GET BREAKING NEWS IN YOUR BROWSER. CLICK HERE TO TURN ON NOTIFICATIONS.

PEPPERELL — Select Board member Tony Beattie will be allowed to continue operating his sawmill on Oak Hill Street at his Robinwood Farm.

On Monday, the Planning Board voted 4-0 in favor of granting a special permit for Beattie’s portable Wood-Mizer sawmill.

With the special permit, Beattie will be restricted to operating it from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. or one half hour after sunset, whichever comes first. Trucks associated with the operation will also be prohibited from using the abutting Blue Heron’s Way, which is a private road.

Beattie said he has been operating the sawmill since 2002 and its use is infrequent, making it difficult to estimate the traffic flow. However, Beattie said in the summer months logs were dropped off only a few times a month.

When the sawmill is used, about 80% of the sawmill’s usage is for cutting log stock brought in by local tree cutting companies. The other 20% is dedicated to custom cutting logs brought in by local residents for home projects.

Because the property where the sawmill is located is on his farm, Beattie believed the sawmill constituted normal farm activities and did not require a special permit.

In conversations with the American Farm Bureau, Beattie learned that would only be the case if 25% of the logs he was cutting were from off-site land, not under his management. The sawmill brings in an additional $5,000 to $8,000 a year, which is a small part of the farm’s gross income, but it is not insignificant.

“This is part of my work history as a farm, as an opportunity to fill in some time when I’m not harvesting and planting or on occasion some other regular farm business,” Beattie said. “Historically that has been what most farmers do. Many farmers will work actually offsite to support their farm life, which is a sad statement about what farmers need to do to stay in business, but it’s long been the case.”

Although the sawmill is considered portable, Beattie said it is rarely moved except for cleaning purposes. When there is waste wood, someone is hired to help create wood chips or sometimes the excess slabs are purchased.

The wood chips often end up in Beattie’s asparagus beds, but he also uses them at a volunteer tree nursery and is able to give some slabs to a town senior citizen who heats his home with wood.

Several of Beattie’s neighbors spoke in support of granting the special permit, however, a neighbor on Blue Heron’s Way expressed some concern with the operation.

Jerry Pries said about a year and a half ago, a tree service truck with a load of logs parked on the Blue Heron’s Way culvert.

“Tony has the right to use the road but he doesn’t have an obligation to repair the road,” Pries said. “And we just think it’s unfair that he has in the past routed traffic down this road … that this road cannot bear.”

Beattie said the logs were not being used at the sawmill operation. Instead, the tree service had rented some space from Beattie in order to park vehicles and store logs. The logs from the tree service were also stored at a separate location.

Since then, the tree service has relocated and Beattie said he is “not too eager” to lease out space to another company.

We invite you to use our commenting platform to engage in insightful conversations about issues in our community. We reserve the right at all times to remove any information or materials that are unlawful, threatening, abusive, libelous, defamatory, obscene, vulgar, pornographic, profane, indecent or otherwise objectionable to us, and to disclose any information necessary to satisfy the law, regulation, or government request. We might permanently block any user who abuses these conditions.