CAMDEN — Voters in November will be asked to approve a handful of amendments to the Harbor Ordinance after the Camden Select Board Tuesday night voted 3 to 2 to move the proposed changes to the ballot.

Select Board members John French, Don White and Martin Cates voted in favor of the ballot questions, with Leonard Lookner and John Heard opposed. The vote came after the board learned that the Harbor Committee the day before, on Sept. 14, had voted unanimously to recommend Tuesday night that the select board not move the amendments, which the Harbor Committee had drafted and recommended, to the voters.

Following a year of work, the amendments to the Harbor Ordinance were originally proposed last month by the Harbor Committee, which had voted unanimously to recommend they go before voters. The amendments also garnered unanimous Planning Board support, which also recommended movement to the voters by the Select Board.

While many of the proposed amendments were housekeeping and language clarifications, two amendments that appeared in the original draft called for eliminating new piers in the outer harbor and doing away with consolidated piers.

During a public hearing Aug. 18, Harbor Committee Chairman Gene McKeever said that during the committee's work to review the Harbor Ordinance, their intention was "to complete the prohibition of piers from just not Shermans Point to Marine Avenue, but all the way over the Dillingham Point."

The amendment to eliminate consolidated piers was made to eliminate the legal wranglings the committee learned was happening in other harbor communities that allowed privately co-owned piers.

McKeever and others, including Camden Code Enforcement Officer Steve Wilson said Aug. 18 that issues have been shown to crop up when either one property sells and a new owner is introduced, when the pier is located on one owner's property and allows access across the others' property, or when one property owner uses it in a way that was not originally intended.

When it was time for the Select Board to discuss the two pier amendments, Cates took issue with the Harbor Committee not contacting potentially affected harbor property owners to gauge their feelings. He also questioned why the proposed amended ordinance would continue to allow a municipal pier to be built, but prohibit private property owners from doing the same.

French said he did not want to pull the plug on potential commercial development that might see piers as a way to create or augment waterfront business.

So on at the conclusion of the Aug. 18 public hearing, the board voted, again 3 to 2, with Heard opposed and Lookner abstaining, to revise the amendments and revert the outer pier amendment and leave it the way it was. The board also added back the ability to apply for consolidated piers.

Tuesday night, McKeever told the Select Board that the Harbor Committee Monday morning had unanimously passed 5-0 the following motion made by Ben Ellison and seconded by Stephen Gold:

"The Harbor Committee recommends that the draft Harbor Ordinance Article VI revision submitted to us by the town attorney (file "KMC 08/26/15") not be put on the public ballot. This revision of a revision may contain unintended consequences and confusions. If the Select Board insists on putting its own Harbor Ordinance revision to a vote, we recommend that it first determine exactly what it would like to change in the existing Ordinance and then ask the town attorney to write a fresh revision starting with the existing Ordinance."

McKeever said, "We are seeking to hold off on everything right now. We are an advisory group to you and it hasn't worked that way so far. We think we ought to have a couple of workshops, discuss what we all want to change and then move forward together."

McKeever added that the committee didn't want to have unintended consequences with an amended Harbor Ordinance that had revisions made on top of revisions.

"We passed everything you put forward to us, except for the pier questions. I don't see the unintended consequences you speak of," said French.

McKeever said that as the Harbor Committee reviewed the most recent version of the amendments, given to them by the Harbor Clerk Monday, they found references to sections and paragraphs that no longer existed.

That kind of discrepancy caused the committee to want to give the whole document another look in case changes made most recently had unintentionally caused new errors.

Following a five-minute break in the meeting for Town Attorney Kristin Collins to consult with Town Manager Patricia Finnigan and put the newest version of the amendments before them, Collins told the Select Board she was comfortable with the version she had reviewed for accuracy.

"As long as its just a typographical error, and it's correctly intended, we should be OK," said Collins.

Moving the question, White made a motion to move forward the Harbor Ordinance amendments to the November ballot.

During the discussion, Lookner said he questioned the haste in moving it, and once again questioning a town committee's work and recommendations.

"I'm not for it, not against it. But once again, the Harbor Committee has put forth some advice to the Select Board and the

Select Board isn't going to go with their advice," said Lookner. "To put something forward that isn't correct, it raises all sort of red flags."

White said he did not want to "start back at ground zero and argue about whether to have piers or not again."

"If Kristin can fix the technicalities, I think we are all set to go," said White.

Collins said she would give the document another look to ensure the public document was correct, and added that she felt the issue was that the Harbor Committee on Monday looked at the wrong document, an older version.

The final vote Tuesday night was 3 to 2, with White, French and Cates in favor and Lookner and Heard opposed.

Related stories:

• Camden Select Board guts Harbor Committee, Planning Board's recommended changes to Harbor Ordinance

• Public hearing on proposed Camden Harbor pier prohibitions Aug. 18

Related links:

• Camden Comprehensive Plan - June 2015

• Camden Harbor and Waterways Ordinance - Nov. 5, 2013