CAMDEN – Local doctors and friends of Fox Hill Real Estate LLC told the Camden Planning Board Thursday evening they endorsed an alcohol and substance abuse rehabilitation center on Bay View Street, but one neighbor has hired a Portland law firm, along with a Camden lawyer, to fight the proposal.

“It is a flawed proposal for this area,” said Matthew Manahan, an attorney with Pierce Atwood. “It is not appropriate in the Bay View neighborhood.”

Manahan represents Leonard and Madlyn Abramson, who own property at 230 and 221 Bay View Street, adjacent to, and directly across, from the Fox Hill property. They are encouraging the Camden Planning Board recommend to the Camden Select Board that the Fox Hill-crafted ordinance amendment not be placed on a town meeting ballot. The Abramsons have also employed local lawyer Jack Sanford in the effort.

In a letter outlining reasons his clients oppose a Bay View Street treatment center, Manahan said it was inconsistent with the town’s comprehensive plan, constituted spot zoning, would pose traffic impacts, and potentially draw down the water supply for the needs of the facility, as well as for fire suppression.

“There is a history of inadequate water for fire supression in the Fox Hill area, and of inadequate water at the site for landscaping and residential demands,” Manahan wrote.

And, he wrote, the facility would open a door to an: “influx of numerous wealthy and famous, and sometimes infamous, people who have no prior connection to Camden. The horrific encounters with overly aggressive news media that our clients endured are well documented and are of public record in Wolfson v. Lewis.”

Bay View Street runs along the shoreline from downtown Camden toward the Rockport town line. As the narrow road winds away from downtown, houses get bigger, many of them large summer homes of wealthier property owners.

Manahan spoke to the planning board at its meeting Aug. 1 at the Washington Street Meeting Room. Besides addressing the Fox Hill substance abuse and alcohol treatment facility, the board’s agenda also included public hearings on two other ordinance amendments, one to do with regulating temporary storage containers, the other to expand small business use of properties in specified town zones. Both were quickly dispatched with unanimous approval. Those proposed amendments will go next to voters in November.

The board was meeting for the second time with project proponents who want to turn the 13.8-acre Fox Hill estate at 235 Bay View Street into a high-end residential alcohol and substance abuse treatment facility for up to 12 clients at a time, each paying up to $60,000 for four to five weeks of treatment. Owners of the estate, Fox Hill Real Estate LLC (24 investors), hope to team up with the Massachusetts-based McLean Hospital to establish the facility in the former Borden Cottage that sits on a hill overlooking Penobscot Bay. The business deal between the for-profit Fox Hill Real Estate LLC and the nonprofit McLean Hospital, which would lease the property, is contingent on local zoning and site plan approval, as well as state regulatory approval.

The first step of that process is placing before voters a proposed zoning amendment that would adjust the town’s coastal residential district parameters to allow special exceptions for “residential treatment facilities for comprehensive alcohol and related substance abuse disorders providing concurrent treatment for addiction and/or other associated psychiatric disorders.”

Fox Hill attorney Paul Gibbons wanted to get that amendment on the November ballot; however, Planning Board Vice-Chairman Lowrie Sargent said July 25 — and reiterated his directive again Aug. 1— that there is not enough time to accomplish that intention while following municipal procedure. He said Gibbons could target June 2014 Town Meeting, or request that a special town meeting be scheduled, which the Camden Select Board would first have to approve.

Planning Board Chairman Chris MacLean has recused himself from consideration of the ordinance amendment, being with the law firm that represented former owner Ellen Simmons in the sale of Fox Hill to Fox Hill Real Estate. Vice Chairman Sargent is acting as chairman in this instance.

All five Select Board members attended the Aug. 1 planning board meeting.

“We are reassured that this is not going to be on the November ballot,” said Manahan, at the Aug. 1 meeting. “We believe there are serious impacts on the neighborhood.”

At the same meeting, Tom Rodman, one of the Fox Hill Real Estate LLC investors and a primary proponent of the project, told the board he has been a summer resident of the Camden-Lincolnville area since he was 11 years old in 1960. He is committed to the region, he said, and the Fox Hill investors want to preserve the open space there, the land and the cottage for generations. He said the project will ensure there will be minimal impact to the neighborhood, and “less impactful” than how it had been used over the last several years or decade. Previous owners included Matt Simmons, who hope to used the property for ocean energy conference gatherings. 

Prior to him, Charles Cawley, president of MBNA credit card bank, had lived at Fox Hill, and expanded the compound to include a 72-car garage, built bowling and pinball arcade, and used the property for business gatherings.

“We are a taxable entity,” said Rodman, referring to the LLC, which is the landowner and which will be paying approximately $100,000 in property taxes to the town of Camden. Fox Hill Real Estate closed the deal on May 30, when the property, which had been listed at $4.9 million, quietly changed hands from Simmons for $2.7 million. The land and the buildings are currently assessed by the town at $6.5 million.

The business arrangement between Fox Hill Real Estate LLC and MacLean would include a 10-year lease, with options for two subsequent 10-year leases, said Gibbons.

“What happens of the ownership changes,” asked Planning Board member John Scholz.

The process

Seeking town approval to site a treatment center at Fox Hill follows a deliberate process and schedule.

The first step is voter consideration of a zoning amendment that would allow a facility like the Fox Hill treatment center to seek planning board approval on Bay View Street.

The next step, contingent on whether Camden voters approve the zoning amendment, is for the project to undergo site plan review by the planning board. It is only the result of that second process that determines whether Fox Hill is allowed to become a treatment center.

The zoning amendment will not be on the November ballot. It is not yet decided by Fox Hill proponents whether they will seek a special town meeting or wait until June Town Meeting for a townwide vote.

The first task, said Camden Attorney Paul Gibbons, who represents Fox Hill Real Estate LLC, is to craft ordinance language that the planning board agrees to send on to the Camden Select Board for its consideration, before it goes before voters.

The Camden Planning Board will discuss the language of that proposed amendment at its next meeting, Aug. 15.

No public comments will be taken at that meeting. The next meeting with be Aug. 29, when the public will be invited to speak.

Following all that, public hearings on the ordinance amendment will be scheduled.

“If the property is sold, the lease goes with the property,” said Rodman. “Our goal was a long-term operator of facility for a long period of time.”

Opponents cite inconsistency with Camden Comprehensive Plan

In a letter submitted July 31 to Chris MacLean, Chairman of the Camden Planning Board, the opponents wrote that the proposed ordinance amendment is inconsistent with the Camden Comprehensive Plan, citing paragraphs that concern the coastal scenic neighborhoods of town, including Bay View and Chestnut streets. These areas, according to the plan, “should allow for a moderate level of residential development, while assuring that these corridors retain their scenic landscapes and vistas and continue to serve as attractive gateways to Camden.”

Light commercial activity described in the plan include nursery schools, daycare centers, golf courses, agriculture and timber harvesting.

Attorney Manahan said the amendment is inconsistent with the comprehensive plan provisions and would allow more intensive development than contemplated, and as such, “would not withstand legal challenge. Maine law requires zoning ordinances to be consistent with the Comprehensive Plan.”

He also said the amendment constitutes spot zoning.

“Engaging in this kind of spot zoning threatens the integrity of the zoning ordinance and the comprehensive plan, and is bad planning and should be discouraged because it would set a precedent for Camden that would be difficult, if not impossible, to reverse,” he wrote.

He also wrotethat his clients are concerned about traffic impacts.

“Even if the patients will not have their own vehicles, the facility will have 24-hour traffic from its employees who do not live on-site, deliveries of food, fuel, laundry and other supplies, catering crews, landscaping crews, patients’ families themselves, and emergency vehicles when needed,” he wrote. “And widening the road to accommodate this traffic would dramatically and irretrievably alter the character of the neighborhood, and likely require a significant amount of blasting of granite, an expensive proposition that should not be borne by Camden taxpayers.”

Manahan also cited the news media as a point of concern: “It is our experience that the news media, when motivated by the desire to slur or harrass celebrities and other wealthy individuals, will stop at nothing to obtain a story, and they are not afraid to assert their right to report it, even if it involves loitering, trespassing, intrusion and other public disturbances.”

That case he referenced, Wolfson v. Lewis, is well studied for its relevance to media law. The case concerned a 1996 television story by Inside Edition about the private lives of U.S. Healthcare executives, including Leonard Abramson, chairman of the board, and Richard and Hancy Wolfson, U.S. Healthcare executives. The reporters allegedly videotaped the Wolfsons by following them in a van with tinted windows and surveyed their home with shotgun microphones and telephoto lenses.

“Our clients selected Camden as the location for their summer residence specifically to enjoy the quiet, peaceful lifestyle they found in Camden,’ he wrote. “It is no coincidence that the family purchased their Camden homes during the time when anonymity became critical to them. Camden has the reputation for providing trandquility to its residents and visitors, where they can avoid the thunderous media attention that they otherwise have to bear. The placement of a facility that invites media sensationalism about its guests would inevitably change the character of the neighborhood and the entire Coastal Residential District.”

Confidential, safe and tranquil environment, proponents say

Philip Levendusky, associate professor of psychology at Harvard Medical School and senior vice president for business development and marketing, as well as director of the psychology department at McLean Hospital, countered Manahan’s points, saying that MacLean Hospital and its Fernside facility in Princeton, Mass., never had issues with paparazzi. Fernside is a similar facility with what is proposed for Fox Hill.

He said McLean Hospital is a ‘highly-credited organization” with the Joint Commission (formerly the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations), and is a sibling of Massachusetts General Hospital. McLean, he said, is part of the original joint Massachusetts healthcare initiative that is related to psychiatric care. MacLean is a member of Partners Healthcare system, which is a holding company of various Boston and community hospitals. MacLean is affiliated with Harvard Medical School, which “carries with it a badge of reputation and quality,” he said.

Levendusky said high-end residential alcohol and substance abuse treatment is a: “thriving level of care. There are people who want to get their treatment in a comfortable, serene environment. They have the means to spend 25-30 days there.”

He said the town of Princeton was initially skeptical of Fernside.

“I can assure you that we are now considered an A++ neighbor,” he said.

Prospective clients for Fox Hill range in age from 30 to 70. They likely have alcohol, and other substance abuse problems, as well as some other psychological problems, he said.

“No psychosis,” he said. “That wouldn’t be appropriate.”

Most clients, he said, would be from outside of Maine, with one-third from other parts of the country. Not many would be drawn from a 50-mile radius of Camden, given that it is, he said, a rural area. At most, there would be eight or nine clients living in the house at a given time.

Levendusky said Fox Hill would contract with local vendors for services, and avoid using national vendors. He estimated that during a weekday, eight or nine staffmembers would on-site, working a typical shift, albeit with some staggering their hours.

In the evening there would be three our four.

Overnight, there would be two awake staff, and on weekends, four staff members would be on duty.

Planning board member Kimberly Tuttle asked if clients would go off campus.

“They are going dawn to dusk in program activities,’ said Levendusky. “But they might for dinner with their families. They are not going anywhere by themselves.”

But, he said, they would not be accompanied by “somebody in a uniform or like someone in van with the sheriff’s department,” he said. “It would be very nonintrusive and respectful.”

Two local therapists, Paul Kemberling and Harold Amsel, spoke separately in support of the Fox Hill treatment center. Both said there is a lack treatment centers in the area, and Maine, in general.

Amsel, who had practiced in New York, said he was stunned by the alcoholism and addiction in Maine.

“With this program, we struck gold,” he said. “The combination of McLean and Harvard – brains and heart and venue.”

He said the presence of the treatment center would create a nucleus of recovery that would spread out into the community, the education of recovery.

Related stories:

Renewed effort to make Camden’s Fox Hill estate an alcohol and substance abuse rehab center begins

Camden’s Fox Hill changes hands, its future under consideration

McLean Hospital looks to Camden's Fox Hill for alcohol, drug rehab center

Camden's Fox Hill rehab deal nixed by landowner, buyer mystified

“It grows out into the community, it would be more than just this facility,” he said. “It would expand out.”

Carole Coyle, who worked with special needs students at Camden Hills Regional School for years, said: “I’m hoping McClean would bring an awareness to our school community. Hopefully, they would reach out to counselors and also bring awareness to parents. There have been a lot of suicides, teen suicides, and I am hoping McLean would partner with counselors and work with them.

Levendusky responded, saying McLean had a substantial educational speakers bureau, with professionals working in the community.

“It is an active part of the hospital’s mission,” he said.

He also said he would not be pretentious and imply that there are no resources already established in the Midcoast, and Mclean would partner with them.

What’s ahead for the planning board

On the heels of a discussion about conditions of approval, Town Attorney Bill Kelly said: “It is helpful to hear this presentation because it gives a story, an explanation of what is intended. But your review of this proposed amendment has got to focus on the language. It is sort of like the movie, the Matrix, when Neo is talking to the architect and they talk about all these things that could have occurred, but ‘you are going to make the same decision because you have to.’ Well, this is the inverse of that. Your job is think about that, when you look at the language in the amendment, all the possible things that could qualify for that which is are not particular to this set of gentlemen with their particular purpose. You have to think large, and about what else could happen here with approval of the ordinance.”

He mentioned discrimination, and if the treatment center begins, but is not viable, what other program might want to use the facility under the ordinance amendment. He said the Americans with Disabilities Act prohibits discrimination, and cited a case that involves the town of Warren and its attempt to restrict a methedone clinic from one area of town.

Gibbons responded, saying the law prohibits exclusion from any town or city people with disabilities.

“You have to accommodate them someplace,” he said. “You don’t have to accommodate them here [at a particular location].

Kelly advised the planning board to be circumspect in its deliberations.

“This is merely a proposed legislative change,’ he said. “Your role is to make recommendation to the select board. That process provides much more flexibility in your role. Let’s say Fox Hill comes back and makes an application if the amendment occurs. You are restricted in independent fact-finding when the application is before you. The reason is, the applicant gets a fair shot. Same thing for an abutter. Lowrie’s point is critical: To have everything up front and on the table. Board members should err on the side of caution and treat this as if it is an application.”

“It’s really important for us to make sure all discussions are out in the open,” said Sargent.

He asked the public not to call the planning board or select board, but to attend meetings and comment, and/or send written comments to Camden Planner and Code Enforcement Officer Steve Wilson.

“Do not mail to individual members of planning board,” he said. “I’m saying more than I normally because I understand there is some energy around this. I want to ensure everyone is included in this process.”

Editorial Director Lynda Clancy can be reached at lyndaclancy@penbaypilot.com; 706-6657.