The Belfast City Council voted 4-1 Tuesday night to reverse a 2021 eminent domain action that was meant to help Nordic Aquafarms develop its land-based salmon farm, raising questions about how viable the hotly contested, years-long project will be going forward.
After more than an hour of public comment — largely from people opposed to the project, but also a few representatives of Nordic Aquafarms — the councilors agreed to vacate the eminent domain decision.
When that decision was first reached in 2021, it was meant to secure access to a contested section of mudflat where the company hoped to bury intake and discharge pipes in the intertidal zone out to Penobscot Bay.
But it was a highly controversial move, and some key things have changed since then, including one court decision that found nearby landowners who opposed the project had rights to the intertidal land, and another that remanded the eminent domain decision back to Belfast for reconsideration or repeal.
Before the vote, multiple councilors suggested that the dispute over the project had dragged on for too long and that it was time for the city to drop its involvement. They also noted that the city had supported the project because of the great tax revenue it was expected to bring, but that the financial situation has improved since then and that the council has been able to lower the tax rate.
“I feel the city needs to extract itself from this situation as quickly as possible, for various reasons,” said Mayor Eric Sanders, who leads council meetings but did not vote himself.
Opponents of the project burst into applause after the decision. Councilor Mary Mortier was the only member who voted against the decision. She noted that the city is still in great need of economic development, and that many other residents have emailed councilors to indicate their support for the project.
Now that councilors have approved vacating the land seizure, the city’s attorney is drafting a formal order to do so that will be voted on at the group’s next meeting.
In a statement, Nordic Aquafarms officials said they’ll be evaluating their options between now and the final vote in May, but that they were “very disappointed” and “even blindsided” by the council’s actions.
Belfast officials are also working to arrange a survey to confirm the city’s border with Northport, after a Waldo County Superior Court justice ruled that the 2021 eminent domain taking had relied on a defunct survey and mistakenly included a section of the neighboring community.
City officials say the survey is primarily meant to confirm the border for tax assessment purposes, but in its statement, Nordic Aquafarms said it had expected the council to wait until that effort was complete before reconsidering the eminent domain action.
“We are considering our options and saddened by the opinions voiced by several council members, this after the company has made a significant investment in the Belfast project,” Nordic Aquafarm’s U.S. CEO, Brenda Chandler, said. The council “simply seems to want to pass on the opportunity for jobs, economic development, and the overall benefits the farm would bring.”