Several home owners have sued the Town of Kennebunkport to prevent public access to the vast majority of Goose Rocks Beach.
Our organization, Save Our Beaches, needs your help, but first–come visit and see for yourself the dramatic sunrise, the many hues of yellow, red and orange at sunset, or watch the full moon rise over the outlying islands, while you still can. Bring your children, your dog, your loved ones…while you still can. For if this lawsuit filed late in October wins, the homeowners, who claim to the waterline, can stop you from using all but about 6% of the beach that they can’t stop you from using. No sand castles, or walking from one end to the other, or enjoying a book in the sun next summer.
Save Our Beaches wants to continue what has made Goose Rocks Beach such a unique place, year round—the sense of shared community where the beach has long been part of the fabric of multiple generations. We want visitors and residents alike to respect homeowners along the oceanfront, and keep the beach clean, obey the laws, and protect the environment, in short, what they have done for the last 100 years. But a few homeowners who have “gotten theirs” now want to deny you the freedom to enjoy Goose Rocks Beach next year, and years ahead. Help keep Goose Rocks Beach available for your grandchildren, and help us fight this lawsuit.
We are now set up for donations , and will have news and pictures, and much more in the next few weeks. But for now, the best thing you can do for yourself, and for the beach, is to come visit, and walk the beach, while you still can.
My Goose Rocks goes back to 1976 when my parents first purchases our home, sometime after my first birthday. Since then, my whole family would spend the summers there, the day school let out, we would be in the car heading “up” and then two days before school started again, a trip to Levinski’s and the mall and then back to Rhode Island. I can remember years where I don’t think I left the beach once – it had everything a kid could need between the Community House, the General Store aka Butz, Chips and of course, the beach.
While other kids went to summer camp or baseball camp, I was there. During those years, I found some of the best friends I would ever have and it all centered around that beautiful beach.
My feelings for this beach are the reason why I moved to Maine as a full time resident – like the sign said, if you worked here, you’d be home now – aint that the truth.
While I don’t live on the beach full time, I still manage to spend as much time as I can down there as I can. I’ve fished on that beach, laughed on that beach, cried on that beach and done everything in between on that beach for nearly 35 years.
The thought of some of our neighbors wanting to change that for not only me, but this generation of kids, and the next, and the next really sickens me.
Goose Rocks is a jewel, whenever I first meet someone who has just arrived their very first time, I ask them if they like it and without fail, they say YES . That’s when I usually say “Great! now don’t tell anybody about it”. They laugh, but they definitely know what I mean.
That’s the kind of place this is, something that is loved and needs to be protected and this lawsuit goes totally against to how we need to save and preserve it, Between meetings, newsletters, announcements, lawyers, court dates and the eventual media coverage that is bound to come, we will only draw more attention to this place which will result in more people and more issues, not to mention a sense of ugliness between neighbors that never existed before.
The only way we can save our beach is to come together as a community, not dividing what’s mine and what is yours based on some arcane pre-colonial ordinance. Whether you are a member of a family that has been here for generations or a renter who feel in love with the beach last summer, beachfront property owner, “back beachers”, east side, west side – we all have something to loose if this lawsuit is successful. Only when we can come together and discuss the real issues at hand – parking, traffic and the future residential and commercial development of Rt. 9 and the other GRB outlying areas will we ensure not only the beach, but the sense of community that is Goose Rocks.
I am wondering if anyone is checking deeds of the people who are attempting to make the beach private and find out exactly when “to the low water mark” was added to deeds. My mother who at one time owned property in Cape Porpoise was told to go ahead and add that her property went to the center of the back cove which came up behind our house to her deed. She refused. I seldom get to the beach but fully support your attemt to keep the beach open. Carol Gray
Hello, Carol. I think there is a great deal of scrutiny going on even as we speak, and I do believe we might find a few interesting documents! I trust in the process, and the people, that love this beach like we do, and thanks for your very kind comments.
Best,
Mic Harris
Chair
I presume that when these 2 owners bought the property in the 1970s that people used the beach as a public beach as they have done for decades (which probably means that due an easement by continuous use that the homeowners will lose)….and yet the homeowners, purchasing in 1972 and 1978, have waited 38 and 32 years respectively to file a lawsuit!!
Did the use of the beach suddenly change last year? I doubt that. My guess is that as these men are getting older they want to get the beaches made private so that their families that inherit the houses will get private beaches for decades to come…at the expense of the wider community.
It’s called “estate planning.”
Very selfish as well.
I fully and completely support your cause. This is an assault on the sense of community and tranquility that has been Goose Rocks Beach for over one hundred years. The entire number of homes directly on the beach are slightly over 1/4th and should not have an impact on their other 88 neighbors. I view this elite move on the part of these parties as the destruction of the fiber of true community and human nature at its’ worst. Many communities have taken the opportunity during these more challenging economic times to pull together. This action seems more likely on Wall St than Kings Highway.
We just finished reading Kaysea’s wonderful letter, to our Chocolate Lab, who has been in love with GRB for all of his 6 yrs. We have been visiting GRB ourselves since Viola Vallely, Judy’s grandmother, built a house one street off the beach in 1965. Viola’s daughter, Marjorie was there until her death in 2008. We, our children, grandchildren and relatives, have enjoyed the house and the beach. That makes five generations that have never worried about trespassing when we went to the beach for sun and relaxation. I think Maxwell can be counted as another generation; at least he thinks so. We are strongly dedicated to continuing the traditions of our five generations of enjoying the pleasures God gave us at Goose Rocks Beach.
Me and my family lived on broadway road when I was much younger. I haven’t returned to goose rocks for almost ten years, but about a week ago Idecided to revisit the place where I grew up. Instantly, all of those fond memories of walking down the beach and biking to the general store rushed back to me. It would break my heart to see most of the beach become off limits. If it does become off limits, I will continue to walk the entire length of the beach.
My family and I have been going to Gooserocks PUBLIC Beach since the 1960′s !
This attempt to steal the beaches from the public is completely unacceptable.
My wife and I and my grown children and their children have already booked our rental home in the area again this year and we will fight this attempt in every way that we can.
My thanks and that of our growing family go out to all of you who are also taking up your beach umbrellas against these interlopers.
I am an out-of-stater who has rented homes, beachfront and off the beach, for 27 years. My family’s best vacation memories are on Goose Rocks Beach, and others like me should have similar opportunities to create similarly wonderful memories.
I will say this … if the beach ever becomes privatized, I will continue to use it as my personal protest and let these selfish individuals try to have me evicted.
Clearly, there is financial motivation at stake. Privatizing the beach would surely greatly imcrease the property values for this small handful of selfish individuals. As always, the almighty dollar rules.
The other side, though, is the loss of tourism revenue for those hundreds of businesses in the area who rely on summer visitors like myself. Much of that would be lost if those tourists do not have access to Goose Rocks Beach.
Then there is the issue within own community. Numerous stories in local publications indicate the divisiveness of this issue, how those opposing beach privatization will no longer be friends of those behind this attempt.
Is the loss of long-time friends, the creation of ill feelings between neighbors, worth this?
I think not.
Is the beach so crowded that privatization should even be considered?
Of course not.
The beach has always been relatively uncrowded, which is part of its lure for those of us fortunate enough to vacation there annually.
But, again, the spectre of increased property values for those few homeowners who might suddenly have ocean-front property on a “private beach” would skyrocket.
Isn’t that the selfish core of this issue?
I have spent summers at Goose Rocks Beach for the past 31 years. When I was ten years old my parents built a house just past the community house. We would drive up to Maine the day after school let out and stay until the day before school started. We spent every day on the beach rain or shine. I took swimming lessons, in the freezing cold ocean, in front of the Anchorage, we participated in sand castle contests in front of the Tides, we walked down to the “river” to look for crabs and past the store to climb the rocks. As I got older, I would meet my friends on the beach every afternoon and we would walk from one end of the beach to the other talking, laughing and gossiping. It seemed every family had a “spot” on the beach. You always knew there would be a familiar face to say hello to and a mom or dad sitting on the beach watching out for you.
The fondest memories of my childhood are centered around Goose Rocks. I feel so lucky to be able to share that with my own children now. I have pushed my children in carriages from one end of the beach to the other. I have jogged up and down the beach and spent numerous early mornings chasing a child on the beach so as not to wake the rest of the family before 6am. Goose Rocks is one of the most beautiful beaches I have ever seen. The thought that a few people would attempt to prevent so many from enjoying this wonderful place is very sad.
I am a homeowner on Goose Rocks Beach and all I have to say to you whiners is to stop being so lazy and earn enough money to buy a house on the beach yourself. Why should we have to subsidize your vacations? We don’t ask to have a barbeque in your backyard in the summer. Stay out of my backyard!
This person’s response is what bloggers refer to as a TROLL. What is his point? We cannot be sure….
He is angry and scared that what he perceives as his “right” by way of monetary merit , will be stripped from him. This is not about wanting to BBQ in his backyard. No one wants to assert that.
If we were to proceed with ” Jim’s” logic, certainly one can ascertain that those who are even fortunate enough to vacation in Maine, Kennebunkport, and even rent on GRB are in the top 1% of the WORLD’S money earners. So, in fact, the many families who have enjoyed this beach have certainly, by this man’s standards, earned enough money to recount their stories of family memories and valued times at GRB.
No one who is lazy can afford to come to KPT Maine to vacation – full stop.
I would ask Jim, please consider the fact that you are in fact being subsidized by the US government in your own tax breaks, and that those who are also homeowners here in Kennebunkport and those who pay to rent homes on GRB are not asking for a handout from your backyard.
If you continue on the vein of argumentation, you will never have any peace or resolution in your life. I can only hope for you, coming from me, a hard working taxpayer, that you will find a way to authentic dialogue to have your property needs met, rather than spurious and fire breathing cantankerousness.
I have spent summers at Goose Rocks Beach for the past 31 years. When I was ten years old my parents built a house just past the community house. We would drive up to Maine the day after school let out and stay until the day before school started. We spent every day on the beach rain or shine. I took swimming lessons, in the freezing cold ocean, in front of the Anchorage, we participated in sand castle contests in front of the Tides, we walked down to the “river” to look for crabs and past the store to climb the rocks. As I got older, I would meet my friends on the beach every afternoon and we would walk from one end of the beach to the other talking, laughing and gossiping. It seemed every family had a “spot” on the beach. You always knew there would be a familiar face to say hello to and a mom or dad sitting on the beach watching out for you.
+1