Opinion ID: 3166759
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Status of the Way and Cul-de-sac

Text: [¶20] We begin our analysis of the status of the way and cul-de-sac by considering the operative legal consequences of the Town’s vote to accept a dedicated public easement over “Coopers Beach Road.” 7 The Edwardses challenge the court’s conclusion that the 1986 petition specifically described the location of the dedicated property as required by 23 M.R.S. § 3025. The Town contends that the Edwardses’ challenge to the dedication’s statutory sufficiency is time-barred by M.R. Civ. P. 80B. We review the interpretation of statutes and the 6 The court also concluded that the Scotts do not have prescriptive rights to use the Edwardses’ beach, but that they do have the right to use the Edwardses’ beach to the extent allowed by Maine common law. Neither the Scotts nor the Edwardses challenge these conclusions on appeal. 7 Pursuant to 23 M.R.S. § 3025 (2014), “Unless specifically provided by the municipality, title to property accepted for highway purposes after December 31, 1976 shall be in fee simple.” Here, the minutes for the special meeting held by the Town of Owls Head on August 19, 1986, reflect that the Town specifically voted to accept the dedication of a public easement over Coopers Beach Road, rather than fee simple title to the road. 10 Maine Rules of Civil Procedure de novo as a matter of law. Gorham v. Androscoggin Cty., 2011 ME 63, ¶ 9, 21 A.3d 115; J.A. Rapaport Family L.P. v. City of Brewer, 2005 ME 89, ¶ 4, 877 A.2d 1077. [¶21] Title 23 M.R.S. § 3025 imposes descriptive requirements 8 on a dedication for “highway purposes,” which purposes are defined to include “use as a town way[9] and those things incidental to the . . . maintenance . . . of town ways,” 23 M.R.S. § 3021(1) (2014). A dedication for highway purposes must be formally manifested by a writing or subdivision plot plan that describes the property to be dedicated for public use. 23 M.R.S. § 3025. When a dedication is manifested in writing, the writing must specifically describe the location and the property interest that is the subject of the dedicatory offer. Id. Municipal acceptance of a dedication may be accomplished by an affirmative vote on an article in a town meeting warrant. Vachon v. Town of Lisbon, 295 A.2d 255, 260 (Me. 1972). A person aggrieved by a municipality’s acceptance of a 8 With added emphasis, 23 M.R.S. § 3025 provides in relevant part: No property or interests therein may be dedicated for highway purposes unless the owner of such property or interest has filed with the municipal officers a petition . . . or other writing specifically describing the property or interest and its location, and stating that the owner voluntarily offers to transfer such interests to the municipality without claim for damages, or has filed in the registry of deeds an approved subdivision plot plan which describes property to be appropriated for public use. 9 “Town way” is defined as, among other things, an “area or strip of land designated and held by a municipality for the passage and use of the general public by motor vehicle.” 23 M.R.S. § 3021(3) (2014). 11 dedication may appeal to the Superior Court pursuant to Rule 80B. See 23 M.R.S. § 3029. Because section 3029 contains no time limit, an appeal from an acceptance accomplished by vote must be brought within thirty days after the vote. See M.R. Civ. P. 80B(b). [¶22] The record here demonstrates that the Town held a meeting in August 1986, during which residents accepted by vote a public easement over “Coopers Beach Road.” Any person aggrieved by the Town’s acceptance of the dedication had thirty days from the date of the vote within which to appeal. The deadline for appealing the Town’s acceptance thus expired in September 1986. [¶23] The Edwardses contend that their claims are timely because they seek declaratory relief as to the location of the Town’s easement over Coopers Beach Road. However, the Edwardses also plainly challenge the description of the proposed dedication as inconsistent with statutory requirements. “Such challenges are the essence of matters that must be brought pursuant to Rule 80B to question whether the particular action of a municipal[ity] . . . is consistent with the requirements of law.” Sold, Inc. v. Town of Gorham, 2005 ME 24, ¶ 13, 868 A.2d 172. Rule 80B is the sole means for seeking Superior Court review of the legality of an act by a municipal body, “whether such review is specifically authorized by statute or is otherwise available by law.” Id. (quotation marks 12 omitted). Moreover, “a declaratory judgment action cannot be used to revive a [Rule 80B claim] that is otherwise barred by the passage of time.” Id. ¶ 10. [¶24] Because no appeal was taken within the time prescribed by Rule 80B, the validity of the 1986 dedication cannot be challenged now. See Whalen v. Town of Livermore, 588 A.2d 319, 321 n.3 (Me. 1991); Goucher v. Hanson, 537 A.2d 1142, 1142-43 (Me. 1988); Town of Fayette v. Manter, 528 A.2d 887, 889 (Me. 1987). The Town’s votes must therefore “be presumed to have the operative consequences apparently intended”: to accept an easement over “Coopers Beach Road.” Manter, 528 A.2d at 889; see also Goucher, 537 A.2d at 1143.
[¶25] The Edwardses next challenge the court’s conclusion that the Town’s easement extends over the way and cul-de-sac located on their property. They argue that the dedication petition plainly demonstrates McLoon’s intent to grant an easement over only the part of the road “abutting” his property, and that the court erred by considering evidence of McLoon’s intent extrinsic to the petition. [¶26] To prove a dedication, it must be clearly shown that the grantor intended to dedicate the property at issue for a public purpose. Town of Kittery v. MacKenzie, 2001 ME 170, ¶ 10, 785 A.2d 1251. The construction of a petition to 10 Though the Edwardses are time-barred from challenging the validity of the dedicatory description on statutory grounds, Rule 80B does not bar the Edwardses’ argument that that description was not intended to include the way and cul-de-sac. 13 dedicate an easement is ordinarily a matter of law. See Testa’s, Inc., 2014 ME 137, ¶ 11, 105 A.3d 1037. However, if the petition is ambiguous, its construction is a question of fact. See id. If the language of the petition is susceptible to more than one interpretation, it “must be read in the light of the circumstances surrounding its execution to effectuate its main end.” Callahan v. Ganneston Park Dev. Corp., 245 A.2d 274, 276 (Me. 1968) (quotation marks omitted). In such cases, “[t]he meaning to be discovered and applied is that which each party had reason to know would be given to the words by the other party.” Id. at 277 (quotation marks omitted). We will uphold the court’s determination regarding the parties’ intent unless it is clearly erroneous. Anchors v. Manter, 1998 ME 152, ¶ 16, 714 A.2d 134. [¶27] Here, the second page of the petition states, “We the undersigned, abutting property owners on Coopers Beach Road, are in agreement with having the Town of Owl’s Head accept the road as a public easement, without claim for damages.” McLoon’s signature under this language clearly demonstrates that he intended to grant the Town an easement over “Coopers Beach Road.” However, this language does not indicate the parties’ understanding as to the road’s location on the face of the earth. The significance that the parties would have attached to the term “abutter” and their understanding as to whether the road included the way and cul-de-sac cannot be determined by reading the petition in the abstract. 14 Contrary to the Edwardses’ contention, the petition is ambiguous and the court did not err in considering extrinsic evidence. [¶28] Competent evidence supports the court’s findings that (1) the Town had historically snowplowed and sanded Coopers Beach Road up to and including the way and cul-de-sac; (2) the petition was circulated after the Town announced its intent to cease maintaining private roads; and (3) McLoon was aware of the Town’s announcement and understood that by signing the petition he could secure the continued provision of Town plowing, but would give up the right to exclude others. The record also supports the court’s finding that, at the time of the dedication, the Town used the disputed way in the same manner that it used the entire road network that was formerly collectively called Coopers Beach Road. [¶29] That the road was dedicated to secure continued snowplowing by the Town and that the way and cul-de-sac had historically benefited from those services suggests that the way and cul-de-sac were to be included in the dedication. That McLoon signed the petition with awareness of the dedication’s purpose and consequences indicates that he intended to give up privacy in the way and cul-de-sac in exchange for the continued benefit of having the Town snowplow those areas. That the Town used the disputed way in a manner indistinguishable from its use of other parts of the Coopers Beach Road network also supports a 15 determination that the Town understood that Coopers Beach Road included the disputed way. [¶30] In sum, there was ample evidence to support the court’s finding that, at the time of the dedication, McLoon and the Town both understood “Coopers Beach Road” to include the way and cul-de-sac.11 Though the record also contains conflicting evidence, the court did not clearly err in finding that McLoon intended to grant the Town an easement over the way and cul-de-sac, and that the northern terminus of the public easement over “Coopers Beach Road” therefore includes the way and cul-de-sac located on the Edwardses’ property. See D’Angelo v. McNutt, 2005 ME 31, ¶ 6, 868 A.2d 239 (“[T]he trial court’s . . . findings of fact [are] reviewed for clear error and will be affirmed if there is competent evidence in the record to support the finding[s] even if the evidence might support alternative findings of fact.” (alteration omitted) (quotation marks omitted)). [¶31] Because the statutory validity of the dedicatory description is no longer open to challenge, the only issue is the location of the dedicated property. Discerning no error in the court’s interpretation of the dedication petition, we 11 This conclusion as to the Town’s understanding of the location of Coopers Beach Road is further supported by the tax map made available at the 1996 meeting, which is displayed supra ¶ 13. The record supports the court’s finding that that tax map had been marked by a selectman “to depict the location of the Cooper’s Beach Road dedication based on his understanding of the 1986 acceptance.” The map depicts a hand-drawn line running the length of Coopers Beach Road and extending over the way and cul-de-sac located on the Edwardses’ property. 16 affirm the conclusion that the 1986 dedication created a public easement that extends over the way and cul-de-sac located on the Edwardses’ land.12