PORTLAND (AP) – Conservationists say they are halfway to their goal of raising $14 million to purchase the Katahdin Lake tract near Baxter State Park.
The Trust for Public Land and its project partners report collecting $7.1 million in gifts and pledges.
The trust has also negotiated a five-month extension of the option agreement to purchase the property from the Gardner Land Company.
The conservationists are now looking at a Dec. 15 deadline.
The land would be added to Baxter State Park.
About 2,000 acres north of the lake will be acquired by the state Conservation Department as permanent conservation land.
The Legislature earlier this year authorized the land deal, which supporters say completes former Gov. Percival Baxter’s vision for the park.
“The legislative process took a good three months out of our fundraising efforts,” Sam Hodder of the Trust for Public Land said Friday. “We had to spend a good portion of our time re-educating people and adjusting our (promotional) materials to reflect the change” in the deal.
Patrick McGowan, commissioner of the Maine Department of Conservation, called the lake area among the state’s highest conservation priorities.
“This current opportunity will never surface again,” he said in a statement. “This is the most important conservation project in Maine since Governor Baxter purchased the lands around Mount Katahdin, and with this campaign, every citizen of Maine will have a chance to take part in making it happen.”
Baxter served as the state’s chief executive from 1921 to 1924 and bought land for the park over a 30-year period, donating it to the state into the 1960s.
The Katahdin Lake parcel borders 7 miles of the eastern boundary of the park. The $14 million Katahdin Lake purchase involves no public money, but legislation was needed because it involves the transfer of state-managed lots to the logging company that’s selling the Katahdin Lake land.
The bill was the subject of lengthy negotiations among landowners, wilderness advocates, hunters, snowmobilers and state officials.
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