BERNARDSTON — The cutting down of more than half the trees at Pratt Field during the last weekend of March will be discussed by the Selectboard at its meeting Wednesday at 6 p.m.
The trees were cut down without the Selectboard’s permission, in preparation for the 42nd annual Gas Engine Show, a fundraiser for the United Church of Bernardston. The show’s organizers had received permission to use the field, but misunderstood what their rights to the field entailed.
A church representative will speak to the Selectboard at Wednesday’s meeting.
This May will be the first time that the show will be held at Pratt Field. Its previous home along Route 10 is now taken by a facility for growing marijuana. Happy Valley Compassion Center, a nonprofit medical marijuana organization, received Planning Board approval in December 2017 to construct a 20,000-square-foot facility on the 7.66-acre lot that the organization leases from Sandri Companies through Crumpin-Fox.
Bob Allen, an organizer of the Gas Engine Show, said that the Selectboard gave the group permission in November to use the field this year.
Workers began clearing the field on March 31, he said.
“We figured we were doing the same thing, just like we used to do with the old lot,” Allen said.
Normally, when a field is prepared for an event like the Gas Engine Show, “overgrowth” is cleared ahead of time, Allen said. “Once we started cutting, that’s when we found out that that wasn’t part of our deal.”
Allen had given his contact information to people living near Pratt’s Field.
“We want to work with the town,” he said. “We’re all town members ourselves.”
On Monday, April 2, a local resident called Allen and said that the show’s organizers likely did not have legal permission to clear the field.
“I think I found out about it before the Selectboard,” Allen said.
Mary Lightner, who lives on South Street near Pratt Field, said that when she spoke to town hall employees on April 2, the day after the trees had been cut, they were unaware that the trees had been cut down.
Later that day, on April 2, the Selectboard ordered that work on the field stop until the matter could be properly discussed by the Selectboard.
According to the deed for Pratt Field, the land was granted to “the inhabitants of Bernardston, through its Board of Selectmen,” in 1976.
Town Administrator Hugh Campbell confirmed that permission to cut down the trees was not granted by the town, and that no one in Town Hall was aware that the trees were being cut down.
“I do not want to say anything that might prejudice what (will be) said in the meeting on Wednesday night,” Campbell said.
Selectboard Chairman Stanley Garland declined to comment. The other selectmen, Robert Raymond and Brian Keir, were unavailable.
Contact Max Marcus at
413-772-0261, ext. 261
or mmarcus@recorder.com