WINSLOW -- W. Elery Keene was one of five Winslow Planning Board members who spent the last four months studying, questioning and debating FPL Energy's application to remove Fort Halifax Dam.

Keene and his fellow planners, all of them volunteers, ultimately approved the application but only after adding a long list of conditions. Keene is proud of the work the Planning Board did.

Others are more critical.

Jeffrey Bennett, a co-owner of a home on Dallaire Street, is angry. He and Donald "Scott" Hermey live in one of six houses that sit on a steep riverbank on the Fort Halifax impoundment.

Concern over the stability of that riverbank prompted the town to hire an geo-engineer to investigate. Sebago Technics recommended that those six homes be evacuated for a day or two when the actual breaching begins.

Planners, as part of their conditions, got FPL Energy to agree to pay households affected $250 each day homes are evacuated, as well as provide the funding to replace any houses destroyed if the riverbank were to collapse.

Bennett said those conditions are not enough.

"They don't care what they are doing," Bennett said. "The town is taking responsibility off their shoulders and putting it on Florida Power and Light. That is exactly what they are doing."

Save Our Sebasticook, the local group that opposes Fort Halifax Dam's removal, sees several flaws in the Planning Board's decision on the dam and has filed an appeal as a result.

The first meeting of the Zoning Board of Appeals -- designed just to set the ground rules for the hearing -- is slated for April 22 and the first substantive meeting May 6, Town Attorney William A. Lee said.

SOS founder Kenneth Fletcher argues that planners were victims of insufficient and sometimes inaccurate information from FPL Energy.

Resident Jane Edwards also has filed an appeal, saying the board did not consider the threat posed by Chromium in the impoundment's sediment.

Keene, the retired executive director of Kennebec Valley Council of Governments, is not bothered by the appeals.

"I feel good about what the Planning Board did," he said, "but I'm not thinking we necessarily identified everything and that is just because it is such a complicated project, and we are laymen."

Town Council Chairman Jerry Saint Amand praised the Planning Board's efforts.

"I think they did wonderful due diligence," he said. "There was a lot of work they put into it."

Town Manager Michael Heavener expressed similar sentiments in his monthly report, noting that the board placed 12 separate conditions on the Dallaire Street situation alone.

He also lauded planners for demanding that FPL Energy do a full breach, rather than its original plan to remove an 87-foot section.

"The Planning Board ... after careful review determined the remaining structure would be unsafe," Heavener wrote, " and as a condition is requiring FPLE to completely remove the dam."

Keene said he felt pressure to make a decision on the application, especially after the board didn't meet the initial deadline on that verdict.

But Keene said he realized early on in the process that he and fellow planners faced a formidable task.

"The application was more than 2 inches thick," he said, "and you're not gong to read every word. You try to read what you think is more relevant, and then you get to the meeting and find out you read the wrong thing."

Keene said he considered Dallaire Street the most critical component of the decision and for a simple reason: "There are human beings who might be in trouble there," Keene said.

Bennett and Hermey are upset that the town did not do more for Dallaire Street residents.

Hermey, who is disabled, said he faces major surgery next month and more than likely will be housebound when the planned dam removal starts this summer.

"It's a huge inconvenience for him," Bennett said of Hermey, " to be asked to move out of his home when he's still recovering from major surgery."

Bennett said the best decision and the right decision would be to purchase the homes of the Dallaire Street residents most in danger.

What is in place now, he said, does little at all for the welfare of Dallaire Street.

"I find the (Planning Board) decision to be cowardly and insulting," he said. "They are hiding behind Florida Power and Light. They are forcing Florida Power and Light to do all the dirty work."

Keene said the town contemplated the possibility of relocating Dallaire Street homes, and Town Manager Michael Heavener continues to explore the possibility of obtaining federal funds to pay for a relocation.

But the Planning Board's conditions on Dallaire Street ultimately focused on monitoring the riverbank and providing evacuation money and a promise to provide the replacement cost of any homes lost for up to a year after the breaching.

"I would have liked to have relocated homes," Keene said, "and I was speaking up for that, but the majority of the Planning Board felt the proposal from the consultant to monitor was sufficient."

Keene noted, too, that the Dallaire Street issue, like the dam application itself, is more complicated than most people realize.

Part of the problem, he said, is the many of the homes in the neighborhood were built in an inappropriate place to begin with. "I don't think we should be holding Florida Power and Light responsible for everything," he said, "and I think the town manager's idea that we share in the solution was a better idea."

Colin Hickey -- 861-9205

chickey@centralmaine.com