[S]T. JOHNSBURY — Town Selectboard members rolled back a Revolutionary War-era policy at a meeting Monday night, potentially saving some residents hundreds of dollars.
The St. Johnsbury Selectboard voted to give up the town’s stake in what are known as glebe lease lands, or properties granted to Vermont municipalities in the 1700s that were once controlled by Britain and used to raise funds for churches and schools.
“To me, we might as well just get it done and clean it up now,” said Stacy Jewell, the town’s clerk and treasurer, pointing to the start of St. Johnsbury’s fiscal year on July 1, when the rollback takes effect.
Jewell said glebe properties make up most of the land in the village and downtown. Town records dated 1989 list over 200 properties as lease lands. And the old, arcane law governing them had been causing problems for modern residents, Jewell said.
Someone looking to take over a glebe land needed to pay $400 in fees to transfer the property because they require quitclaim deeds, she said. The town’s attorney charges $350 to handle one of those deeds, and when glebe lease lands are transferred, an additional $50 is tacked on to go toward school funding, she said.
Those fees will now go away on July 1. “It’s just one less expense that they have to worry about,” Jewell said.
Many glebe lease lands were originally granted by the governor of New Hampshire in colonial days, according to the Vermont League of Cities and Towns. Both New Hampshire and New York had claimed Vermont as their territory.
In 1794, the Vermont Legislature gave the state ownership of the lands and then gave those rights to municipalities, according to the league. An 1805 law mandated that selectboards lease the lands out perpetually and use rents to fund schools and churches, according to the league, though a 1947 law ruled out benefits for churches.
Gov. Phil Scott last year signed a bill requiring municipal governments to vote to keep their lease lands, or people leasing the lands will be granted full ownership of them on Jan. 1, 2020.
But the bill also said local governments can vote to relinquish the lands before then, so officials in St. Johnsbury decided to act early.
The town used to collect 25 cents as a lease payment from residents using the lands, but it stopped in February 1996, according to town officials. Collecting the fee had become more expensive than the fee itself.
That’s the case for many Vermont municipalities, according to the League of Cities and Towns. Most of the lands aren’t mapped — or even known about — and they generate little, if any, revenue.
The unique task of dealing with land policies from hundreds of years ago was not lost on the Selectboard members and other officials, who bantered about getting one last punch against the Brits. Someone suggested making the effective date July 4.
“We’re finally free of the British,” Town Manger Chad Whitehead said, laughing.
