Cape gun club under fire

The Town Council will try to mediate with members and neighbors in a dispute centered on safety fears

CAPE ELIZABETH — Following a volley of accusatory letters, the Cape Elizabeth Town Council has agreed to stage a workshop aimed at easing tensions surrounding the Spurwink Rod & Gun Club on Sawyer Road.

However, it’s not clear what, if anything, the council can accomplish. Councilors seemed to acknowledge as much themselves at their meeting Monday, debating for several minutes whether they should host talks, or encourage the club and its neighbors to work things out among themselves.

“What about the attorneys representing the parties meeting?” asked Councilor Jessica Sullivan, suggesting another alternative.

But local attorney Jamie Wagner says that’s the problem. After an initial meeting with gun club lawyer Jeffrey Jones of Ellsworth “about nine months ago,” Wagner says he’s been repeatedly rebuffed. 

“Therefore, I am compelled to address the issue to the Town Council,” he wrote in a March 24 letter requesting municipal intervention.

Mark Mayon, who assumed the club presidency in January, shot back in a March 29 missive that Wagner was hired with one goal in mind – “to find a way to shut down the Spurwink Rod & Gun Club.”

Complaints about noise have been commonplace in Cape Elizabeth for at least 25 years, ever since houses began to spring up in the Cross Hill area surrounding the 57-year-old gun club. In more recent years, allegations have circulated of ammunition rounds found lodged in trees and homes and yards.

“There should be zero tolerance for this type of accidental discharge,” wrote Wagner, claiming to speak “on behalf of certain concerned citizens.”

After Monday’s meeting, Wagner acknowledged that while he’s had talks with “several” club neighbors, he has a single paying client at this time, who retained his services “almost exactly one year ago.” Wagner declined to name his client when asked by the Town Council.

It was only after a half-dozen phone calls and two emails went unheeded, Wager says, that he chose to involve the Town Council, in hopes of avoiding a costly court battle. 

But Mayon says that the March 24 ///overture////LETTER?// is “laced with alarmist statements and untruths.”

The most recent allegation of bullets escaping the club’s firing range, he said, happened in 2009. Since that time, Mayon said, “a considerable amount of effort has been made to enlarge the shooting berms” in front of a “huge hill” that separated the club from nearby homes. The club also spent “thousands of dollars and hundreds of man hours” to install security systems to ensure only authorized club members use the firing range,” said Mayon.

During Monday’s meeting, Mayon argued that there is no proof stray bullets reportedly recovered from Cross Hill homes and woods actually came from the gun club. However, when club member Ben Black claimed neighbors have, in the past, resorted to “planting” bullets they later picked out of their siding to show police, Cardinal Lane resident Mark Membrino took the podium in his own defense.

Although he said he is not Wagner’s mystery client, Membrino admitted being the homeowner referenced in the March 24 letter. It was in 2009, Membrino said, when he found a bullet lodged in a shingle below his daughter’s bedroom window. The bullet did not penetrate the shingle, he said, and although his home is “in the direct line of fire” from the club range, the bullet was stuck at an angle that seemed to suggest it fell from almost directly overhead.

Membrino said he bought the house in 2008, and has no way of knowing how long the bullet, which he described as “a range round,” was there before he discovered it.

“I wouldn’t say that I’m afraid to live in my home,” he said after Monday’s meeting, “but I am concerned for sure because, I promise you, there is no way I planted that bullet there.”

One issue, said Membrino, is that there is no fence staking off the firing range. Wagner raised that issue, as well, suggesting to councilors how easy it might be for a neighborhood child to “inadvertently wander into a danger zone.” 

Mayon dismissed this hazard.

“The parents of these children purchased homes in the vicinity of a gun club,” he wrote. “Isn’t it the responsibility of the parent to make sure their children know where it is safe to play and where it is not?”

Although Mayon says the club “far exceeds the state’s requirement for signage per foot” with posted warnings such “No Trespassing,” and “Danger. Firing Range,” Wagner called it “kind of unbelievable to blame the parents.”

Although Wagner says his client cares only for the safe operation of the club, with “no intent to shut it down,” he did raise several red flags, suggesting, for instance, that the town “consider whether there are any negative environmental consequences stemming from the activities of the club.”

He also questioned if the club’s intent to form a junior shooting team and host competitive meets constitutes a change of use that would allow the town to step in and regulate the club in ways not now allowed under state and federal laws.

These side issues, says Mayon, only reinforces the belief of the 300-plus club members that Wagner and his client “have a strong desire to shut down our club.”

Still, Mayon said, “our club is definitely willing to come down in a workshop environment and see what we can come up with.”

The council did not set a date for that workshop, voting only to put the topic on an upcoming agenda.

“I think this issue has been around long enough that we ought to just move it forward,” said Councilor David Sherman. “Let’s just have a workshop and then we’ll be in a much better position to decide what the appropriate steps might be, if there are any additional steps to take.”

Still to be determined is the degree of involvement the council would take in the dispute. Town Manager Michael McGovern suggested a limited, mediator role, may be the best course of action.

“I don’t know if the council wants to spend workshop after workshop getting into the details of this,” said McGovern. “Maybe the compromise is the town has an initial meeting where everyone hears what the issues are and then gives a certain period of time for the main parties to go and have discussions, with the understanding that the council is going to revisit it at a set date.”

However, Councilor Frank Governali said little ground would be covered if the upcoming workshop covers the same issues that have been at play for years.

‘Coming to the workshop, I think it would be very productive if both sides had specific recommendations as to what they think can occur to promote safety,” he said. “I think debating facts is not going to be very productive.”