PROSPECT, Maine — Voters in Prospect decided in favor of passing a commercial site plan review ordinance Saturday at the annual town meeting, according to Selectman Bill Sneed.
He said in an email to the Bangor Daily News that the review ordinance, which will allow local officials the chance to weigh in on commercial and industrial projects proposed in Prospect, passed 47 to 16, with little debate.
“The meeting was well-attended and calm,” he said. “In the last number of years, attendance has hovered around 30 to 35 [people]. This year it was about double.”
The town’s planning board had been working on the draft site plan review since last fall, and residents narrowly passed a six-month development moratorium in February. That happened just as developer Arthur House was promoting his plan to build a major heat-treated wood chip operation in an old gravel pit off Route 1A.
House was awarded a $750,000 grant last summer through the Maine Department of Transportation’s Industrial Rail Access Program after stating in his application that he would provide a $1.4 million match to rebuild old tracks in Prospect in the first phase of the project.
The director of the rail program at the Maine Department of Transportation told the BDN last December that House still would need to provide more details about his finances and about the project before the state would give him the grant money.
House sent a letter to Prospect residents in February to encourage them to vote against the industrial development moratorium.
“[It] could force me to bring my business elsewhere,” he wrote.
According to Sneed, House attended the annual town meeting but did not speak. Efforts Tuesday to contact the developer and ask him if the site plan review ordinance will affect his plans were unsuccessful.