There were two filings made Friday June 1st in the Bankruptcy Sale proceeding by J. Scott Logan Esq, counsel for Debtor Paul Kelley. The first filing, document #30, is an objection to the Motion to Sell and doesn’t contain any great surprises. The other filing, Exhibit A (document #31) is a letter from attorney Sarah McDaniel on behalf of Butch Duncan addressed to Bankruptcy Trustee Jeffrey T. Piampiano and it’s a bit of a head-scratcher:
- #30 DEBTOR’S SUPPLEMENTAL RESPONSE TO TRUSTEE’S MOTION TO SELL
- #31 DEBTOR’S SUPPLEMENTAL RESPONSE EXHIBIT A
Debtor’s Objection to the Sale Motion is interesting. And short (only 2 pages). Not surprisingly, the Debtor (Paul Kelley) opposes the sale of the dam without the “water level covenants” (the restrictive covenants) but doesn’t give any good reasons for keeping them other than stating that the “covenants pertain to environmental benefits and should not be stripped off as a matter of public policy.” What does that even mean? How does draining 300 acres of prime wetlands result in environmental benefits? Since Kelley will no longer own the dam and claims he has nothing to do with and no interest in Aquafortis Associates LLC, or their property, why should he care if the covenants remain in place? Continue reading
Representing the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, Assistant Attorney General Kevin Crosman, Esq. has filed a brief with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in response to motions filed last week by Bankruptcy Trustee Jeffrey Piampiano, Esq. The State fully supports the 
No really! The Clary Lake Association’s 
I got a call this afternoon from my old friend, Robert Giampetruzzi. He called to tell me that his mother, Roberta Giampetruzzi died last night after losing a battle with Alzheimer’s disease. She was 93.
And we’re off! On May 22nd after weeks of preparation, Bankruptcy Trustee Jeffrey T. Piampiano, Esq. has finally filed with the United States Bankruptcy Court a Motion to Sell the Clary Lake dam to the Clary Lake Association. The Trustee also filed at the same time a “Notice of Sale and Invitation to Bid Motion” and a “Motion for Substantive Consolidation” (more about this later). A hearing has been scheduled for June 7th at 2:00 PM at the United States Bankruptcy Court at 537 Congress Street in Portland Maine to consider the proposed bid procedures and act on the Motion for Substantive Consolidation. Objections to the motions must be filed by June 5th. A hearing date for the Sale Motion proper will be set at the June 7th hearing for sometime later in June, presumably also in Portland, though that remains to be seen. All of these hearings are open to the public should you want to attend. I’ll post the Sale Motion hearing date, time, and place as soon as it has been scheduled. Assuming the Judge approves the Sale Motion, we should own the Clary Lake dam before the end of June 🙂 
Today (May 15, 2018) marks the official end of our Spring 2018 “Buy the Dam” fundraiser and we would like to publicly acknowledge and thank our (anonymous) matching donors and by name, those other individuals, members and non-members alike, who have helped make our campaign such an outstanding success. We have reached our fundraising goal of $125,000 and we are extremely gratified by the outpouring of support for our efforts to buy the dam and protect and preserve Clary Lake. Donations arrived not just from people in our local communities of Whitefield and Jefferson, but also from people from elsewhere around Maine, and around the Country. Donations are expected to continue to arrive over the coming weeks, and the funds will be put to good use. There will be more work to do, and ongoing recurring expenses that need to be covered so if you haven’t yet 
I’ve sent emails to our Membership 3-4 times in the past few months including one yesterday afternoon. Generally only about 3/4 of them get opened. Now, by unsolicited commercial email standards (a.k.a. Spam) that’s a fantastic open rate, but I’m not sending spam, I’m providing important news and updates of special interest to our Members and if possible I’d like to see ALL of the emails opened. If you are a Clary Lake Association member and you haven’t seen any emails from us in recent weeks, chances are the emails are getting dumped into your spam folder. So first, check your spam folder! You may have to train your email program that emails received from webmaster@clarylake.org are not spam (generally you just open the message and click the “not spam” button). The other possibilities are that we either don’t have your email address (19 of our current 138 members have not provided us with an email address) or we have the wrong address. None of our emails have bounced, but not all mail hosts still bounce bad addresses; some do, some don’t. Therefore, if you are a CLA Member, have an email address but haven’t received any emails from us, please 
We’ve been busy! Our original matching donor cut off at $45,000. We have actually managed to secure another matching donor (who also wishes to remain anonymous) who will match up to an additional $10,000 worth of donations! Seeing as how we’re currently at almost $107,000, an additional $10,000 in donations along with these new matching funds will push us over the top of our phase 2 fundraising goal of $125,000. This means we should be able to make permanent repairs to the Clary Lake dam this summer, rather than having to wait a year. Our fundraising success has been incredibly gratifying and shows just how much people want this water level crisis to end. If you haven’t donated to our fundraising campaign yet, please consider doing so at your earliest opportunity. Checks may be sent to:
We reached our initial Phase 1 fundraising goal of $90,000 much sooner than expected and while the Board hadn’t discussed trying to raise additional funds for permanent repairs so soon, it only makes sense that we maintain our forward fundraising momentum and move right into Phase 2 fundraising without delay! We needed the initial funds to purchase the dam in a relative hurry, however Phase 2 fundraising can proceed at a somewhat more leisurely pace. The money is to pay for engineering services and for permanent dam repairs which we won’t need to spend for a while. We have only begun working on getting prices and we won’t have a firm budget for the work yet. However, some preliminary estimates we’ve received indicate we’ll need at least $30,000 for this second and final phase of effort, possibly more, hence a new fundraising goal of $125,000. We may need to revise that figure upward but for now it seems like both a realistic goal and an achievable one. I haven’t felt the need to reset our donation thermometer and have instead just added $35,000 to the original $90,000 goal giving a new goal of $125,000. The money all goes into the same pot, so to speak. Any money left over after permanent repairs are completed will be use to fund ongoing dam maintenance and repairs. Owning the Clary Lake dam is a big commitment and we’re taking it seriously. 
In only two short weeks of fundraising we have met our phase 1 goal of $90,000!!!! Many, many thanks to everyone who contributed, and special thanks to our patron who has matched donations dollar for dollar. I’m truly grateful for the outpouring of support, financial and otherwise, shown by our members, other lake shore owners, and friends of Clary Lake in the surrounding community.
A quick reminder for our Clary Lake Association Members: we’re holding a Special Membership Meeting this coming Wednesday April 4th at 5:00 PM at 