February 2012 – Page 6 – Jay's Real Estate Blog

A Proper Farewell

The life of Rev. John A. Grant was remembered and celebrated Tuesday in a final farewell, involving hundreds of mourners. Grant, a well-known historian and Episcopal priest, died Friday at the age of 88. A veteran of World War II and a graduate of West Virginia University, Grant came to be one of the most articulate and well-informed historians of the local area, serving as editor of the Glades Star, the journal of local history published by the Garrett County Historical Society, for 19 years. Grant was also an active member of the Deer Park Volunteer Fire Department, the American Legion, the Oakland Masonic Lodge 192 AF&AM, the Scottish Rite, Ali Ghan Shrine in Cumberland, and clan chief of the Ali Ghan Pipes and Drums.

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In the funeral procession Tuesday, more representatives of organizations touched by Grant were present, and are visible above. The Deer Park firefighters followed the casket on Oakland’s “Old Number 1,” which is now housed in the county’s new Transportation Museum (the yellow building on the right of the street), in which Grant was involved. He was a charter member of the Garrett Highlands Pipes and Drums, with whom he played the bagpipe for over 30 years. That group preceded the fire truck, as shown. St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church is at center, where the reverend served as rector for many years. He was also vicar of St. John’s in Deer Park and Our Father’s House at Altamont. As was noted at the ceremony, Grant lived a full and active life, giving freely of himself and his abilities. Photo by John McEwen.

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Buying or selling real estate in Garrett County or Deep Creek Lake, Maryland? Call Jay Ferguson of Railey Realty for all of your real estate needs! I take great pride in referrals, and I assure you, I will take great care of your friends, family & colleagues!

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GC Officials Still Reviewing ASCI Issue, Stress County Will Not Take On Its Debt

Feb. 9, 2012

The Garrett County commissioners announced this week that they are still reviewing the Adventure Sports International Center (ASCI) debt issue. They met in executive session last month with the ASCI board members to discuss the legal implications of the not-for-profit organization’s decision to default on $3 million of capital debt.

“We are continuing to work on this matter,” Commissioner Jim Raley told a group of about 50 residents who attended the public meeting on Tuesday morning. “We will be meeting with legal counsel to continue a dialogue and a discussion with this matter.”

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Located on Marsh Mountain, ASCI facilities include a self-contained man-made whitewater course and 550 acres in the Fork Run Recreational Area. ASCI became operational in 2006 through public (federal/state/county) and private sector funds amounting to about $24 million. During the construction phase, however, the organization borrowed millions of dollars from Susquehanna and First United banks to address unanticipated costs.

The ASCI board discussed the issue with the commissioners in January and presented them with a resolution.

“The offer by ASCI, as reflected in the resolution, included an offer to convey all of ASCI’s facilities, assets, and operations to the county,” Raley read from a prepared statement. “The county has taken this matter under advisement, and the transfer of proprietary ownership would not be considered or undertaken if the existing debt obligations remained.”

Raley stressed, however, that the assumption that the county will appropriate the amount of $3 million toward the debt is unfounded and is not being considered.

“The county believes that ASCI is an asset to Garrett County and is part of the overall and comprehensive tourism objective that will enhance and grow the Garrett County economy for many years,” Raley read from the commissioners’ statement.

He noted that ASCI had been paying on its debt until September 2010. The commissioner indicated that part of the reason for the payment stoppage involved Wisp Resort, which is now in Chapter 11.

“Some of it was probably the complexity of the relationship that they (ASCI board members) have with a fee that was collected from the Wisp in the amount of $180,000 per year,” Raley said. “And once that fee was not able to be collected, it caused some problems for ASCI to be able to meet its financial obligations to the debt service.”

County administrator Monty Pagenhardt noted that ASCI is sustainable and shows a profit, except for the capital debt.

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CitizenShale Praises Sen. Edwards' Proposed Natural Gas Impact Fund

Feb. 9, 2012

A local organization active in efforts to reform natural gas leasing in Maryland praised Sen. George Edwards this week for his proposal of a “Natural Gas Impact Fund,” which the state could use to pay for environmental issues associated with gas exploration and drilling.

The bill Edwards introduced, SB 768, would direct state agencies charged with regulating gas-drilling to make allocations from the impact fund for remediation in Garrett and Allegany counties “not attributable to a specific company at a specific site.”

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Funding would come from a 2.5 percent severance tax, or production tax, on gas at the well-head, once a well is connected to a pipeline.

“We are encouraged not only by the efforts of Del. [Wendell] Beitzel and Sen. Edwards to secure much-needed protections for those who lease land for shale gas development, but it is also very gratifying to see the senator recognize our environment’s importance,” said CitizenShale acting director Natalie Atherton.

The 2.5 percent state tax would augment another 5.5 percent county production tax already in place in Garrett (and being proposed for Allegany) County. Atherton said the total 8 percent tax would put Maryland’s rate “in the middle of the pack” nationally, and roughly equal to that of West Virginia. Pennsylvania lawmakers continue to grapple with impact fees, but the gas industry has avoided all severance taxes, according to Atherton.

Maryland law also gives state regulators the authority to impose impact fees for costs and risks associated with drilling, such as damage to roads and the need for additional enforcement. State agencies are in the process of developing those fees; announcements are expected later this year.

No gas wells have yet been permitted in Maryland as the state completes a review process (which Atherton said is recognized nationally as the country’s most thorough) in the search for what Gov. Martin O’Malley has called the ” gold standard” in regulation.

Edwards is one of five local representatives appointed by O’Malley to a special commission studying the potential effects of gas-drilling using the controversial technique known as hydraulic fracturing. Contamination of water wells and aquifers in several states has been reportedly linked to “fracking.”

In his executive order creating the commission last year, O’Malley identified passing a state severance tax as his top priority.

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Red In Morning, Sailors Take Warning

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If that ancient adage were completely accurate (“Red at night, sailors delight; red in morning, sailors take warning”), Tuesday’s weather would’ve been much more severe, as this was the scene early that day, captured on a digital camera by Deb Swiger. But Tuesday’s weather was actually quite fair on the Mountaintop, with perhaps one little shower of rain. The weather is going against most adages these days, continuing on with unusually warm temperatures and bringing next to no snow. While that makes for more ease in traveling and keeping warm, it is still an odd state of affairs for a population that is used to far more wintry conditions. The groundhog apparently did see his shadow this morning, predicting six more weeks of winter. So perhaps February will bring weather more characteristic of Garrett County at this time of the year.

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Md. county won't bail out whitewater course

Posted: Feb 07, 2012 12:19 PM EST Updated: Feb 07, 2012 12:19 PM EST

OAKLAND, Md. (AP) – The Garrett County Commissioners say they won’t bail out a manmade whitewater course near Deep Creek Lake.

The nonprofit Adventure Sports Center International asked the county last month to consider taking over the mountaintop complex, including payments on about $3 million in bank loans.

The commissioners said Tuesday they won’t consider a takeover that would include the debt obligations.

The center’s operators defaulted on the bank loans after the group that owns the nearby Wisp ski resort stopped paying them for marketing services. The Wisp owners filed for bankruptcy protection in October due to a slowdown in sales of vacation home sites.

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Funding ‘critical’ for education

Elaine Blaisdell Cumberland Times-News

OAKLAND — Sen. George Edwards and Delegate Wendell Beitzel are currently proposing a bill — Senate Bill 586 — that will cap losses of state funding to any school district to a 5.5 percent limit, said James Raley, Garrett County commission chairman, during Tuesday’s meeting. Raley said commissioners supported the bill and encouraged residents to do the same, stating that, “education funding is critical.”
“Any action on the part of the board of commissioners as the funding source is not intended to usurp their difficult decisions,” said a public statement, read by Commissioner Gregan Crawford, during the meeting.
The county has committed to funding education said Raley, adding that last year the county gave an extra $1.7 million towards education.
“We stand to say that we are willing to give some additional funding this year even though we are going to have to look long and hard as to where we are going to find that funding. Because there is not a new Wind Turbine project, there is not a Marcellus Shale Gas extraction severance tax, there is not any real new revenue that is coming to the county,” said Raley.
The commissioners vowed that the county will emerge from this financial crisis and asked the community to keep faith.
“We ask that we remain respectful of one another as we continue to work through this evolving process,” said the public statement.
In fiscal year 2012, the Garrett County Board of Education funding level was reduced by the state by $1.5 million, according to the public statement. Until last year, the state was required to fund education at the same level as the previous year, according to Raley.
“Garrett County government has been experiencing a financial shortfall status and there are numerous challenges to secure funding for the provision of all public services for the residents, property owners, and visitors to Garrett County without operating with a structural deficit,” said the public statement.
In order to fix the financial situation that the Garett County Public School system is facing, Sue Waggoner, interim superintendent, developed a five-year plan that reduces the budget $3 million by eliminating programs, reducing budgets and positions, providing retirement incentives, reconfiguring fifth graders into middle school and by closing Dennett Road, Kitzmiller and Friendsville elementary schools.
The commissioners encouraged the board to review the retirement incentives and allow for the reduction of staff numbers without eliminating the jobs of new employees. The commissioners also encouraged the board to work with them to identify areas of overlapping services and practices.
“We have deliberated and identified the fact that public education is not only our number one fiscal priority, but also a notable objective of our future economic development vision. The downturn in the economy, reductions in state-level school funding require that all parties cannot continue to operate under the same paradigm. The new paradigm insists that we must not only do more with less, we must do better with less.”
To read the commission’s public statement in its entirety, visit www.garrettcounty.org.
Contact Elaine Blaisdell at eblaisdell@times-news.com.

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Garrett commissioners to detail ASCI debt, reveal county’s position

Chairman says nonprofit group may consider transferring ownership

Elaine Blaisdell Cumberland Times-News

OAKLAND — The Garrett County Commission will provide a more detailed review today of Adventure Sports Center International’s debt situation and will make known the county’s position, according to Monty Pagenhardt, county administrator.

The commissioners made a public statement at the Jan. 17 meeting that they met in executive session earlier that day to discuss legal, financial and personnel implications for ASCI in regard to the default of $3 million of capital debt obligations.

ASCI is a nonprofit entity and not under the authority of the county commissioners, according to Pagenhardt. The financial institutions involved with the debt collection are Susquehanna Bank and First United Bank & Trust.

Adventure Sports Chairman Duane Yoder told The Associated Press that the group may consider transferring ownership to Garrett County or Garrett College.

The $3 million debt was incurred during cost overruns in construction of the actual whitewater course and pond, Matt Taylor, executive director of ASCI explained to the Times-News in a previous interview. ASCI broke ground on the whitewater facility in 2004 and opened in the spring of 2007.

“The ASCI whitewater course is a one-of-a-kind facility and a combination of unique building challenges and high cost of materials. Most of the facility was built in the years following Hurricane Katrina, which greatly inflated certain material and transportation costs (that) led to the overruns,” said Taylor in a previous interview with the Times-News.

Today’s 9 a.m. public meeting agenda will also include a briefing in regard to the county public school system’s fiscal 2013 budget.

The school system is $2.6 million in debt because of enrollment and wealth loss, according to the five-year plan proposal outline. The school system hopes to reduce the budget by $3 million by:

• Eliminating the high school driver’s education program, $200,000.

• Eliminating full-time school enrichment teaching positions, $165,000.

• Closing Dennett Road, Kitzmiller and Friendsville elementary schools, $2.16 million.

• Providing a retirement incentive.

• Reducing the transportation budget by $128,000.

• Reducing the maintenance budget by $100,000.

The five-year plan, developed by Sue Waggoner, interim superintendent of schools, also calls for:

• Reduction of six instructional assistant positions, $150,000.

• Reduction of academic intervention, $50,00.

• Reduction of three high school positions, $165,000.

• Reconfiguration of grade levels, making middle school fifth through eighth grades.

On Jan. 17, the board of education decided against moving fifth-grade students into middle school and instead considered a grade school alternative that will be based on next school year’s kindergarten enrollment numbers.

A decision on the proposed school closings will not be made until the March 13 board meeting.

“We are $3 million short. There is no way around the closings,” said Waggoner during the January public meeting.

The county commission will also discuss the Good Will Volunteer Fire Department boundary dispute. The fire department, which is located in Lonaconing, wants to provide service in Garrett County and receive fire tax revenue. The commission has no authority in this matter and the fire department has received a letter from the Public Safety Department explaining that there is a process, according to Pagenhardt.

The land-use management work session that was supposed to be discussed today was rescheduled to Feb. 14 at 1:30 p.m. to allow sufficient time for review and discussion.

Also on the agenda:

• County roads department will provide an update on the status of Westernport and Lower New Germany roads and an update on federally mandated radio equipment.

• An update will be provided on the Garrett County Airport and its 50th anniversary plans.

• A 2012 legislative update will be provided.

Contact Elaine Blaisdell at eblaisdell@times-news.com

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With deep concerns over fracking, a Va. county says no to more gas drilling

By Darryl Fears, Published: February 5

In BERGTON, Va. — Carrizo Oil and Gas had every reason to believe this rustic town in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains was an ideal place to build Virginia’s first well to explore for natural gas in the state’s Marcellus Shale.

Carrizo liked Bergton’s location — eight miles from the West Virginia border, not far from where other operations are extracting gas. Carrizo bet that gas was locked in the shale under the town and put up tens of thousands of dollars for landowner leases as collateral.

All it needed to start the job was a special land-use permit from the four Republicans and one Democrat on Rockingham County’s Board of Supervisors.

Carrizo didn’t even come close. Concerned about controversial drilling methods, the supervisors never voted on the permit, and recently the company shelved its application following a two-year pursuit, ending its immediate hopes of exploring for gas.

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$3 million would be better spent on schools, not ASCI

To the Editor: Cumberland Times-News

I am a local Garrett County resident, pay taxes and am a voter. I am very concerned about the finances of Garrett County Commissioners budget and the Garrett County Board of Education’s budget.
The biggest percentage of the locals in the county cannot afford to go to Deep Creek Lake to do extra activities.
The Garret County Board of Education needs $3 million from the county commissioners to keep the schools open that helps educate our children and grandchildren.
These are well maintained schools. Why close schools because people in the past did not make good financial decisions?
If the county commissioners do not fund the board of education to this capacity, our children will be cheated out of a good secure education. They will be put in schools that will be over state capacity and be in over crowded classrooms.
This means more discipline problems and less instructional time. Overcrowded classrooms mean our test scores will go down. This also means losing good young teachers. I really believe cuts could be made in other areas, starting at the top with pay cuts and unnecessary spending.
The county commissioners will be meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 7. At this meeting they will be making a decision whether to pay ASCI out of debt for $3 million. For anyone who doesn’t know, ASCI is located at “The Wisp” Deep Creek Lake.
I really believe this $3 million should be spent on our children’s education!
People, please go to the meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 7 and voice your opinion on this matter. Once they decide to help ASCI there will be no saving our children.
Remember, our future is in the hands of these children! Help save our schools!
Gerald “Jerry” Wilson
Oakland

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DNR talks Savage River trout at open house

Michael A. Sawyers Cumberland Times-News

CUMBERLAND — More than 30 people came to an open house Saturday to hear about brook trout management in the upper Savage River drainage, some traveling from as far away as Baltimore and Sugar Grove, W.Va.
The Maryland Fisheries Service, a part of the Department of Natural Resources, conducted the meeting at Allegany College of Maryland to discuss impacts of special regulations in place for brookie fishing during the past five years.
Beginning in 2007, the use of bait and the keeping brook trout in 111 miles of the river’s drainage was prohibited. Much of the drainage is made up of tributaries flowing into the Savage River Reservoir or the river that feeds it.
“There has been no significant improvement (in the brookie population),” said Don Cosden, chief of the freshwater fish management. “In fact, there has been a drop across the board.”
Cosden said bad reproduction of baby brookies throughout the study period have made the results inconclusive. Robert Hilderbrand, PhD, of the University of Maryland’s Center for Environmental Sciences, Appalachian Lab in Frostburg, directed the study.
Reproduction was poor, Cosden said, because of high water flows in some years and low water flows in others.
Visitors to the open house were given the opportunity to supply written comments about the brook trout management.
“We had the gamut,” Cosden said. “Some passionately told us we had made the wrong decision (with the regulations). Some agreed with the regulations and some wanted the regulations to be even more strict, such as a moratorium on fishing.”
The complete study is available at www.dnr.state.md.us/fisheries as is a place for online comments.
Cosden said all public comments will be reviewed and considered in future management decisions.
Doug Oxford, Oakland, said he is an avid Garrett County brook trout fisherman who has mixed emotions about the regulations.
“In 1987, a friend and I would start at the top of Poplar Lick and fish all the way to the bottom. We would catch 200 brook trout using small red garden worms and hooking them in the lips. We put them all back,” he said.
On the other hand, Oxford said he doesn’t think all fishermen have the knowledge and skill to use bait to catch brook trout in that manner. More fish die that swallow hooks into their throats or gullets, according to Hilderbrand.
The regulation will remain unchanged for now, Cosden said. The agency will continue annual population surveys of brook trout by shocking them with electric current for weighing and measuring before their return to the water.
Contact Michael A. Sawyers at msawyers@times-news.com.

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Month: February 2012

A Proper Farewell

GC Officials Still Reviewing ASCI Issue, Stress County Will Not Take On Its Debt

CitizenShale Praises Sen. Edwards' Proposed Natural Gas Impact Fund

Red In Morning, Sailors Take Warning

Md. county won't bail out whitewater course

Funding ‘critical’ for education

Garrett commissioners to detail ASCI debt, reveal county’s position

With deep concerns over fracking, a Va. county says no to more gas drilling

$3 million would be better spent on schools, not ASCI

DNR talks Savage River trout at open house

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