The Gorham Town Council approved a measure Tuesday in a special meeting authorizing Portland Water District to buy property for the sewer line extension along Mosher Road.
The council voted in favor of it unanimously, with councilor Matt Robinson absent.
The sewer line from Little Falls along Mosher Road and into Westbrook would replace an antiquated sewerage treatment plant that serves both Little Falls and South Windham. Michelle Clements, a spokewoman for the water district, said the project required a land acquisition near the Little River for a pumping station.
Clements said the site now being eyed is for sale by the Allocca family. “Most likely the property would be resold after a station was built and we would retain an easement,” she said.
The site for the pumping station is one of three that was under consideration. The canoe launch on Mosher Road apparently was also a possible site. Richard Curtis, president of the Gorham-Sebago Lake Regional Land Trust, said Monday that the land trust had discussed with the water district the possibility of placing the pumping station at the canoe launch site.
“There never was a consideration of displacing the canoe launch. The plan was that both could easily fit on the property,” Curtis said in an e-mail response.
Curtis said the water district had changed its plans, deciding to locate the pumping station on another site.
“We’re talking a quarter of a million here,” Town Councilor Burleigh Loveitt said Tuesday about the acquisition.
Loveitt said the Gorham-Sebago Land Trust wasn’t interested in having the pumping station at its site. Loveitt felt the land trust was uncooperative, which he found “galling.”
Loveitt said use of land trust property for a pumping station wouldn’t destroy it for other use. The Little River is a tributary of the Presumpscot River, which would be cleaner with a sewer line eliminating discharge from treatment plants at Little Falls and the state prison in Windham.
“I can’t understand the reluctance,” Loveitt said about the land trust.
David Cole, Gorham town manager, said the land trust was “less” than enthusiastic but wasn’t “totally uncooperative” about use of its site. “A private land owner is a willing seller,” Cole said.
Cole said the water district would go out to bid for the sewer line project in September and could award a bid to a contractor in October. The deal would need final approval from Gorham and Windham town councils, which earlier this year approved the engineering study.
Cutline (land trust 1) 
Cutline (land trust 2)
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