NORWAY — The Opera House eminent domain case is heading to trial after both sides Friday failed to agree on how much the heavily damaged building is worth, attorney Norman Rattey said.

Rattey represented the town at the two-hour conference before Justice Carl Bradford in Cumberland County Superior Court in Portland.

Rattey said said the former owner of the building, Bitim Enterprises Inc. of Londonderry, N.H., submitted an appraisal of $328,000.

The town offered to pay $185,000 for the three-story brick building in the heart of the downtown historic district. That figure came from a professional appraiser hired by the town.

“I think we’re too far apart,” Rattey said. There is more than $100,000 difference for the Main Street edifice, which the town took possession of earlier this year because of public safety concerns.

Barry Mazzaglia, owner of Bitim Enterprises, did not attend the conference.

“He said he forgot to put it on his calendar or something,” Rattey said.

Instead, Mazzaglia was represented by attorney Durward Parkinson of Kennebunk. The procedure allows the both sides to meet together and separately with the judge to try to reach a settlement.

Mazzaglia paid $225,000 for the Opera House in 2003 after it was placed on the state’s Most Endangered Historic Properties list by Maine Preservation of Portland. At that time, there were storefronts on the ground floor but the second and third floors had been vacant for decades.

In September 2007, a portion of the sagging roof collapsed under the weight of water and all three floors were flooded. Engineers hired by the town deemed it structurally unsafe, so last year the town took it because efforts by Mazzaglia to shore it up failed, officials said.

The town recently hired Chabot Construction of Greene to begin stabilizing the building.

With no agreement on compensation, the case will now be scheduled for a trial in Oxford County Superior Court in Paris.

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