Maurice Sawyer house at the Meadows coming down; board to review scaled-back site plan on Mon.

GILFORD — Wrecking crews remained in the Sawyer Meadows yesterday, tearing down the old farm house that was once home to family patriarch Maurice Sawyer.

According to Gilford School District Scott Isabelle, the School District will plant grass where the farm house and green houses stood as part of their plans to improve the overall appearance of the property. He said the three barns will stay as they are and are all being used by the school district.

Noting that the inside of the farm house had been damaged some time ago by a fire and that there was some asbestos concerns, he said the district determined it was unfeasible to use it for any school purposes.

He said the district consulted with Andy Howe of the neighboring Beans & Greens Farm as well as a greenhouse consultant and learned the greenhouses were "beyond their useful life."

The Planning Board will review the scaled back version of original site development plan on Monday night for the 64 acre parcel given to the School District by Raymond and Barbara Carye in 2001.

According to the online version of the Belknap County Register the Carye's bought the house in 1962 from Maurice and Rachel Sawyer. It's not known if the Carye's ever lived there but Conservation Commission member John Goodhue remembers the Carye's owning a sheep farm and the farm managers living in the farm house.

Isabelle said the plan now is to irrigate and put sod on the football and practice fields and expand the practice field so that in the future it could be used for a sporting field like lacrosse or soccer. He also said that the plans for a large formal parking lot have been scaled back.

He said the district will not be going into the wetlands so the need for the wetlands permit from the Department of Environmental Services is no longer necessary. He also said the School Board scrapped the plans to alter the terrain.

There will be no drainage as previously planned, said Isabelle, because the Department of Transportation determined the School District couldn't direct the runoff into an existing DOT culvert and it would be too expensive to build an additional one.

He said after the Planning Board review the next step is to provide a runoff plan to the DES for the time period during the field construction.

Isabelle said the district has until 2016 until its current DES permitting expires. With the blessing of the Planning Board, he said the district can begin fundraising for the field improvements.

The Planning Board meets Monday night at 7 p.m. in the Gilford Town offices.

CAPTION: Workers began demolishing the former home of Maurice Sawyer Tuesday morning. The former post and beam home had also been used as a home by farm managers when the former owner's owned a sheep farm on the side. (Laconia Daily Sun photo/Gail Beane)