For decades, environmental groups rallied to save Sears Island from industrial development. In recent years, proponents of a port on the island began pushing back, noting the island was purchased by the state in 1998 expressly for future transportation needs. When the liquefied natural gas industry began looking at the 941-acre Penobscot Bay island for a possible terminal facility in late 2003, it seemed another chapter in the 40-year history of debate over the island’s fate was about to be written.

Instead, Gov. John Baldacci took LNG off the table, and convened a 40-plus member stakeholder group. That group labored for 18 months on an agreement that puts two-thirds of the island in permanent conservation for low-impact recreation such as hiking and bird-watching, while reserving the remaining third for a possible port; that port would be built only if facilities at nearby Mack Point can no longer be expanded.

A bit of political theater recently staged by the Rockland-based Penobscot Bay Watch, in which the group’s supporters acted as pallbearers for a coffin symbolizing the Sierra Club, seemed aimed at inciting new conflict over Sears Island. Penobscot Bay Watch sought to embarrass the Sierra Club for the role its Maine chapter played in developing the compromise agreement. The Sierra Club, through lawsuits, stalled construction of the port in the late 1980s and 1990s, so it is a convenient target.

It is true that Sears Island, the largest uninhabited island on the East Coast, is a stunningly beautiful microcosm of the Maine coast. But because its northwestern shore lies adjacent to 40-foot-deep waters, and because the Maine, Montreal & Atlantic Railway could easily extend a line across the wide causeway that connects the island to Searsport, Sears Island is also an ideal place for a shipping port. With the world’s energy economy in flux, it is impossible to predict what Maine’s future transportation needs will be. But it’s not hard to imagine needing a deep-water port, especially since transporting goods by ship is the most energy-efficient method with the smallest carbon footprint.

Maine taxpayers have spent millions constructing the causeway and jetty and buying the island for transportation needs. That investment is honored by the agreement struck last year.

And the five environmental groups that worked on the agreement should be praised, not shamed, for their courage. They achieved what had eluded others for 40 years – permanently conserving 600 acres on the island. They looked beyond their narrow missions to see the importance of retaining the possibility of a port on the island, whose need may one day be deemed critical to Maine’s economic survival.

Another group is publicly working out the details of the final boundaries for the conservation and the port development areas. When that work is done, it will be a landmark resolution.

When the governor’s legacy is discussed, tackling the Sears Island question head-on should be on the list. His leadership empowered stakeholders of all stripes to create a compromise that protects Maine’s future on two very different fronts, conservation and commerce.