Banks Pays Back Taxes
On Beanville Property

A back bill of $82,774—by far the largest delinquency on Randolph’s roster of delinquent taxes—was paid in full last Wednesday, less than 24 hours before the property was scheduled for a tax sale.

Atty. Pamela Stafford, who handles tax sales for the town, confirmed Tuesday that five years of back taxes on a 3.6-acre, commercial property on Beanville Road had been paid in full by Randolph National Bank, which holds the mortgage. Property owner is "I Lease for You, Ltd.", a corporation of which former resident David Threlkeld is the sole stockholder.

The former home of New England Precision, the property has been largely vacant for years, because of creosote contamination that was caused in the 1960s, but only discovered in the late 1980s, around the time Threlkeld bought the property.

Atty. Stafford noted this week that it is not uncommon for lien-holders to pay taxes on tax sale properties, rather than move to buy the property themselves.

Had the property gone to tax sale on Sept. 15, one of the bidders would have been the town itself. The Randolph Selectboard had earlier authorized a bid of up to $85,000. The property presently has an assessed value of $322,000.

New Request

On the same day as RNB settled the tax bill, Atty. Stafford received a written request from Threlkeld’s attorney, David Blythe, requesting partial abatement on the property’s taxes. The first half of 2005 taxes on the property of $4204 are due at the end of October, she noted.

Blythe’s request will be heard by the town’s Board of Abatement on September 27, Stafford said.

In April, Threlkeld’s attorney appeared before the Tax Abatement Board to request a total abatement of back taxes, interest, and penalties on the property. Although Blythe withdrew the request that evening, the meeting was cordial, and the board left the door open for a possible new request.

Stafford noted this week that the town is not in a position to forgive an entire tax bill, since a portion represents education taxes.

"It’s not ours to abate," she pointed out.

At the April hearing, Blythe said a clean-up had recently been completed, with an old tank removed, and groundwater monitors were in place. He also indicated that an agreement had finally been worked out with the state, permitting subdivision of the property, so that a half-acre of contaminated property could be sectioned off and the balance sold.

Negotiations, he added, were underway with a possible buyer for the property, which has several commercial buildings on it. Blythe could not be reached yesterday for an update.

Until Blythe’s letter arrived last week, Stafford said she had had no communication from him or Threlkeld since the tax sale was warned in July.

For years, the town had been reluctant to move to a tax sale, for fear of becoming liable for the pollution and clean-up costs. Thanks to a 2004 piece of legislation, which protects a municipality from liability if it acquires property in any municipal function, the town was able to move forward this year on the sale.

For this particular sale, the town had stretched the usual 20-day window between warning and tax sale to two months. That was to allow extra time for Threlkeld to sell the property, Atty. Stafford said in July.

A Brief History

Threlkeld bought the Beanville property, formerly home to a lumber mill, in 1986. Shortly thereafter, state and federal agencies determined that a portion of the property had creosote contamination, from wood-treating operations at the mill in the 1960s.

Threlkeld, as the current owner, suddenly found himself legally liable for the clean-up. The environmental lien, he said, also put the property in economic limbo, as Threlkeld found it impossible to sell or even re-mortgage.

In recent years, Threlkeld had refused to pay taxes on what he said was an unsaleable and largely unusable property. A portion of the property, however, is currently rented.

The state had initially proposed a multi-million-dollar clean-up plan, but later conceded that the ground contamination was relatively minor. After years of back-and-forth negotiations, a much smaller plan was approved, and the state legislature in 2001 took the unusual move of authorizing $30,000 to fund the cleanup.

Those funds were held in escrow until earlier this year, when the clean-up was finally done.

By Sandy Cooch