OTISFIELD – Town officials, eager to get rid of large rock chunks they said were laid down without permission last fall by developers at a public boat landing, have declared they will take away the rock, piece by piece.
The Planning Board organized a meeting Monday night to approve a new plan by a water and soil engineer to remove the rock – good-sized pieces of blasted ledge – later this week and haul it away from the Saturday Pond site.
“We’re going to hand-pick it out there,” Planning Board Chairman Richard Micklon said by telephone Monday. “By this weekend, people will be able to swim down there.”
The landing, called Sam’s Landing after its benefactor Sam Jaakkola, is a 100- by 100-foot lot the town has owned since 1946.
Last year, developers Dale Verrill of Paris and Tom Kennison of Oxford approached the town with a proposal to improve the landing by stopping soil erosion and building a concrete boat ramp. Verrill co-owns eight lots on Saturday Pond, about 3,000 feet of shore.
Selectmen asked to see a plan before they approved the project, as well as authorized them to apply for permits from the Maine Department of Environmental Protection.
“I offered to do the boat ramp for free,” Verrill said by phone Monday night. “Just so you could turn around a small boat.” He said he originally planned to invest $10,000 on the project.
But because the department did not respond to the permit application within two weeks, Verrill said that he figured by law he had an automatic authorization to begin work, which included cutting down some trees and laying down stone.
Verrill said last fall he put down the rock, called rip rap, to stabilize the soil through the winter so he could cover it in the springtime with concrete pads for a boat launch.
Instead, Verrill said DEP officials contacted the town office with its answer: a denial because the application had an error.
Town officials stopped the work at the landing within hours.
“Before you do any work in a shoreland zoning, you have to go before the Planning Board,” Selectman Mark Cyr said Monday night by phone. “You can’t cut trees within 100 feet of water; it’s illegal.”
“I worked four hours,” Verrill said. He said he spent more than $300 on the project.
The town posted No Trespassing signs at the landing and roped it off to prevent the public from stumbling and falling on the stones.
The Planning Board has approved a new plan to reverse the work at the site. After the rock is removed, workers will lay down bark mulch and place several large boulders on the access road to prevent vehicles from passing through.
Eventually, Micklon said the town will add a picnic table or two, as well as possibly build a walking path allowing people to carry in canoes or kayaks.
Micklon said he is not sure how much the cleanup project will cost, but thought it will be more than $1,000. The rock will not be returned to Kennison or Verrill.
“Selectmen feel it landed on town property, so it will remain town property,” Micklon said.
“They can do whatever they want,” Verrill said.
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