Millinocket council rejects zone change Plans for Mountain View condos halted

MILLINOCKET – The Town Council effectively stopped the town’s first large-scale new housing initiative in at least 20 years by voting Thursday against a variance that would have allowed it to proceed.

The council’s 4-1-1 vote overturns a Planning Board recommendation to change zoning off Forest and Hillcrest avenues and Route 157 from residential to commercial-residential for the proposed Mountain View Townhouses condominium complex. The council must approve zone changes.

Developer Robert Benjamin called the $2 million to $3 million, four-building, 16-unit development a boon to the neighborhood that would address Millinocket’s lack of upscale, new housing, but councilors heeded residents’ complaints that the condo plan failed to fit the neighborhood’s character.

“I have stated once before that if they [developers] could shrink the project to two condos I would vote for it,” said Councilor Scott Gonya, who was named acting chairman in Councilor David Nelson’s absence.

Gonya said he polled residents and businessmen extensively before arriving at a decision.

“The comment I continuously heard was that Millinocket was going to send the wrong message [to developers and other potential town investors] if we rejected this,” he added. “I think the message we send is that we listen to the residents.”

The zoning change would have cleared the way for a proposed site plan. If the zoning board approved the site plan, young professionals and elderly retirees, people who do not typically want to fuss with yard work or maintenance, would spend at least $200,000 per two- to three-bedroom unit to buy into the complex, which will include underground parking and other amenities, Benjamin has said.

Residents of the neighborhood, which consists of single-family homes, said the project would destroy their view of Mount Katahdin, elevate their taxes and would not fit the area’s character.

They wondered why Benjamin needed to build the complex with the town suffering a housing glut.

Katahdin Timberlands LLC sold the land to Benjamin’s company, Katahdin Homes LLC, in March. Katahdin Homes picked that plot because Millinocket lacks infrastructure and new housing stock, Benjamin said.

Developers building in undeveloped areas pay $300 to $500 a foot for new roads and utilities, a huge expense atop the risk of a new development.

Councilor Matthew Polstein was the only vote in favor of the zone change. He said he felt uncomfortable overturning a zoning board recommendation and that the town’s broader interests called for the development to proceed.

Councilor Bruce McLean abstained, saying afterwards that he felt his vote was pointless and that councilors should have postponed the vote and met with the zoning board and Benjamin to iron out differences.

Also, Daniel Corcoran, an associate broker with North Woods Real Estate, who presented the plan with Benjamin in late June, is married to McLean’s mother, McLean said.

Councilors Jimmy Busque, David Cyr, Scott Gonya and Wallace Paul voted to reject the zone change.

Cyr has said he feared compounding two zoning board regulation errors allowing duplexes in that neighborhood’s zone and zoning one house there neighborhood-commercial. Planning Board Chairman Anthony Filauro said neither should have occurred. Both will be addressed at board meetings next month.