ROCKPORT – More than two years after Lewis Rohrbach was cited for illegally dumping gravel on his harbor-front property, the fill remains.

Rohrbach has argued all the way to Knox County Superior Court that the filling did not violate local and state environmental regulations. Though the courts have ruled against him, the fill remains.

Earlier this month, the town was in court, asking that a judge order Rohrbach to take the necessary steps to remediate the damage to the shore.

The filling was dumped during the Labor Day weekend of 1998, less than three months after Rohrbach purchased the property on the southwest side of Rockport’s harbor. The fill was noticed by then-Code Enforcement Officer Mary Jane West.

West reported that Rohrbach had built a wall 18 feet in length that joined two small breakwaters, then dumped about 330 cubic-yards of fill in the area, in violation of the town’s shoreland zoning ordinance. According to the court document, the fill – dumped on the shore-side of a boathouse – significantly increased the size of the property.

“Rohrbach turned what was formerly tidal waters into real estate,” the town’s court filing states, “thereby increasing his real estate holdings on the water.”

The town ordinance requires a permit for any amount of fill greater than 10 cubic-yards. CEO West issued a notice of violation, which Rohrbach appealed. The appeal was denied by Rockport’s Zoning Board of Appeals in February 1999.

Rohrbach then took the matter to superior court, which ruled in July in favor of the town, dismissing the landowner’s appeal.

In addition to the fill, Rohrbach illegally cut about 60 trees from the edge of a stream that feeds into the harbor, the town alleged.

The town is now asking the court to order Rohrbach to: submit a writtensoil erosion and sedimentation control plan; remove the fill; present an acceptable plan for replanting trees; and pay fines and penalties on a per-day basis.

Town attorney Paul Gibbons said Monday he was not sure whether Rohrbach had been served with the notice yet. Rohrbach lives in California for most of the year.

“There’s no reason for him not to have moved it,” he said of the fill.