New industrial zone eyed in Scarborough

The allowable size of buildings may not be the only significant change residents will soon see in Scarborough zoning. During last week’s council meeting, Harvey Rosenfeld of the Scarborough Economic Development Corporation let drop, in an almost offhand manner, that he may return “within the year” to ask for the creation of a new, fifth industrial zone.

On Thursday, May 19, he named its possible location. “We are tentatively looking at an area around Exit 42,” he said. “CPIC [the Comprehensive Plan Implementation Committee] will probably take a look at that in the next few months.”

The west side of the Exit 42 area is now a business zone, with rules generally more suitable to retail stores. The change would allow light manufacturing.

“It could lend itself to electronics manufacturing, or biotech,” said Rosenfeld. “It would be for more than office use or retail. Right now, we’re really limited in our industrial zones. So, that’s an opportunity.

“This is a long-term process,” said Rosenfeld, adding that no particular company has come asking for space by the interstate. “One of the things I think Scarborough has done well is planning ahead. We’re a suburban community, so you really want to control where you do want commercial growth.”

“It’s got to be well-planned, or it gets out of hand,” said Rosenfeld. “Scarborough for the last 25 years has been really proactive in its planning, which has really allowed the community to grow both residentially and commercially without one impacting on the other. Other communities haven’t done that.”

Scarborough residents get deal on beach visits

The Scarborough Town Council says it heard residents loud and clear when, earlier this year, they asked to have Higgins Beach included as an option for season-pass parking.

Unfortunately, when the fee schedule for the next year was voted on at the May 5 council meeting, that request was overlooked.

So, as a way to make amends, councilors voted May 18 to add the beach into the existing pass system for the same money.

Historically, residents and taxpayers of Scarborough have been able to buy a season’s parking pass to either Ferry Beach or Hurd Park for $20, or one pass to both beaches for $30.

Now, the $30 pass will include unlimited parking at Higgins Beach, as well.

“Ordinarily, this would go back to the finance committee,” said Councilor Ron Ahlquist, who chairs that group, “but the fact of the matter is we are way into this [season] and we need to take care of this quickly.”

As of May 18, about 50 people already had purchased an all-beach pass. Town Manager Tom Hall says those folks will be contacted and told they now have parking rights at Higgins Beach. A $20 Higgins-only option will not be available, he said, only because the town cannot procure the necessary stickers in time.

“The next two weeks are the busiest,” said Hall. “If we don’t catch them now, we’ll have a lot of catch-up to do. If somebody is that interested in Higgins, they’ll have to buy the [$30] pass.”

“Or pay the $5 daily fee,” said Council Chairman Judith Roy, adding, “the whole Higgins beach thing this year is a trial run, so there is the potential to change it if necessary.”

“We are open to change if there’s a demand for it,” said Councilor Carol Rancourt, who suggested the fix.

Arrests made in credit card scam

Police say N.Y. men found in Maine Mall area with hundreds of fake cards.

Three men from away are sleeping in a local jail following a $10,000 shopping spree on somebody else’s dime.

According to Sgt. Steve Webster of the South Portland Police Department, the trio from Brooklyn, N.Y., arrived in Maine at about 3 a.m. Saturday morning. After a short layover in a Scarborough motel, the men began hitting local stores with bogus credit cards.

Their whirlwind tour of local checkout lanes didn’t last long – they were sitting in the back of a police cruiser by 11:30 a.m. – but it was impressive, totaling slightly more than $10,000 in merchandise purchased with falsified credit cards. Stores hit included AT&T Wireless, Bull Moose Music, Gamestop, Sally’s Beauty Supplies and Walmart, in Scarborough, as well as Babies “R” Us and Toys “R” Us, both in South Portland.

The grafters seemed primarily interested in gaming systems, although six hair-trimming units were found among the haul. When the vehicle was searched, police found what Scarborough Detective Sgt. Rick Rouse describes as “a small cardboard box with about 100 credit cards, along with three wallets full of additional cards, all from various banks, like Chase, Capital One, Citi and other companies.” Also found were driver’s licenses from Florida, Illinois and New Jersey, all in the name of “Shawn Collins.”

“It appears that most of the credit cards had the same name on them,” said Rouse, Monday morning. “However, they didn’t have the hologram square that is commonly used on credit cards today. So, it’s believed they were all illegally manufactured.”

Arrested were Michael Barnes Jr., 32, Esley W. Porteous, 27, and Terrell J. Campbell, 25, all of Brooklyn, N.Y.

Each man was charged with aggravated forgery, a Class B felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison, and theft by unauthorized taking, a Class C felony that can earn an additional five years. Barnes also was charged with operating a motor vehicle without a license.

According to Rouse, it was Bull Moose employees who first got hip to the scam. After one of the men purchased $700 in merchandise, the other two tried their hand, each in succession, with less luck. The second had his card declined, while the third couldn’t get any help at all from the Bull Moose clerks.

“Of course, they were all using credit cards with the same name on it,” said Sgt. Webster, picking up the narrative. “By the time the third gentleman came in, they started to catch on that something might be wrong, and they refused to sell to him.”

Instead, said Webster, the Bull Moose crew said Toys “R” Us might have what the third man wanted to buy.

“Greed is a wonderful thing,” said Webster. “We had a heads-up as to where they might be, and there they were.”

Things happened in rapid succession at that point, when Toys “R” Us employees called in their own string of suspicious purchases.

When the men left the store with about $3,000 in gaming consoles in tow, South Portland police were already outside, looking for the 2001 Toyota Sequoia described by Bull Moose workers.

“One of the officers spotted the car,” said Sgt. Webster. “He watched them all come out of Toys “R” Us, get in to it – of course loading it up with merchandise – and pulled them over.”

The thieves attempted to talk their way out of the stop, to no avail.

“One of them tried to say they had never even been to Toys “R” Us, even though they had receipts and gift cards in the car,” said Rouse. “They gave different stories about looking for jobs, and having family or friends up here, but nothing seemed to really pan out.”

Porteous and Terrell were arraigned in Cumberland County Superior Court on Monday and are being held for cash bail of $50,000 and $10,000 respectively. Banes was able to make bail and was released.

Webster said the Secret Service will eventually claim jurisdiction in the case.

“There is a huge problem with these fraudulent credit cards,” he said. “The criminal masterminds get the information overseas. They then sell those card numbers to people here in the states. Once they have that information, all they need is a card-maker, basically.”

Although all of the cards found with the suspects were printed with one of two names, each card number was different, apparently derived from a list of compromised accounts. Each man went into each store with one of the cards, Webster says, because they apparently had no way to tell which had working account numbers.

“It’s kind of a hit-or-miss situation,” said Webster. “Some of the cards will work, others will be declined.”

Although the Brooklyn crooks were caught in record time, local police says shopkeepers must remain vigilant.

“This is not the first time this has happened around here,” said Webster. “It happened in Biddeford recently. It’s happening more and more.”

Scarborough wants bigger buildings

Change sought to allow for expansion of local businesses

It’s as simple as this – in a tough economy, if a business wants to grow in your town, don’t get in the way.

With that thought in mind, the Scarborough Town Council on May 18 fast-tracked a request to relax building-size limits in any of the town’s four industrial zones.

Currently, structures in these zones may occupy no more than 35 percent of a property lot. In a May 10 memo, Harvey Rosenfeld, president of the Scarborough Economic Development Corp. (SEDCO), asked the council to bump the limit to 50 percent.

At least two businesses, he said, have recently been frustrated by the “space and bulk” regulation in Scarborough’s zoning ordinance. One, described as a “large biotech company” located in the industrial park, wants to add 30,000 square feet to its facility, said Rosenfeld.

He declined to name the business because it has yet to make a formal application. Also unknown: How many jobs might be at stake.

But what makes the need particularly pressing, he stressed, is that the company in question reportedly came to Scarborough only because it could not expand in its former location. Although he did not say so in as many words, the longtime development guru intimated this firm could easily jump ship a second time.

“We don’t want to see companies leaving Scarborough because they can’t expand,” said Rosenfeld. “This really is a valuable change to the [zoning] ordinance.”

The proposed change is so valuable, in fact, that Town Manager Tom Hall brought the request directly to the council, bypassing the usual preliminary stop at Scarborough’s ordinance committee.

“In this instance,” he said, “given some of the urgency and, frankly, the common sense associated with it, we really wanted to get this matter before council quickly and demonstrate to our good, local businesses that we do not want to provide any impediment to their interests in expanding here.”

“Especially in this economy, projects seem to take forever to get to a final stage,” said Rosenfeld, in a subsequent telephone interview. “If we can get something moving along, I really don’t want to put any roadblocks in the way.”

The May 18 council vote – unanimous but for Councilor Karen D’Andrea, who was not at the meeting – forwards the amendment to a series of public hearings. The council is slated to take public comment June 1, while the Planning Board will likely hold a hearing at its next meeting, June 20.  Final adoption could then occur as soon as the next regular council meeting, July 20, unless a special session is called beforehand.

Councilors seemed to have few reservations about the change, in part because none knew the reason for the 35 percent restriction.

“I really don’t know where that number came from,” offered Rosenfeld. “It’s been in the ordinance for a long time. It probably was just a guess as to what fit in.”

“Certainly, I don’t have an issue with 50 percent,” said Councilor Michael Wood. “The applicant would have to meet all other requirements, such a parking, setbacks, stormwater treatment, et cetera, et cetera. But I can’t answer the question about the 35 percent. It must have been before I started reading the ordinances.”

“I think I can probably, maybe answer it,” said Chairman Judith Roy. “If you look at [the ordinance under section] B.3, that section was first put in there in March, 1975.

“So, it’s been a while,” she said.

“Even before me,” joked Rosenfeld.

Only Councilor Carol Rancourt raised a concern, asking if the change could have “unintended consequences,” given the proximity of Scarborough’s industrial park to its marshlands.

“I don’t have any objection,” she said. “I just want to make sure we’ve thought of all the obstacles that might come in the future.”

Town Planner Dan Bacon said just about any industrial expansion would require a site plan review, as well as an eyeballing from the Department of Environmental Protection.

“This would not change any of those requirements,” he said, “particularly the ones that are intended to protect the marsh. I feel pretty confident this change would have no adverse effect in that [regard].”

Scarborough tightens tap in new aquifer zones

In an attempt to save local groundwater supplies, the Scarborough Town Council voted unanimously May 18 to create 10 new “aquifer protection districts,” controlling and limiting land use in each area.

The newly protected sand and gravel aquifers are in North Scarborough, between Gorham and County roads; on both sides of Broadturn Road; off the Haigis Parkway; near Mussey Road; and in the areas of Pleasant Hill and Black Point roads.

On-site storage of heating fuel is now limited to 660 gallons in these areas, effectively outlawing any new gas station within protection district borders. Storage of other chemicals, including fuel not used for heating or emergency power generation, is limited to 25 gallons. Properties that now exceed these limits are “grandfathered,” but may be subject to the new rules if facilities are renovated, expanded or modified.

“These changes only make sense,” said resident Paul Porada, who took credit for instigating creation of the new rules by submitting state aquifer maps to the Comprehensive Plan Implementation Committee “more than six years ago.”

“Water needs to be clean when it comes out of the ground, and we also need to think about making sure it’s clean when it comes time for it to go back into the ground,” he said. “We want to make sure that people with drinking-water wells like myself, or especially people like my neighbors, who have shallow, hand-dug wells, are not affected by the development that goes on around them.”

“This is a small step, but it’s a step in the right direction,” said Councilor Michael Wood. “West of the turnpike, most, if not all, of us do rely on wells to draw our domestic water. We should feel comforted that the town is paying attention to protecting those resources.”

Among additional restrictions, new building permits will feature higher standards for home fuel tanks, including a color requirement on the outside (they must be a “light or white color”) and a double-lining on the inside. New permits will be denied on any septic system with a 1,250-gallon tank, or a design capacity of 2,000 gallons per day, until the owner can prove nitrate concentrations will not exceed 5 mg/L.

Also, any new construction that triggers a site plan review will also now require submission of a plan to control and treat stormwater runoff.

Meanwhile, with the exception of sump pumps, any new floor drain must be registered with the state and any geothermal heating unit designed to draw more than 2,000 gallons per day is banned barring proof it will not "adversely impact" either the quality or the quantity of groundwater.

Finally, any commercial use of manure or fertilizers must adhere to “best management practices” of the Department of Agriculture.

“It’s not perfect, what’s being presented,” said Porada. “But it’s far better than what we haven’t had in place. This ordinance really gets us from nowhere to someplace where other towns may adopt something very similar to this.”

Wood observed that the “man-made lines” that set Scarborough apart from its neighbors pass directly over some of the protection zones. “Aquifers don’t follow our rules,” he said.

In that light, Wood asked Dan Bacon, the town planner, to send copies of the zoning change to neighboring communities, particularly Gorham and Westbrook, which appear to share Scarborough’s largest aquifers. Unless those communities adopt similar rules, he said, “Our best efforts would go for naught.” 

“We can set all this in motion and be very conscientious about it,” agreed Chairman Judith Roy, “but the stuff they let go into the aquifers could come into ours.”

Bacon admitted aquifer sites are “not precise,” given that they are based on existing Maine Geological Survey maps, and not recent testing.

“For that very reason, we have a provision for the boundary to be questioned, or challenged and altered, though additional evidence,” said Town Manager Tom Hall, “because we acknowledge that the boundaries, as mapped, are approximate.”

However, Bacon noted that the “burden of proof” is on the property owner. Thus, in many cases, it may be cheaper for the homeowner to drop a few hundred dollars on mandated equipment, like sleeved lines and filter protectors, than to survey groundwater to all lot lines.

At any rate, given frequent references to the ordinance change as a starting point, there seemed a strong indication that additional restrictions may be on tap for the future.

“Everything we do when we do development comes with a price,” Porada told councilors, just prior to their vote. “Particularly, think about de-icing chemicals applied to the road base and on properties. That can affect groundwater quality. This ordinance really doesn’t get to that. It’s something to consider.”

“These are the small steps you do now to save your tomorrow,” said Councilor Jessica Holbrook.