Decide dismisses attraction over Ellsworth’s lease for a brand new police station
A choose has dismissed an attraction of a call by Ellsworth officers to lease a Excessive Avenue constructing for a brand new police station that alleged that the town failed to offer correct public discover concerning the proposal earlier than the Metropolis Council voted on it.
On Oct. 17, 2022, the Ellsworth Metropolis Council voted 5-2 to signal a 20-year lease with Gurney Funding Properties for a 8,400-square-foot constructing on the nook of Excessive Avenue and Buttermilk Street. Councilors Steve O’Halloran and Casey Hanson have been opposed.
O’Halloran and a gaggle of native business property house owners then filed the attraction final fall in Hancock County Superior Courtroom, after the town signed a lease with the corporate.
With the vote, the council authorised a plan to spend roughly $870,000 to renovate and furnish the previous ironmongery shop to swimsuit the police division’s wants. The lease on the constructing will begin at $113,400 per yr with a lease interval of 20 years, with a 3 p.c enhance in lease every year. Over the 20-year time period of the lease, annual lease would enhance to $198,848 per yr, leading to an general cumulative fee of $3,047,104 to the constructing’s proprietor by 2042.
O’Halloran and the property house owners argued in court docket paperwork that the town ought to have publicly issued a request for proposals in order that different landlords might have made gives to the town, they argued in court docket paperwork.
No particulars concerning the metropolis’s plans to lease the constructing have been publicly launched till Oct. 14, 2022, three days earlier than the council voted on the matter.
Justice Bruce Mallonee determined that O’Halloran and the landlords didn’t have standing to file the attraction, nevertheless. Mallonee dismissed their criticism on Friday.
“Not one of the petitioning property house owners have come ahead with proof that their property would possibly truly be appropriate to be used as the town’s police division,” the choose wrote in his resolution. “Whereas the town’s resolution could have affected the petitioning property house owners in some summary method, merely being affected by governmental motion in an summary hypothetical sense is just not adequate to confer standing.”
Mallonee additionally rejected O’Halloran’s argument that, as a sitting metropolis councilor, the Oct. 17 vote by some means harmed his potential to faithfully discharge his duties as an elected official.
“None of Maine’s courts have but decided whether or not an elected member of a legislative physique has standing to problem an motion of that physique by advantage of merely being a member of that physique with an obligation to satisfy his or her duties of workplace,” the choose wrote.
On the time that the proposed lease was introduced to the town council for approval, Metropolis Supervisor Glenn Moshier, who additionally serves as the town’s police chief, stated that the present police station at Metropolis Corridor was overly crowded and {that a} resolution wanted to be made quickly. The present station has no out there storage, officers often should course of and check seized medicine in its cramped kitchen area and there’s little privateness for conducting interviews on delicate matters, Moshiers and others with the division stated.
The division has scouted numerous websites over time, at the side of contemplating potential new areas for the town’s hearth division, however haven’t discovered different viable choices, police officers stated. In 2015 the town thought of setting up a brand new public security constructing for each its police and hearth departments, however balked on the projected $20 million price ticket.
O’Halloran and different plaintiffs had sought a brief restraining order to forestall work from being executed to renovate the property whereas their criticism was pending in court docket, however Mallonee rejected that movement in February.
Renovation work on the constructing is predicted to be accomplished this summer time, metropolis officers have stated.
Town’s legal professional, Roger Huber, didn’t return a message searching for touch upon Tuesday.
The plaintiffs’ legal professional, Brett Baber, declined to remark late Tuesday afternoon, saying he had not but seen the choice.
