SALEM – A local school district is taking a progressive approach to raising money to revamp their high school’s athletic fields.
This past June, a measure on the ballot to allow SAD 58 to harvest timber on district land and then sell the wood with proceeds to be invested in improving athletic facilities at Mount Abram High School won easily.
The timber will be cut from the approximately 170 acres behind the high school and the school bus garage, both in Salem.
SAD 58 superintendent Quenten Clark said it took a while for the district to find out whether the project was legal or not. No lawyers the district spoke to had ever heard of doing such a thing, he explained, and there were no laws on the books about such a plan.
Eventually, clearance was given for the project, and this fall the district began chopping trees down and cashing in.
Pete Tracy, a forester from Farmington, is managing the project and Phillips contractor Mainely Trees, owned by Bob Thorndike is cutting the wood.
The majority of the crew working the wood graduated from Mount Abram High School.
With this harvest alone, the district should raise over $40,000, said Clark.
“We’re pleased. It’s going to do a job that we wouldn’t have otherwise been able to do,” he said of the athletic facilities project. “We don’t want to diminish the value of the property. So, we are taking the value away from the trees and putting it back into our facilities.”
Not only will the harvesting bring in a steady stream of money over the years, but it will be a good model for the elective forest management class taught every other year at the high school.
“It really is the best looking chopping job I’ve ever seen,” Clark said, laughing.
Tracy had similar things to say in a recent timber harvest inspection report released at the end of November, noting that the harvest site was in surprisingly good condition, considering the rain and wind over the fall.
“Nearing completion. Looks great. Attention to detail by the crew and Bob Thorndike. Professionalism!” he wrote.
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