By KIM SMITH DEDAM
ELIZABETHTOWN -- The "deal of the century" could end up being a bargain for some Adirondack towns and villages.
The Adirondack Chapter of the Nature Conservancy is closing in on strategic plans to sell, lease and keep parcels of the 161,000 acres it purchased from Finch, Pruyn & Company last June, Executive Director Michael Carr said in an interview this week.
Some of the lands will be kept as timber lots to support the Finch Paper Company. Other parcels will be offered to the state for purchase, and some land may be sold to private timber investment companies.
The break-out isn't finalized, though a draft version of what the conservancy is calling a "disposition strategy" has been sent to the Department of Environmental Conservation.
Not unlike a "unit management plan," the strategy is based primarily on science, forestry and an inventory done on the lands over the last six months.
It will not be open for public comment and will be reviewed at DEC for its accord with the Open Space Conservation Plan, according to DEC spokeswoman Maureen Wren.
Carr said they haven't come up with final numbers of acres that will be sold yet.
But about 83 percent of the property is located in five towns -- North Hudson, Minerva, Newcomb, Indian Lake and Long Lake -- all surrounded by Adirondack forestlands in a large mass that likely won't be subdivided.
"Ideally, we'll avoid subdivision. It takes time and costs money," Carr said of the emerging strategy.
The conservancy would consider redrawing boundaries in other holdings along Adirondack Park Agency jurisdictional lines or along a highway or a river, Carr added, in areas considered "non-critical, where it makes sense to subdivide."
Subdivision requires approval by the APA.
ONE-THIRD OF NEWCOMB
About 60,000 acres of the former Finch, Pruyn lands are in the Town of Newcomb, composing fully one-third of the town.
Town Supervisor George Canon has had two meetings with Carr in the past six months.
"So far he seems to be trying to make everybody happy without committing himself," Canon said of the ongoing discussions in his town.
Of primary concern in Newcomb are some 30 to 50 hunting and fishing club lease-agreements, the supervisor said, conveying long-held and historic use of lands in Boreas and Tahawus sections of the Adirondacks.
Carr said the concern of sportsmen is understood at the Nature Conservancy.
"We are also hunting enthusiasts, some of us, and hunting is a historic primary use of the Adirondack forest."
Carr pointed to recent success the conservancy had with recreational clubs on 104,000 acres of former DomTar lands they purchased several years ago in the northeastern corner of the park.
Two of 23 clubs were displaced, he said.
But that deal had more elbow-room, more distance per club per acre.
"Fully 131,000 acres of the former Finch, Pruyn lands are leased to hunting and fishing clubs," Carr said. "Unfortunately, some of them will be displaced. We will try to strike some balance. The public would always have access to the acres conveyed to the state."
GOLF COURSE AND SNOWMOBILE TRAILS
Newcomb is looking to obtain 200 acres of former Finch, Pruyn land to add nine holes to the town-owned golf course.
They are also looking to add a snowmobile corridor to Indian Lake. The trail would be built under existing power lines.
"Those are the items up for discussion," Canon said.
A similar deal is underway the next town over.
In North Hudson, Supervisor Bob Dobie and other town officials met with the Nature Conservancy twice.
About 22,000 acres of former Finch, Pruyn land contain historic hunting grounds including the historic Boreas Great Camp.
"It looks like a good share of North Hudson land is going to be sold back to the state," Dobie said, a move he is cautious of.
But Dobie gave the environmental group high marks in terms of effort.
"I think they are genuine in this review. They are trying to do some good things for everyone," Dobie said. "They've offered North Hudson land for a snowmobile trail to Newcomb."
The sled corridor would follow roughly the Blue Ridge Road under an existing power line, ultimately connecting Newcomb and North Hudson with Schroon Lake and Crown Point on the eastern edge of the Adirondack Park.
Dobie said negotiations haven't touched on a manner of sale or a price for lands to build the trail.
"That's what the next meeting is about," he said. "But they have been genuinely interested in what we've had to say. They (the conservancy) were gracious enough to take us into the (Boreas) Great Camp. It is a beautiful, beautiful building."
Finch, Pruyn and Atlas Holdings, LLC, held a lease on the Great Camp property for eight more years, he said.
After that, the plan is to raze the historic structure, returning the land to wilderness.
FIBER SUPPLY
Nature Conservancy spokeswoman Connie Prickett said some of the newly purchased land would remain as timber holdings in a fiber-supply agreement struck with Finch Paper Company at the time of the $110 million sale.
Finch reportedly selectively culled timber from about 3,500 acres last year.
The Nature Conservancy has said from the beginning a good portion of the land will remain in working forest.
Other negotiations underway include conveyance of hamlet lands in Long Lake and Indian Lake to the Adirondack Community Housing Trust for affordable housing, a use Senator Betty Little (R-Queeensbury) applauds.
Assemblywoman Teresa Sayward said the Nature Conservancy's apparent priority to work with the towns had been a welcome gesture from the green community.
She, too, remains concerned with the sportsmen's lease agreements, hoping they will remain in place.
"We understand they made a deal with the Gooley Club in Newcomb to let them still hunt and have a club for 20 years. But I have a strong feeling that after that 20 years is up, the state will try to buy that land."
kdedam@pressrepublican.com
