www.forum.Calais.us

[Steve_Gallagher]

This letter will be published in the Maple Corner Net Newsletter on Dec. 3rd. Within a week I will be sending another leter to the Calais Selectboard and a few area newspapers:

I attended the Curtis Pond Dam Public Hearing on Nov. 6th, the day before the vote, and have been thinking about many of the issues brought up there every day since. I am in the process of writing a letter to the Selectboard expressing some of my views and opinions, and have had a number of people help me on this. Even better would be to get a more Town-Wide discussion going, and bring up some of the issues that many people might not know about, and talk about some of the wider repurcussions and consecuences of the upcoming vote.

The Selectboard is intending to have a vote at Town Meeting if possible, which would mean that the wording of the vote would have to be decided by the last week of January in order to be published in the Town Report for vote by Australian Ballot in March.

Personally, my main concern is for the undeveloped portions of the Curtis Pond Shorefront, and I do have a very personal stake in this issue, as my family owns a 32 acre woodlot on the north end of the pond, that has the 3rd largest amount of shorefront or about 6 1/2 %. The Town of Calais has 7.4% in 2 parcels, and the Sacane's (you might know this as the Rubner, or the Patrick Henry propery) own about (a guess here) 30%.

Calculating the tax consecuences for myself, based on the recommendation of the Dam Task Force that 80% of the cost of the dam be paid by shorefront owners, and based on shoreline frontage, my tax bill would increase by 600-700 %. I feel that this is an attack on the undeveloped shorefront, and quite likely unintentional and just an example of poor planning. Taxes are used as a method of paying for things, but the truth is that they are also used as a political tool to control people's actions. High gasoline taxes in Europe have made a tradition there of more bicycles and trains, and fuel efficient cars. Tax breaks in Vermont for agricultural and forest land has been instrumental in slowing land subdivision and development here. So all that I can say here is that a tax method here in Calais which targets the largest parcels can only promote development of the remaining natural land around the pond. I don't belive that there is a person here who would be in favor of that, and therefore, people need to contact the Selectboard and tell them that this is an option in which we are not interested.

Issues I would like to bring up are:
Possible negative consequences of new Tax bills.
How many voters are there around the pond, and is it good public policy to attack a politically powerless group and send them the bill?
Who actually uses the pond?
Community Spirit involves pulling together to solve a problem, rather than looking for a scapegoat.
Will the creation of a higher tax district in Calais create hard feelings and a deteriorization of community?
Speading the costs out to the maximum number of people will create a situation which is onerous to none.
Curtis Pond is accessible via StateAccess, and Town owned propery, and a State owned body of water.
I don't think that any shorefront land on Curtis Pond is posted, which is amazing.
Shorefront propery owners already pay a huge tax bill based on the high appraised values on this land.
How committed are Calais voters to helping landowners to keep their land undeveloped?

I have talked to many people about this issue in the past couple weeks, and one of the most common comments is that "90% of the voters are casting their ballots into a knowledge vacuum". I would like to help keep that from happening, and hopefully prevent unreversable changes to the pond that harm it, and negatively affect all of us. As a start, I have created a space for discussion of Curtis Pond issues at the Calais Forum found at www.forum.calais.usand invite all Calais residents to post their ideas and comments there, or at least read what others might think.

Thanks, from Steve Gallagher
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Steve Gallagher
www.picture.net

[Steve_Gallagher]

A few statistics:

Number of land parcels in Calais - 940

Number of land parcels bordering Curtis Pond - 55, including 2 town owned and one state owned

Number of registered voters in Calais - 1243

Number of registered voters with land on Curtis Pond - Estimated at somewhere between 15 and 30.
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Steve Gallagher
www.picture.net

[Steve_Restelli]

My wife and I purchased our camp on Curtis a few years ago and have made lots of improvements there. I am sure that the re-appraisal will cost us more for making it look much better and the values have climbed since we purchased it. I spend the majority of my time on Curtis after the snow leaves. I am registered to vote in Calais and consider it my home, since I am here more than in Barre.
It is true that there probably are no more than 20 registered camp owners who can even vote on this subject so we are really at the mercy of all Calais voters to either tax us out or help solve the problem. I am not wealthy enough to pay more in property taxes than I currently do and I am sure that there are others like me approaching retirement that will soon be on a fixed income.
Any substantial increase will force me to sell what I have worked for all my life. It has been my hope that I can enjoy my 3 grandchildren when they come to visit me here, but now I realize that I may be forced out if the entire Calais community doesn't do what is fair and just.
It is absurd to think that Curtis Pond belonges solely to those whose property has water frontage on it. I am just a small fish in a very large pond. We would love to stay here, we love this community!
Steve Restelli

[Sandra Voorhees]

My husband and I purchased a camp on Curtis Pond in 1974 and have watched the tax grow from about $300. to $2,300. In all that time we haven't really received any benefits or services from the town of Calais. The road to the camp is privately maintained, there is no place to get rid of garbage locally. I have had no children in the school system or made any other demands on the town systems. We enjoyed many weeks of vacations at the pond and now that I might be able to retire and spend the whole of my summers there I may not be able to afford to do so. I really don't think its fair to tax just the pond property owners for a facility that the whole town and state are able to use. That is just my personal opinion and as I am not allowed to vote on the issue, thank you for providing this forum to express it.

Sandra Voorhees
Camp Owner
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SJV

[Anthonylow]

At the time the problems with Curtis Pond dam came to my attention, I took the trouble to look into the whole situation. Among other things, I walked down Kent Hill Road observing the lay of the land, speculating where the flood would go if the damn broke. It soon became evident that it would run down the north side of Kent Hill Road for the first half mile or so, and then would hit a rise in the pasture and run into and over the road itself. It would certainly hit the Museum, the Sawmill, the houses above Kents Corner, and our own house, The White House at Kents Corner, as well as the houses further on down the road.

When it became evident that the Select Board seemed to be more interested in postponing and delaying the problem than in solving it, I took out flood insurance. This would not solve all our problems if the dam broke, but at least it wouldn't wipe us out completely. It would, of course, be impossible to rebuilt the White House at Kents Corner with historical accuracy. Nor would it be possible to build anything like it for the amount of money the house can be insured for. But presumably we could build some kind of small house to take its place.

I would assume that after due consideration, it and the other houses destroyed by a flood would be removed from the National Register of Historic Places, since they would no longer have any historical interest.

Now it's several years later, and we have not progressed at all, beyond the initial studies that were commissioned. Nothing whatever has been done to move things forward, and we are presumably three years closer to the eventual collapse of the dam.

I just got the bill for renewal of flood insurance, which is $352 for next year's coverage. That amounts to perhaps ten times more than I might pay annually on an assessment to cover the costs of building a new dam. I suppose while the Select Board continues to deliberate and postpone any action, I will probably have to go on paying this premium for at least several more years, and maybe until the dam actually collapses or a decision is forced to drain the pond and let it revert into a swamp.

It is clear to me that a healthy and useable Curtis Pond benefits the entire town and increases the value of its tax base. If the dam breaks and the Select Board still has done nothing about it, then the taxes on shorefront properties will certainly have to be adjusted downward by substantial amounts, and everyone else's taxes will be raised to make up the amount. Summer visitors and renters will decline, income to the town will decline, and everyone in town will end up paying higher property taxes than they would pay if the dam had been built and the whole town was assessed equally to repay the bond issue. At the same time, everyone's property will be worth less.

I recognize that those who live in other parts of Calais might prefer to have someone else pick up the tab, but they should recognize that if an equitable solution is not agreed on, the whole town will suffer, and not just those living near the pond. The pond is open to public use, accessible to anyone living in Calais, and provides a boost to our entire economy and the value of property throughout the whole town. If that is recognized, then I think the solution is obvious. To move ahead, fix the dam, and add what would amount to a very small additional assessment to everyone's tax bills, in proportion to their valuations. The whole town benefits if the property owners around the pond keep up and improve their properties, and even more they will benefit if the property owners refrain from developing land that has up to now been kept wild. All of that will disappear under economic pressure unless we agree to take fair and reasonable action for the benefit of the entire town.

In case there were a flood before the matter is resolved, the town would certainly suffer in a number of ways. It would lose one of its chief attractions to vacationers. It would lose an important amenity for ourselves and for our children. It would require property reassessments that would necessarily sustantially lower taxes of houses around the succeeding swamp and increase taxes throughout the rest of the town to make up for the difference.

It might also wipe out a good number of houses in the center of the Historical District, as well as the Kent Museum and the Robinson Sawmill, thus decreasing the attractiveness of the entire town and lowering property values and resale values throughout the town. And it would show that we are unable, as a town, to come together and solve problems that should be a common concern to us all.

-Anthony Low