Crescent Beach debate highlights land issues

CAPE ELIZABETH — One of the largest businesses in Maine’s richest community has joined the growing list of groups calling on the state to resolve its ongoing loggerheads regarding lease terms at Crescent Beach State Park in Cape Elizabeth.

Rauni Kew, director of public relations and green programs at Cape Elizabeth’s Inn By the Sea, said the hotel is “very concerned” about plans to move the beach’s 870-spot public parking area from its location near the mile-long beach on the south side of the hotel to a spot on the inn’s northern side, between it and the Richmond Terrace development. Those plans stem from the state’s inability to come to terms with the Sprague Corp., which owns most of the 187-acre park, including access to the parking lot from Route 77.

“Inn by the Sea believes it is in everyone’s best interests to use the existing entrance to the park, and not create a new entrance,” Kew said on Monday. “We hope the Sprague Corp. and the state will come to an equitable and fair agreement before the looming deadline of Sept. 1.”

However, Will Harris, director of the Bureau of Parks and Lands within the Department of Conservation, said there is no “hard and fast” date to do a deal with the lease.

Although Harris acknowledged Tuesday that Sept. 1 is when his budget is due to Gov. Paul LePage for the next biennium, and that the budget does not yet include money to buy the Sprague land, he said it does not necessarily follow that failure to reach an agreement in the next two weeks means loss of public access, privatization of the beach or establishment by Sprague of a competing operation when the lease expires in April.

“I can say we are still talking and we are trying to find that workable solution that keeps the entire parcel together,” said Harris. “When the budget is due doesn’t have a drop-dead affect on our negotiations.

“We won’t be negotiating in the press and I really don’t want to define a date when things must be decided because there’s just way too many moving parts in this.”

Still, there appears to be some fear in state circles that park privatization is in the cards. Last week, the Maine State Employees Association launched a petition drive aimed at knocking that option off the table.

"After privatizing the state's Fort Knox Historic Site, Gov. LePage and Conservation Commissioner Bill Beardsley now appear willing to put the revenues of the entire state park system at risk,” read a release from the union. “Instead of renewing the state's expiring lease for Crescent Beach State Park in Cape Elizabeth, Gov. LePage and Commissioner Beardsley seem to be moving in the direction of privatizing this enormously popular beach attracting over 100,000 visitors a year."

Mary Anne Turowski, political director for the state employees union, said Crescent Beach is one of the top five revenue-producing sites in the state park system.

But issues swirling around Crescent Beach could also swallow nearby Two Lights State Park, which the state manages alongside Crescent under a single director, and Scarborough Beach State Park, where Sprague’s management contract expires in 2014.

When Crescent Beach Park was created in 1960, it included 100 acres leased by the Sprague Corp. for 50 years at $1. When that agreement expired two years ago, the state negotiated a year-to-year deal, letting Sprague keep the 5 percent fee it pays the state out of revenue it generates at Scarborough Beach State Park under subsidiary Black Point Resource Management. According to Harris, that deal nets Sprague about $10,000 per year.

Now, it’s reportedly pushing for a better deal.

Initially, talks centered on state purchase of the property, in a deal similar to the one reached in 1998 at Scarborough Beach State Park, which the state bought from Sprague using a Land for Maine’s Future grant.

“During the previous administration, we encouraged them to get that done,” said Cape Elizabeth Town Manager Michael McGovern. “In my opinion, they dropped the ball. Now we no longer have the Land for Maine’s Future money and our new governor has indicated he’s not willing to take on any new debt.”

Although the issue is largely between the state and Sprague, McGovern said the town’s concern includes continued public access, including for fishermen at nearby Kettle Cove.

“Someone needs to look after the interests of the commercial fishermen, the boaters, the kayakers and the beach users, in Cape and other communities,” said McGovern, noting that he had a meeting scheduled with Sprague for late week. “If the state has more or less decided to privatize the beach, the town has an interest in making sure the public has a right of access.”

Like the state employees union, McGovern said it appears the final resolution might be a sale/management deal similar to the Scarborough Beach arrangement.

“My guess is this that’s probably the route this is going,” he said.

That potential jeopardized not only state proceeds from the Crescent Beach, but also a number of park ranger jobs, although Harris brushed off such conjecture. “We are very happy with state management,” he said.

Harris did say that if contingency planning for an alternate parking area have to be put into action, funding would come from deferred capital projects throughout the state parks system. How much the project might cost, he could not say.

“We’re working those figures up now,” said Harris.

Those plans do not include improvement to Route 77, which has a third lane for turning traffic at the entrance but is only two lanes wide where the new lot might go.

That’s a concern for the Inn by the Sea, said Kew, considering the volume of traffic the park might get, even with a smaller parking lot.

“Cars could very well back up on Route 77 past our entrance,” she said.

Even so, that and the fact that the new lot would be visible from “one or two” rooms at the inn is the least concerning prospect, said Kew.

Instead, it’s a potential ecological disaster that concerns Kew.

According to the Department of Conservation’s director of engineering and real property, Skip Varney, material from the parking lot would be reused to upgrade an existing maintenance road that leads to the beach from the proposed new lot. That path would be widened for “general, emergency and maintenance use,” said Varney.

“Inn by the Sea has had longstanding concerns around preservation of the natural local environment, and is very concerned about the impact this new lot and the access road would have on the surrounding community, quality of life, traffic, beach and dunes, on local wildlife and the environment in general,” said Kew.

“Inn by the Sea last year spent a great deal of money, time and effort working with the Department of Conservation and Crescent Beach State Park to eliminate bamboo and bitter sweet on park land, and to replace it with indigenous habitat suitable for the endangered New England Cottontail,” said Kew.

Although the state shared Kew’s concerns, that won’t necessarily forestall development, if push comes to shove, said Harris.

“We’re aware of the cottontail issue,” he said. “That is a concern to us and we have a wildlife biologist on staff that we’ve been discussing the matter with. If we have to go ahead, and this is still a big if, whatever we do will be of a minimal impact.”

Sprague Corp. head Seth Sprague did not return a request for comment. Nor did the governor’s spokeswoman, Adrienne Bennett. Still, McGovern said what happens in the near future could well set the tone for public lands throughout the state.

“There’s a battle going on from within the state – pubic ownership vs. private management,” he said. “We’ve had a public beach and state park that’s been very well run for the last 40 years. It’s a major asset to the entire greater Portland region. But now the question is, do you run the park as a business or as something that’s only concern is to benefit the public?”