Another Day, Another Dollar

Imagine if the state decided to collect tolls on the Maine Turnpike by the person not the vehicle, and assessed an extra fee for every day the occupants were in the state. Would Maine’s “chamber of commerce” let that slide? Unlikely. Yet in the Seboomook Lake region in northern Maine, visitors and camp owners endure just this situation.

It now costs out-of-state tourists—the folks who increasingly drive our manufacturing-starved economy—$7 a day per person to visit the Seboomook Region, paid at toll gates owned by North Maine Woods LLC. (More on just who NMW is in a moment.) Thus, if I invite my brother and his family to visit me at my camp, they pay fees of $35 a day to sit on my porch, on land that I own and pay taxes on. As a Mainer, I get to pay the discounted rate of $4 per day. This fee is assessed whether, on any given day, I or my visitors use land owned by North Maine Woods or not.

The per-diem-fee road I am speaking of runs from Rockwood through the 20 mile checkpoint where the North Maine Woods fees are collected, and on to the Seboomook Wilderness Campground and Pittston Farms. As all other access roads are now barred and gated, hundreds of small camp owners on Seboomook and Moosehead Lakes must use this road—and pay these tolls—to reach their properties.

Amazingly, the state owns land on either side of this road, yet ownership of the road itself was left with an organization of timber management companies collectively known as North Maine Woods LLC, or NMW.

NMW includes Maine-based companies such as Seven Islands Land Company, and out-of-state LLCs that represent investors, including such prominent organizations as Yale University. Unlike the former owner of that land, Great Northern, who managed the lands for local mills, the consortium of companies that makes up NMW functions primarily as real estate and timber speculators, and benefits from Maine laws, which tax timberlands at vastly reduced rates through the so-called tree growth benefit. This tax law was enacted decades ago to provide paper companies, who then owned more than a third of Maine’s forests, with incentives to let trees mature sufficiently and to ensure Maine citizens access to the north woods. Maine law allows such landowners to charge for a “reasonable road use fee,” which Great Northern did. Notice the language. A road use fee—not a per diem head tax.

When the state of Maine began purchasing lands and easements in the Moosehead region, local residents thought the state might purchase the roads as well and eliminate the toll roads. No such luck. Instead, following the state’s purchase of lands and easements in the Moosehead area, private camp owners in the Seboomook region, as in other areas “managed” by NMW subsidiaries, were forced to buy the land their camps sat on—a situation most owners welcomed—though for some senior Mainers this was difficult, as these, generally, half-acre lots sold for upwards of $30,000. Camp owners were then slammed with enormous increases in access fees.

Previously allowed to purchase vehicle season passes for $25 each, the annual fee soared to $35—per person—and $60 per person for “guest registration passes.” Thus, if you have two adult kids not listed on your deed as owners, tack on $120 per year. From $50 per year for two cars, regardless of the number of occupants and with unlimited access, the cost for a family of four rose to a minimum of $190. Prior to North Maine Woods LLC taking over the gate, unlimited guest passes were available to camp owners at no charge. Guests paid a $4 fee for their vehicle, got a sticker to show at the gate as they left, and owed no more.

A final insult—the road, once well maintained by Great Northern, deteriorated, and the “Seboomook cut-off road” was abandoned, adding several miles to the trip to Seboomook. North Maine Woods claims it cannot afford to keep the roads in the same condition as their predecessors due to cost, yet they are charging more and doing less. As NMW is not a public company, there is no transparency to their claims.

The state holds periodic talks with NMW with the intent of alleviating this burden and has suggested reimbursing NMW for in-state visitor fees, but the timber barons rejected this plan. All agree no deal is in sight. During this prolonged period, the owners of the Seboomook Wilderness Campground and Pittston Farms, two of the area’s surviving businesses, have watched their bottom lines shrivel. Rick and Janine Sylvester, who own the Seboomook Wilderness Campground, have seen visits decline by “more than 20%” since the NMW takeover. Rick recalled seeing a former regular customer while shopping in Augusta a few years ago. “He asked me if we still had the new gate fees, and when I told him we did, he just waved and walked off,” Rick said. “The fees are killing us.”

Alternatives, including exercising the state’s right of eminent domain to take the section of the road owned by NMW, have been suggested, though, according to Conservation Commissioner Pat McGowan, the state is reluctant to do that, citing Mainers’ inherent distrust of this process, and the possibility of then having to negotiate fee structures with dozens of entities rather than one. North Maine Woods could also respond to a takeover of the roads by limiting access to its lands. However, the Maine Legislature could also play hardball: The same tax laws that NMW is now banking on, laws created to support a different breed of landowners, could be changed or abolished by the legislature, which would effectively ruin the land’s resale value.

The fact is we all deserve the chance to make a living. The Seboomook region needs tourist dollars and the ancillary spending such revenues spawn. One of the best ways to energize the region is to free it from the literal toll inflicted on the region’s economy each day by NMW. Through tax abatements, bonds, the purchase of easements, and other state spending, the citizens of Maine paid for the right to use the land for recreation, and ought to be able to enjoy it. Instead, the same Maine taxpayers who support bond issues to secure rights to Maine’s forests, rivers, lakes, and ponds, and spend millions on protective easements, are now forced to pay through the nose to visit them. That last part wasn’t on the ballot. Instead, time-honored Maine traditions—family camping, fishing, and canoe trips, having friends and grandkids out to camp—have been sundered by landowner greed and government indifference.

I say, if the NMW will not negotiate a fair “road use fee,” let’s play the eminent domain card and take the road from them. We’ve paid for it.