patio and porch areas.

A new practice green will also be located next to the clubhouse and overlook the ninth green and the Bigelow mountains.

“Everyone is delighted with the support our residents have shown for this project,” said Carrabassett Town Manager Dave Cota, according to the release. The project, Cota has said, will improve the area’s recreational facilities, which the town considers its source of economic development.

Construction is set to begin next summer, and it is expected to open the following spring.

An hour after the polls closed, 37 voters braved the icy roads and deluge of rain to attend a special town meeting at the Touring Center.

At that meeting, voters unanimously decided:

• To accept $22,500 the town was awarded last month from the Land and Water Conservation Fund for a new playground and to improve the basketball court at the town park.

• To appropriate $22,500 from the Recreation Endowment Fund and up to $18,000 from the Playground Reserve Fund as the town’s share of a $63,000 project to reconstruct these improvements at the town park.

• To spend the remaining state funding of approximately $84,000 and town funding of approximately $21,000 as approved at the 2001 town meeting to construct a 0.25 mile non-motorized bypass trail. It will bring the trail traffic from the Narrow Gauge Pathway around the residential area of Bigelow Station and take users all the way to Route 27 and closer to the Sugarloaf Mountain Access Road.

sdepoy@sunjournal.com

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