TREMONT — On Friday, Dec. 6, Ellsworth Superior Court Justice Harold Stewart found in favor of the town of Tremont in a civil code enforcement violation trial for land use violations dating back to August 2018. Robert and Judy Cousins have been ordered to abate the conditions of the violation within 30 days, pay the town “reasonable” attorneys’ fees, and pay a monetary civil penalty of $231,100.
On the night of Dec. 4, 2013, Cap’n Nemo’s, a restaurant and bar with an attached residence in Bass Harbor, burned to the ground. The Cousinses were the owners of Cap’n Nemo’s, and the land underneath it was the subject of the violations.
In April 2014, the Tremont Planning Board approved an application by the Cousinses for a permit to rebuild within the existing footprint of the previous structure. Then, in December of 2015, the Cousinses filed a lawsuit against the town and more than a dozen firefighters who were at the 2013 blaze.
In March of 2017, the court dismissed the lawsuit filed by the Cousinses in relation to most of the firefighters and, in August of 2018, granted a summary judgement in favor for the town and the remaining firefighters.
In the interim, then-Code Enforcement Officer Debbi Nickerson issued a stop work order and a notice of violation to the Cousinses in October 2015, because they had allegedly poured a new foundation that went beyond the footprint of the original structure.
According to the order and findings of fact issued last week by Justice Stewart, the Cousinses have since filed an unrelated lawsuit in federal court relating to the 2015 stop work order and violations.
On Aug. 9, 2018, Tremont Code Enforcement Officer John Larson issued the Cousinses a notice of violation for three alleged infractions on their property: an unpermitted junk yard, an unpermitted campsite, and creating a road opening without a permit.
The Cousinses allegedly received the notice in September 2018 and eventually worked with the town on a consent agreement to resolve the matter. The Cousinses did not ever enter into that consent agreement, however, saying that it would require them to drop their pending federal court case related to the stop work order and violations from October 2015. Nor did they correct the three alleged violations.
Early this month, the court found in favor of the town for the violation of having an alleged unpermitted junk yard, but it did not find enough evidence for the other two violations.
According to the court documents, “located upon the property since the issuance of the NOV are stacks of used bricks, piles of old and discolored lumber, old lawn furniture, numerous pieces of scrap metal, an old freezer, remains of wooden fencing, discolored buoys of various sizes, a large metal cylinder marked ‘for sale’, an old unregistered snowmobile, a metal canopy frame, garbage cans, used commercial cooking equipment, numerous rubber tires, stacks of old metal lobster traps, two old unregistered trailers, two old unregistered boats, and a tow behind trailer.”
The documents also indicate that “Vegetation is growing over most of the items” and that various other unregistered vehicles have been on the property at various times.
The Cousinses argued that the items in the yard were work materials and those materials have sat so long because of the 2015 stop-work order and subsequent suit that they filed in federal court.
The court rejected “the contention that the items constitute construction materials. The court finds the items located on the property render the property a junkyard as defined by the statute.” The court also acknowledged that the Cousinses do not possess a junkyard permit as required by Maine statute.
The court found that “accordingly, the property is in violation of” the requirement to possess a permit for a junkyard.
As of Dec. 6, 2024, it had been 2,311 days since the original Aug. 9, 2018, notice of violation was issued. The court found that this constituted 2,311 separate violations.
The minimum fine for a land use penalty without permit is $100 per day and the court stated that the Maine Supreme Judicial Court ruled that the courts have no discretion to suspend any portion of a minimum penalty.
Therefore, the court imposed a civil monetary penalty of $231,100. The court also declared that the Cousinses pay “reasonable” attorneys’ fees to the town, that the Cousinses are permanently banned from operating or maintaining a junkyard, and that the Cousinses must remove the materials that constitute a junkyard from their property. If they do not remove the materials within 30 days, the town may enter the property to take corrective action.
This story was originally published by The Bar Harbor Story. To receive regular coverage from the Bar Harbor Story, sign up for a free subscription here.
