Misquamicut Developments

Developers envisioned the gorgeous hunk of waterfront property as the perfect spot for some 250 residents to enjoy their retirement years, playing cards, entertaining grandchildren, and watching the sun set over Misquamicut Beach.

Conservationists eyed the same 173 acres of woodlands, rich in geological history and wildlife, as a rarity that must be preserved for hiking, bird watching, and studying glacial wonders.

After five years of brainstorming, representatives of the Westerly Land Trust and an Iowa-based development company have come up with an unusual plan that accommodates both visions.

Situated between Tom Harvey and Shore roads near the Westerly State Airport, the pristine site offers a splendid view of Winnapaug Pond, Misquamicut Beach and the Block Island Sound.

The property, purchased in l916 by John Champlin, a philanthropic Westerly physician, was left to his descendants in the Lathrop family who had decided in the late '90s to consider selling.

The unconventional deal materialized last August when the land trust bought the parcel for $2.8 million. It will be completed in late May or early June when Newbury Development Co. buys a 38.7-acre stretch of land on the western side for $1.6 million, more than half of the land trust's original cost.

Slightly less than 135 acres will be preserved as the Dr. John Champlin Glacier Park, named after the man whose contributions included setting up in Westerly the first automatic telephone company in the Eastern United States.

On the remaining acreage, the developers will spend roughly $50 million building retirement cottages and a sprawling structure that will have both independent living and assisted living units. They would also like to include a small nursing home section.

The developers wanted the high flat lands and the land trust was determined to preserve the wetlands and the rolling landscape.

"What we were most interested in was what they were least interested in," says Harvey C. Perry II, president of the Westerly Land Trust, who received a statewide award yesterday for his achievement in conservation.

"A lot of time people think you have to choose between conservation and development. We think you can have both."

At the outset, the land trust believed that it could not have raised enough money to buy the land and create the park without a developer's contribution, Perry says.

And, the developers, James Levy and Richard Bright, realized that they needed an association with a land trust to meet the Lathrops' goals -- which were to "get some money and preserve the property," says Thomas Liguori, the developers' lawyer.

"It was a great marriage," Liguori says. "It serves as a good example for other projects."

THE MARRIAGE of development and conservation involving land trusts is known as limited development. A land trust in Lincoln, Mass., first employed this technique in 1966, according to Jeffrey Milder, a Cornell University graduate student who is studying limited development as a conservation strategy.

Although the notion of a limited development has been around for decades, it is not widely used, Milder says. He cites one study showing that only 2 percent of all land trust projects in the nation in l996-98 involved limited development.

"Many land trusts -- their preference is still to protect the entire property and they'll try to do that," Milder says. Limited development projects are more common in New England, where land is costly, than elsewhere. Land trusts use limited development to finance a purchase and protect the important parts of a parcel.

"It's better than protecting nothing," Milder said.

Rupert Friday, director for the Rhode Island Land Trust Council, says the land trust arrangement in Westerly is "pretty innovative." The alliance between the trust and the developers will save a very important resource for Rhode Islanders for generations, he says.

"They really created a legacy there."

ON A WHITE winter morning, Harvey Perry, who has been with Westerly's land trust since it was founded in l987, treads briskly through what will soon become the Dr. John Champlin Glacier Park. Along the way, he spots a trail of fresh deer prints in the snow. Their path meanders between blueberry bushes and tall oaks, slowly vanishing under a cover of falling snow.

Dressed in a dark green down jacket and brown hiking boots, Perry walks a trail shaped like the figure 8, pointing out deep kettle holes and ponds and high ridges called kames. They were formed when blocks of ice trapped beneath the sediments melted and collapsed thousands of years ago.

The land's dramatic and picturesque topography is a living text book for the study of glacier movement during the most recent ice stage, says Charles Hickox, a Westerly native and retired geology professor who now lives in Charlestown.

"I don't know of any place in the world where you can see as much late glacier geology as you can see here," he says.

Hickox, who studied the mechanics of glacial flow in the Swiss Alps and did geologic mapping in Nova Scotia, says the New England shoreline provides a unique view of land formation because of its proximity to the ocean.

From a high point that overlooks Winnapaug Pond and Misquamicut Beach, he says that, "with a little imagination" one can let his mind travel back 18,000 years to a period when glacial ice melted and the sea level rose, changing the landscape.

Since much of the New England shore is cluttered with homes, marinas and ports, the preserve is one of the few remaining places for the public to appreciate and learn about glacial geology, Hickox says.

THERE USED TO BE a hotel at the southwestern tip of the property, John H. Lathrop says. His great-grandfather, John Champlin, converted a century-old farmhouse into an upscale hotel called Oaks Inn.

On Nov. 24, l916, The Westerly News described the plans for the resort this way: "When the farm house is enlarged and the grounds are improved, it will be one of the most beautiful country estates in the east."

Indeed, in the 20s, the inn was bustling with wealthy New Yorkers and Bostonian elites vacationing in Westerly, Lathrop says. There were parties, polo games and horseback riding. Using existing trails and opening up new ones, his great grandfather Champlin had created 20 miles of woodland paths for horseback riding.

A lull hit during the depression and Champlin passed away in 1937. During World War II, the U.S Army, assigned to protect the shoreline, used the hotel as a barracks. Gun placements lined the edge of the property.

After the war, the hotel was torn down.

Before Champlin died, he set up the property as a trust for his descendants.

While growing up, Lathrop remembers family hikes on the site, skating on the ponds, and spotting furtive deer and coyotes in the woods. His late father, Francis Lathrop, would often trim the trails and clip the bushes.

Perry recalls that sometime in the late l990s, Francis Lathrop, a longtime acquaintance, asked him whether the land trust was interested in buying the family land.

"He felt very strongly -- he wanted to preserve a lot of the woods for future generations," John Lathrop says of his father, Francis, who died of cancer in 2002.

At the same time, Francis and his brother John C. Lathrop, owners for the site, were feeling mounting pressure to sell the land. There were expenses -- the cost of upkeeping the land, property taxes, liability insurance -- and no income from holding onto the property, John H. Lathrop said.

"We could have sold it for more" if the whole property was developed, John Lathrop said. But the family decided, "We live in this community and love this area. We did not want to do anything to jeopardize the natural resources here."

MEANWHILE, Richard Bright, a retired motion picture producer from New York City, had been canvassing the Northeast for a housing site on behalf of an old college friend, James Levy, president of Newbury Development Co., in Des Moines, Ia. The Northeast has a substantial elderly population, Liguori says, and Newbury specializes in housing for seniors.

"I could not find a nice piece of land that made economic sense," Bright said of that search, which covered parts of New York and Connecticut. Someone suggested Rhode Island, which eventually led him to the Lathrop property.

Bright says he learned early that the local land trust would have to be involved to convince the Lathrops to consider any offer Newbury might make. The two sides began to talk.

In the summer of 2000, the land trust and the developers made a joint offer of $2.6 million, a figure topped by a golf course developer who offered $2.8 million, Perry says. The land trust and Newbury agreed to match the $2.8 million figure and the deal was made.

From the fall of 2000 to the end of 2004, the developers jumped bureaucratic hurdles to get a wetlands permit, zoning changes, Town Council approvals and even an amendment to the town's comprehensive plan. They also successfully beat back a Superior Court challenge.

"Just to get 22 percent of the land developed, we had to get an alphabet soup of agencies' approval," Liguori says. "But it was worth all the work."

During the same period, the land trust was applying for grants and fundraising to cover its $1.2 million share of the total cost. Among the first was a $300,000 grant from the state Department of Transportation. Support also came from the state Department of Environmental Management, which also gave $300,000, the Nature Conservancy, the Champlin Foundations , the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, the Bafflin Foundation, and the Forrest Lattner Foundation, which gave $100,000.

The land trust plans to erect signs and observation platforms to teach trekkers about the site's natural history. Plans are being made to create an endowment fund to maintain the park.

THE DEVELOPERS hope to start construction on the cottages at Champlin Woods At Winnapaug Pond in late May or early June, James Levy says.

But even before the first shovel of dirt has been turned, they've received deposits for nearly every one of the 60 retirement cottages. The colonial Newport-style homes, ranging from 1,900 to 3,000 square feet, will cost between $470,000 and $700,000.

"Every house backs up to the woods," James Levy, whose development company is building the complex, says. "The living room, the master bedroom, would be part of nature."

The two-bedroom retirement cottages will be age-restricted, meaning that at least one occupant must be 55 or older. The first such project in town, it will allow long-time residents who become empty-nesters to sell their larger family homes and still remain in the area.

The 80 independent units -- most offering an ocean view -- start at 900 square feet each. The developers retain ownership of the units and occupants can choose to sell them back to the developers (at 90 percent of the purchase price) when they move out, Levy says. They will also pay a monthly fee for utilities, a meal a day, organized activities, housekeeping and transportation. The 30 assisted living units will be at least 600 square feet each and residents make a monthly payment.

The independent and assisted living complex will include a library, lounge, dining room, and health club.

Levy says he thinks the beauty salon, offering hair cuts and permanents and possibly manicures, will be the most popular spot in the complex.

"For an 85-year-old who can no longer drive, or exercise the power they had when they were younger, it is important that they have some areas of discretion," he says.

The project will have no impact on the school system and the roads will be privately maintained by a homeowners association, according to zoning official Anthony Giordano. The only public services that residents might require are fire and police.

The project could bring in more than $700,000 in tax revenue, making it the largest taxpayer in town.

"It's a win-win situation." Giordano says.