Sanbornton cemetery deed ruling delayed because judge has conflict

Town officials who had hoped resolve the ongoing dispute over Town Forest land they want to make into a municipal cemetery were stumped in their efforts yesterday after Belknap Country Probate Judge Christina M. O’Neill recused herself from the legal proceedings.

O’Neill said she knew several Sanbornton residents who were attending the hearing — including Helmut Busack, who has been fighting the cemetery project for months now — so rescuing herself was the best way to remove any appearance of impropriety.

Selectmen Steve Ober said afterwards he was disappointed because he’d hoped the issue would be resolved at yesterday’s hearing.

But immediately after the court adjourned, Busack approached officials with the probate court to ask for paperwork needed to file a Motion to Intervene in the case. For months Busack has claimed there is an aquifer underneath the planned cemetery land and that putting the burial grounds there could cause harmful “cemetery pollution” on land further down the Tower Hill Road site, including on his own property.

During the hearing, town attorney Christopher Boldt told the judge that since the issue before her was “benign” the town had no objection to her ruling on the case, despite her personal knowledge of some residents. Boldt said Busack, who appeared to be the only person present with objections about the land transfer, does not have legal standing in the court. Busack is not an abutter, the lawyer said, and he failed to file a motion in Superior Court voicing his concerns in a timely manner.

But Michael S. DeLuci, the director of NH Department of Justice’s Charitable Trust division, said he understood O’Neill’s concern and had no objection to waiting until Administrative Judge David D. King appointed a new judge.

Yesterday’s hearing was meant to resolve a problem discovered when the town looked into using part of the town forest for a cemetery. In court papers filed with the Probate Court in July, the town stated that three acres of the 12-acre Tower Hill lot was donated to the municipality by the now-defunct Sanbornton Agricultural and Mechanical Society in 1962. Volunteers had already cleared the land to use for a nondenominational town cemetery, which, according to state statute, every New Hampshire community should have but unfortunately since the “donor” organization is now defunct, it’s longer available to okay the “change of use”.

Busack, who has suffered with health problems the last year, said he was delayed from filing an objection earlier but would file a Motion to Intervene as soon as possible. He understands a new judge could still declare his legal action untimely but he thought that was unlikely since he has “real records, minutes of meetings and things like that” relevant to the case to present to the court.

Busack also said he’s not given up on the idea of finding a legal authority to probe what happened to the lumber that was cleared from the three acres some time ago. Busack said the wood had financial value and town officials acted improperly by simply allowing the logger who worked on the land to take it away.

During the summer, the state attorney general’s office notified town officials it saw no evidence of criminal wrongdoing in the clearing of the timber products but Busack said he is hoping to get Attorney General

Kelly Ayotte to reconsider the issue after he gets at least 25 residents to sign a petition asking her to look into the matter.