Plum Creek plan can’t remain a local issue

Perhaps the most consistent thing about Mainers is how darned inconsistent we are. You may remember that we had a big election just a few weeks ago where every voter – which basically means everyone over the age of 18 – got to decide if Washington County got a racino. Some of us, especially some Washington County residents, felt this decision-making body was a bit too large and way too far flung. Nevertheless, vote we did and the 272,622 citizens of Maine who turned out on Election Day determined the outcome of the racino question.

Well, the Moosehead Lake-Plum Creek hearings are going on in Augusta this week before the Land Use Regulatory Commission. And those commissioners – all seven of them – will decide whether or not the state’s largest land development proposal goes through.

See what I mean about Maine’s inconsistencies? When deciding if slot machines could go into an area just about 90 miles from other slot machines, the whole state got involved: but now that we’re talking about changing forever the zoning of Maine’s wilderness, seven unelected appointees will choose.

And holy Moses, they’ve got a lot to think about. Like the fact that Plum Creek bought land zoned for tree growth and pays one kind of taxes but now they want houses and fancy estates and all kinds of sprawl. Buildings like that require infrastructure that pine trees and moose just don’t need – necessitating way more investment – something tree growth taxes haven’t provided.

And if the racino decision really should have been made by the whole state, then this Moosehead decision needs to be made by the whole country.

Unless you believe this is a local issue.

But you couldn’t possibly. Do you think that the owners of a new “power retailer” will be from Rockwood? Do you think the buyers of the new resorts and waterfront property already live in Greenville?

Actually, this whole discussion is about folks from “away.”

It can’t remain a local issue from the corporate expanse point of view or the tree hugger point of view. Not anymore than the preservation of the Grand Canyon is a local issue.

Moosehead Lake is a national treasure: it has an exploitation value that we can’t even imagine.

And I’ll bet you a Santa’s sack filled with Chinese-made lead paint toys that some greedy son of a gun would sell house lots on the rim of the Grand Canyon if they could. And worse, some “I can buy anything I want and keep you from sharing it” fat cats would buy them.

So what’s happening at the hearings this week? Lots. For example, Thursday the commissioners will hear testimony about the affordable housing proposed for what is now timberland. This is to prove ordinary Mainers could live there.

They are planning to build units with a $150,000 price tag. I looked up the housing prices in Piscataquis County. The average house in the 04463 zip code is $86 grand: That’s Milo, Derby, Medford and some unorganized territories. Housing for ordinary Mainers.

Now the hearings on Thursday will explain that Coastal Enterprises Inc. will build these houses and that Plum Creek’s going to bankroll the development by giving CEI the cash it needs: interest free. CEI won’t have any risk as they speculatively mow down the wilderness to build houses that ordinary folks in the area actually can’t afford.

Let’s do the math. A person making $31,784 a year – the U.S. Census Bureau says that’s what a person in Piscataquis County makes – who has astoundingly saved $15,000 for a down payment needs to finance $135,000 at probably 8 percent. Their monthly house payment, about $1,100 before taxes and insurance, far exceeds recommended ratios for borrowing. This is one of the recipes that cooked our current national mortgage crisis.

If you haven’t started paying close attention to the Plum Creek hearings, start. Especially if you voted either for or against the racino: you clearly believe in being part of the decisions made in Maine that will impact our way of life.

Pat LaMarche of Yarmouth is the author of “Left Out In America: The State of Homelessness in the United States.” She can be contacted at PatLaMarche@hotmail.com.