Four Orono residents who live near the site where a gas regulating station is to be built claim in a lawsuit that the town and Bangor Natural Gas failed to properly notify them about the project.
Emma Ford, John Jemison, Payson Welch and Adam Daigneault live near 19 College Ave., the site where Bangor Natural Gas last year proposed to build a gas pressure regulating station, said their attorney, Charles E. Gilbert III of Bangor. Orono’s planning board held a public hearing and approved the project on July 19, 2023.
The residents allege that the town did not notify Ford despite an ordinance that says at least 10 days prior to a site plan review hearing, written notice shall be mailed to owners of abutting properties within 500 feet of the property being considered. Instead, the notice was mailed to the previous owners of Ford’s property, according to the suit.
The residents are “aggrieved by the action and decision of the planning board,” and asked the court to review and overturn the approval, according to the lawsuit filed Sept. 13, 2023, in Penobscot County Superior Court. The following month, Bangor Natural Gas and Orono asked the court to dismiss the complaint, arguing the residents failed to meet the requirements for a trial and that its evidence is irrelevant.
The court hasn’t yet ruled on the motion for a trial.
Bangor Natural Gas’ plans for the old facility at 19 College Ave. and information about potential emissions from the new gas regulating station should be included in the record, according to the residents.
Bangor Natural Gas argued that the “plaintiffs never asserted that the planning board’s decision was unlawful,” and they failed to identify what evidence they relied on to argue that the notice was improper, according to an Oct. 5, 2023, request to dismiss the complaint.
Failure to provide a property owner with notice does not require another hearing or invalidate the planning board’s decision, the company argued in the document signed by its attorney, Benjamin J. Smith of Augusta.
But the residents, in a reply memorandum dated Oct. 23, 2023, said the company misstated language in the ordinance.
“Notice shall be deemed received if mailed to an owners’ last known address according to the Town tax records,” according to the ordinance. “Failure of any property owner to actually receive notice shall not necessitate another hearing or invalidate any actions of the planning board.”
The Fords, owners of their property since December 2022, were or should have been placed on Orono’s tax list as of April 1, 2023, and were legally entitled to a notice, the residents argued.
The residents requested including in its motion a photo of a regulating station in a nearby town, which shows a vent stack. They argued that the gas company asserted there would be no emissions from the regulating station built at 19 College Ave., but comparable equipment has a stack that can only be seen as releasing emissions. Bangor Natural Gas and Orono opposed the request.
Residents had the chance to attend the hearing, raise their concerns and present the photograph, but they did not, the company and town argued.
“The planning board’s review of the application was extremely thorough and well-documented,” said Roger Huber of law firm Farrell, Rosenblatt & Russell, who represents the town. “They applied the standards they are required to apply, and we feel strongly that they came to the right decision.”
