Plan in the making for former Birds Eye site clean-up

CARIBOU, Maine — Owner of the former Birds Eye site Steve Nasiff indicated on Tuesday afternoon that he was working with local companies to have the property secured in a way that will keep kids out of it. He plans to install motion detecting lights, a fence, cameras and a person to guard the property on a rotating basis because “not one of those things by itself would keep kids out,” he said on Tuesday afternoon, acknowledging that he was a kid once himself.
Caribou’s city council stipulated during their June 23 meeting that Nasiff, owner of Nasiff International of Fall River, Mass., secure the site in seven days and develop a clean-up plan in 30 days.
Assistant City Manager and Code Enforcement Officer Tony Mazzucco explained that the seven days began when Nasiff was officially served the order by the council — not calendar days from the meeting date.
In Mazzucco’s opinion, securing the site with a fence or a guard is only a temporary measure. “In some cases, it still doesn’t alleviate the safety concerns from these severely deteriorated structures,” he said on Monday. “It’s not just the presence of an abandoned structure that’s the issue; it’s the risk of structural collapse, and in most of the buildings, imminent structural collapse is obvious.”
While the council agreed that the structure needed to be secured for public safety (with one councilor opposed to the seven-day window) Nasiff said on Tuesday that there’s a reason why a fire hasn’t occurred and no one’s been hurt: “It’s because of the work we did,” he stated.
Nasiff understands that it doesn’t look like much work has been done, but defended that he spent eight months cleaning out the buildings on the site and even knocked down a 26,000 square foot potato house, remediating its asbestos in the process. He also outlined that he’s in the process of getting a plan together for the council, “mostly getting bids, numbers, assessments of what needs to be done with the individual buildings,” he said, adding that he would have something in-hand for his next meeting with council.
In the midst of preparing the clean-up plan, Nasiff received his property tax bill for $311,000, “which frosted me a bit,” he added.
Nasiff also said that he wasn’t aware of city’s efforts to have the buildings on the site declared dangerous until mid-April, which surprised him since he’s been trying to sell the property to the town.
“To me, it’s a sham,” he said. “It’s a tactic to take this property from me without paying me fair money for it.”
Nasiff further stated two reasons as to why he feels it’s a sham: “One, it’s been there the whole time, and two, when someone’s going to lose (a property to the city), there’s a history of problems.” He explained that there isn’t a history of problems with the site because of the work he’s done to the facility.
Mazzucco explained that the city is serious about addressing its blighted buildings in a proactive manner. Acknowledging that blighted buildings are across the state and not unique to Caribou, he expressed that city officials are working with their partners at the state level to see what they can do about cleaning up dangerous and blighted sites.
“We’ve decided that we want Caribou to be a nice place to live, work and play, and people have a right to have abutting properties that are safe and clean,” Mazzucco said on Monday. “That’s really what it comes down to, is safe and clean housing and neighborhoods. Some of these problems have existed in the community for a long time and haven’t been addressed, and we’re very serious about addressing them.”
Earlier in June, the city closed the Lazy Acres mobile home park on the Access Highway due to a failed septic system, forcing two residents to relocate their trailers.
Mazzucco said that the owner was ordered to install a new septic system if he was to continue operating the park as a mobile home park and, in resolving the septic issue, would need to fill in a large, open hole that was collecting sewage.
“He did neither, so the city, stepped in and filled the hole in completely with gravel, thus abating the immediate nuisance of the open raw sewage flowing from the two homes,” Mazzucco described.
The cost of doing so was $2,831.77, which Lazy Acres owner Bradley McCurtain of Portland paid; included in the memo of the check, however, was the statement “paid under protest and lack of due process reserving all rights to challenge.”
“He may think that cost is unfair, but once again, if he corrected the issue when it came in, he probably could have done it for much less,” Mazucco said.
McCurtain offered no comment on Tuesday afternoon.
Mazzucco said he’s spoken with McCurtain’s attorney, and the owner expressed interest in correcting the remaining land use violations on the property “including piles of debris, abandoned vehicles, the three remaining homes which, regardless of the septic issue, are not habitable,” the assistant city manager listed.
On the list of Caribou’s blighted buildings include some Collins Street properties owned by the city, and Mazzucco assured that they were in the process of being rectified.
“We’re actively preparing plans to take care of city owned properties that are in poor condition,” he said. “One of the challenges we face, and we just had a meeting this morning with the Department of Environmental Protection, is that any city acquired properties that we want to tear down, we’re required to go through asbestos abatement,” Mazzucco added. “That naturally adds enormously to the cost and the timeframe.”