‘Facts, not fiction’ about Estabrook Trail

Honesty and facts matter. Too many myths have been publicized about the Estabrook Woods and its owners. Falsehoods are not benign; they do real damage to real people. In support of facts not fiction, I list the following:

1. The main Estabrook Trail is privately owned; it was adjudicated private in 1932. Middlesex County and Land Court records confirm that fact. 
2. The town admits they do not own the trail. 
3. The first section of trail is private residential property; the second section is owned by private landowners and Harvard College. The private landowners pay taxes on their property. Harvard is exempt as a non-profit. 
4. The Estabrook Access Committee mapped 21 entrances into the Estabrook Woods; eight are legally public, therefore visitors have never been denied access to the hundreds of acres of private woods. 
5. The private landowners and Harvard offered the town four settlement offers for use of their properties. Town officials rejected three and violated the terms of the fourth they signed with Harvard. 
6. The town filed the multimillion-dollar lawsuit, not the landowners. 
7. The landowners’ and Harvard College’s legal position has been supported in amicus briefs to the Supreme Judicial Court by The Real Estate Bar Association of Massachusetts; The Abstract Club (100 top real estate lawyers); North Andover, Plymouth County, Barnstable County, the Franklin Regional Council of Governments, the Berkshire Regional Planning Commission, and the Central Massachusetts Regional Planning Commission (140 municipalities); the Massachusetts Association of Land Surveyors and Civil Engineers; and numerous private property owners (including Acton owners) of ways discontinued under the same law as Estabrook.

Finally, like philosopher John Locke, our country’s founders believed liberty and property rights were inextricably linked, thus the Fifth and 14th Amendments exist to protect those rights.  We need to honor them.

William Becklean

Fairhaven Road