PARIS — According to the Maine Municipal Association, the town can’t rescind access to a public way for ATV use.

In an emailed response to Paris selectmen, William W. Livengood, director of the Maine Municipal Association legal services department, said that Title 12 sections 6A and 6H of state ATV law don’t allow municipal officers to prohibit ATV use on a section of a public way and that rescinding access doesn’t include the 500-yard limit between trails.

Selectmen received the opinion last week in response to their questions on how to proceed on the ATV issue. Selectmen also asked if a board should set a general rule on ATV use or whether it had authority to decide on ATV access on a case-by-case basis.

Livengood told the board that they could decide case by case. “I would characterize the authority given in subsection 6(H) as being totally discretionary and not subject to any requirement that similar roads be dealt with in a same manner,” he said in an email.

After giving ATV riders access to Parsons Road last year, complaints from a couple living on the road led the Board of Selectmen to rescind access to that road in January.

In March, the X-tra Mile ATV Club found a workaround — a Paris resident would let them ride their ATVs on his property so that the club’s use of Parsons Road would be less than 500 yards, the maximum distance ATV riders can use between trails, according to Maine ATV law.

Selectman Jean Smart said she believed that because selectmen had voted to rescind access to Parsons Road that the club couldn’t ride their ATVs on the road, even if they were riding less than 500 yards.

ATV club members haven’t revealed the location of the trail or whether the new route would pass the property of James and Paula Hakala, the Parsons Road couple whose complaints led selectmen to rescind access in January.

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