Also orders code enforcement officer to issue driveway permit
The Bar Harbor Story is generously sponsored by The Witham Family Hotels Charitable Fund.
TREMONT—Maine’s Business and Consumer Court has ordered the Tremont Planning Board to approve the application of Madelon Brogdon and ordered the town’s code enforcement officer to issue a permit for the use of a way to access Brogdon’s proposed campground, the application for which was previously twice denied by the town’s planning board.
Both times that the planning rejected the application, Brogdon appealed the planning board’s decision to the Business and Consumer Court.
Brogdon owns approximately 18 acres on Harbor Drive in Tremont and wants to put a small campground at the rear of her property. The front of Brogdon’s property is in the Commercial Fishery/Maritime Activity Shoreland Zone (CFMA) and the rear of her property is in the Residential-Business zone.
The issue and reason for the denials, is whether or not an existing way is a road or a driveway. This existing way would be the access to the campground and if it is deemed a driveway, would not be an allowed use in the CFMA zone, which needs to be crossed in order to access the proposed campground.
Brogdon’s application was first denied by the planning board on January 10, 2023, with the stated reason being that access to the site requirements were not met. After the denial, Brogdon appealed to the court.
The result of this first court decision was to remand the case back to the planning board.
The court wrote, “In the first challenge, it was abundantly clear that the planning board did not apply the applicable LUO definitions. As a consequence, the court remanded the matter to the planning board to make findings of fact, accompanied by an analysis and determination of whether the existing way Brogdon proposes to use to access the campground is a road, a trail, or a driveway. Brogdon v. Town of Tremont, BCD-APP-2023-00006 (Me. B.C.D. July 26, 2024) (‘Brogdon I’).”
Based upon the remand, the planning board took up the application again on January 14, 2025, and heard oral arguments from attorney Ed Bearor, representing Brogdon and attorney Daniel Pileggi representing the neighbor intervenors.
According to the minutes from the January 14, 2025, meeting, “Member Gott moved to adopt Mr. Pileggi’s (neighbor intervenor’s attorney) findings of fact and conclusions of law with the two amendments. Member Hodgdon seconded the motion and the board voted 3-1 to approve the motion with Member Harper against.”
Also according to those same minutes, “Mr. Bearor (Brogdon’s attorney) asked the board if they were going to address his similar uses argument to which the board declined.”
On January 28, 2025, according to court documents, the planning board issued a written decision, denying the application for the second time. Brogdon again appealed to the court.
In this second decision, the court ruled fully in favor of Brogdon and took away the planning board’s power of further decision making in this application.
“Despite the court’s guidance, the planning board’s decision following remand committed two significant errors of law. First, the board failed to consider the length of the way, as clearly required by the LUO’s definition of driveway. The board also failed to consider the issue of similar use, also clearly required by the LUO. Given the facts of the case and the nature of the planning board’s errors, it makes no sense to remand the matter to the planning board for any reason other than to order the planning board to approve Brogdon’s application. The permitting process for this simple application has already taken over four years. Thus, as discussed below, the court reverses and remands the matter to the planning board with instructions to approve Brogdon’s application and instruct the code enforcement officer to issue a permit for use of the way to access the proposed campground,” the court wrote.
The Tremont Planning Board has a meeting scheduled for Tuesday, October 28, 2025, and the only item currently on the agenda is “make final findings on Madelon Brogdon campground application and sign the site plan and decision.”
Read the Full Court Order
Brogdon V
14.2MB ∙ PDF file
Planning Board Minutes
Pb Minutes January 10, 2023
98.4KB ∙ PDF file
Pb Minutes January 14, 2025
159KB ∙ PDF file
Pb Minutes January 28, 2025
162KB ∙ PDF file
Correction: The last paragraph initially read January 28. It is October 28 and we apologize for the error!
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I can”t thank you enough for printing the article about the”campground” in tremont!
We have suffered negative nonsense not true articles in a local paper for 5 years now! Simply put, if you meet code, then give the permit! Personal preference has no place on a planning board! Love to share the whole crazy story sometime!