40 acres along Pickerel Pond conserved (complete article from source)
Source: fosters.com, by ADAM D. KRAUSS
March 05, 2007
ROCHESTER — When you're sitting on 40 acres of land abutting a pond in a remote section of the community, people put thoughts in your head, George Maccabee says.
"A lot of people told us we were crazy and should have just taken the money and run," he said.
Those people thought George and his wife, Shawn, should abandon their concerns that too much valuable land is being turned into cluster subdivisions and sell the parcel to a developer, who could have created at least six house lots.
But they had a different idea: conservation.
On Feb. 6, roughly two years after George Maccabee, 43, said he approached the city about protecting the land and its vital role providing drinking water, the City Council approved funds to protect the property.
The 11-2 vote authorized the spending of $152,000 from the city's conservation fund and a $77,500 state grant to protect the land on Sheepboro Road. It leads to Pickerel Pond, a wildlife-rich body of water that feeds the Berry River and Rochester Reservoir — the city's 53-acre drinking water source.
"If it hadn't been for the location ... if this had just been off in a fairly neutral site, I may have very well gone ahead and just put it up for sale, but it's really the fact of the pond and the watershed that makes a difference in why I wanted to have things done the way they were," George Maccabee said Wednesday night.
Conservation Commission member Jeff Winders, who worked with the family during the process, said the easement "is not to stop development. This is for the preservation of our drinking water."
Winders said when he hears from landowners who say the need to protect land is diminished by lack of rights to the water, he counters: "The water is influenced by the land it travels through. If the water's clear and then goes through polluted or mistreated land that will affect the water quality."
Sarah Pillsbury, administrator of the state's drinking water and groundwater bureau, said the property was a prime candidate for the water supply land grant program, which provides 25 percent matching grants. "We were happy to provide them with a grant to get that land permanently protected," she said.
Pillsbury, who works for the Department of Environmental Services, said not only will the protected land help preserve quality drinking water but reduce treatment costs, preserve open space and wildlife refuge.
Winders said a "natural resource inventory" will be done on the land.
The Maccabee effort is one of several efforts underway to protect all of the land fronting Pickerel Pond, a haven for beaver and an array of fish. Four property owners surround the pond, including the newly protected Maccabee land, the Maccabee's homestead on the opposite side and dozens of acres owned by David Hatch.
Before nightfall Wednesday, Hatch said and his wife have "definitely thought about" protecting their land, full of tall white pines. "I think in the future, definitely before I retire, we'll do something," he said, adding he was encouraged by the Maccabee's actions.
Hatch said he wants to protect the environment and check rapid development. "They're not making any more land. If our kids and grandkids are going to have a place to hike and fish, then we got to do something," he said. "If we don't do something it will be nothing but parking lots and buildings."
Winders said he's in talks with landowners in Farmington to protect hundreds of acres of the Berry River that flows into the reservoir.
"There's a movement afoot in Farmington to preserve a vast ... amount of acreage that would be beneficial to the City of Rochester" because it includes streams that run through properties that flow into a network of ponds leading to the Berry River, he said.
The Berry River watershed encompasses 10,147 acres, of which 6,226 acres, or nearly 10 square miles is part of the watershed that feeds Rochester Reservoir, according to Paul Susca, DES' source water protection coordinator. On the Maccabee's preserved 40 acres, the city will be the easement's primary holders, and following a site walk it's likely The Strafford Rivers Conservancy will assume secondary holder responsibilities, Winders said.
The Maccabees will be allowed to develop one, two-acre house lot on the property, but George stressed it "won't be down deep into the woods near the pond."
He said having the ability to sell or develop the lot was critical to finalizing the deal: he and his wife are donating their share of the land's development value for the easement while the bulk of the allocated funds, save for closing costs, will go to "buying out" his brother and sister, who "wanted to make sure they get their share of inheritance."
The land originally belonged to family patriarch Wayne Maccabee, who died in 1989, leaving it to his wife, Mildred, who died in 2003. The family bought the property in the 1970s.
Councilors Ralph Torr of Ward 5 and Larry Goelz of Ward 4 voted against the project.
On the possibility more land important to the water supply will become available, Ward 2 Councilor Sandra Keans said if "it does directly impact upon the reservoir, I think it would be good to look at."
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