AUGUSTA, Maine — The LePage administration says the state has received federal grants totaling $8.7 million to conserve two forest properties in western Maine.
Most of the money from the U.S. Forest Service Forest Legacy Program, $7 million, will purchase 11,800 acres on Crocker Mountain in the town of Carrabassett Valley. The lands are part of a working forest owned by Plum Creek and include a segment of the Appalachian Trail and opportunities for ATV and mountain biking trails.
Another $1.7 million will enable the state to purchase a conservation easement of more than 5,800 acres of family-owned timberlands in Madrid Township.
Gov. Paul LePage and members of the Maine congressional delegation announced the grants on Thursday.
I think its great that we have 8.7million to spend on protecting trees at a time when we have to make cuts on healthcare and liheap before we run out of money. Mr.LePage certainly has his priorities in check.
Ya, but it’s “free” money from the fed’s printing press. Trouble is there will be no one to take property taxes from once the land is conveyed to the state.
These properties are very likely already in the Tree Growth Tax program. That means the landowners pay about $1 per acre in property taxes. The total potential tax loss would likely be less than $17,000. In exchange for that the snowmobile, ATV and hiking trails will stay open (bringing in loads of cash for local businesses) and we’ll all have the right to hunt and fish on these properties without worry of being locked out in the future. Seems like a bargain.
The Tree Growth Tax program is nothing but a trap. Anyone who has tried to take land out of tree growth knows what I mean.
It’s only a 10-year “trap.” It should have been clear what the stipulations are when you put your land in current use. The purpose of current use taxation is to promote forestland ownership and conservation by lowering the tax rate to a value that doesn’t prohibit keeping the land in forest, promote liquidation and subdivision, and not developing it to meet the high valuation of “highest and best use (HBU)” taxation.
Your taxes were lowered for the commitment to conserving land in working forest. If you break that commitment, you pay a penalty.. It’s a pretty fair system to me.
This money came from the federal government earmarked for this purpose. LePage did the absolute right thing. These projects will protect miles of important snowmobile, ATV trails, keep the land open for hunting and fishing, and insure that they will continue to be managed for forest products. No way the Governor could walk away from that. Not to mention the local communities, businesses, and snowmobile clubs have been leading the effort.
Are you telling LePage not to take it ?
If not what ?
Hve a nice day
Otay boss, but are these people telling LePage to not take it, OR NOT ?
Please read the article before commenting..
Will be a good place to put up wind mills :-/
When that becomes an urgent National Defense priority ?
We need wind mills to protect the USA from the Canadians…LOL!!!! War proffiteers may do just that…
“We need wind mills to protect the USA from the Canadians…”
Not yet, but it might come to that when the Saudis and other OPEC’er embargo their oil, again.
Don’t take Canada for granted, now that we getting the biggest part of our oil from there. They are just another Oil Producing Exporting Country, now, aren’t they ?
They aren’t even our biggest trading partner anymore..
So why shouldn’t they be as Chauvinistic as you are
or as just much war profiteers as OUR military industrial complex is ?
How does it make sense that we spend $8.7 million public dollars to place 17,600 acres in conservation in western Maine and turn our backs on the generous gift of 70,000 acres offered free in eastern Maine?
Good forest management in place of the intense forest harvesting that is the norm under Maine’s low standards would produce more commercial timber and increase employment, taxes and the Maine economy than is ever lost when we seize the opportunity to protect a few fragments of land in our time.
Why is the local community culture in parts of Maine so resistant to gifts of privately owned land for national public use? And why do our elected Senators who support (to their credit) bringing millions in public funds in this way for conservation, fail to stand tall in support of a study of the possible benefits of accepting the gift offered by Ms. Quimby?
Why? Do local politics trump adherence to high principles and fail to look generosity in the face?
Because we here in the Katahdin region don’t want Quimby’s gift. Let her pay the taxes on it!!! The tax monies she would pay on it will help Mainers more than here giving the clearcut to the Federal Government.
It’s well known that the Katahdin Region intends to prevent the rest of the people of Maine and the US from benefiting from the generous gift of 70,000 acres to the Nation and another 30,000 acres to the State for public recreation and hunting. No need to say it again.
http://bangor-launch.newspackstaging.com/2011/03/28/outdoors/burts-bees-founder-quimby-wants-to-donate-national-park/
It’s also well known that communities thrive near distinguished natural areas where everybody is given public access to enjoy them (and not just the few living nearby who enjoy “traditional use”). Take a trip to the Maine mid-coast area and ask what it costs to hire a skidder or a carpenter or a caretaker or a contractor – and see if you can find one available.
There’s no doubt anywhere what the Katahdin region wants in public $$ – try landfill and recreational trails.
The question is: “Why is the Millinocket Region so mean to the rest of us? We are not even looking for federal or State dollars. We just want the wrapping taken off an offered gift so we can look at it and all decide whether to accept it. Why so mean? Why? The rest of Maine supports conservation with public money?”
Its also well known that the state needs the taxes that Quimby should be paying on the 70,000 acres alot more than the Feds need a new park.
easy answer. quimby wants this land to not be used by anyone, 70 thous ac res.the other land, read again.maybe it wont be hard for you to understand. let her buy land in north carolina, try to shove her no good intentioned ideas down there throats. the y may be more receptive, seing how she took her company and its jobs out of maine, and relocated them to no. carolina!! she can go back there and stay with that bunch from boston.
Nobody offered Maine a 70,000 acre free gift.. They want to give 70,000 acres to the federal government, which would make it the property of DC not Maine..
LePage needs to refuse this money. Send it back. Get Obama on the phone and say: “hey, we need money for other programs besides lining the pockets of Plum Creek execs. This makes me look like a complete moron to accepts this federal money. Here Obama, take it back”.