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After more than two years, a $4.2 million Falmouth mansion donated to the University of Maine Foundation is little more than an expensive meetinghouse.
The Portland Symphony Orchestra plans to use the mansion in summer 2009, and the foundation’s governing board meets in it on occasion. Aside from that, it has gone unused.
The foundation has no plans to liquidate the house and its property but is considering the possibility. Money from the mansion’s sale would likely fund a future scholarship.
The mansion was given to the UMaine Foundation in December 2006 by Eric and Peggy Cianchette with the desire that the university find a use for it.
The university has not asked the foundation to sell the mansion, but communication between both is close, according to Joe Carr, director of University Relations.
“There’s regular contact between the foundation staff and leadership and the university,” Carr said.
The foundation’s governing board would make any decision regarding the mansion’s future.
“Our goal would be to use it – if we can – to satisfy the donors’ wishes,” said Amos Orcutt, president of the UMaine Foundation. Orcutt acknowledged the mansion’s liquidation would be advantageous for the university.
The mansion is the largest donation the foundation has received, and selling it would likely prove difficult in today’s housing market, which is part of the reason why the foundation is reluctant to do so. Another reason is the mansion satisfies the need for a permanent university presence in Southern Maine, according to Orcutt.
“The university really needs a facility in that neck of the woods,” Orcutt said.
The foundation hires a caretaker to maintain the mansion and pays approximately $25,000 per year in property taxes. It also pays $400 to $500 per month on electricity and keeps the house heated during the winter. None of the money covering the mansion comes from the university; it is all paid for with private gifts given to the foundation, Orcutt said.
Property donations are common in a negative economy because people are unable to afford houses and decide to give them to the foundation.
“We’re at that point now where people realize they don’t want to carry [their property],” Orcutt said.
Also, because of the sagging economy, the foundation will likely not receive its average $10 million in donations by the end of the fiscal year in June. Gifts are already down 30 percent, Orcutt said. The foundation received $6.2 million by the end of February.
“We’ll be lucky to hit $9 million this year,” Orcutt said.
The foundation’s purpose is to raise money for the university.
Falmouth has restricted the mansion’s use in the past to the foundation’s meetings, saying it can qualify as a “club,” and therefore its meetings are acceptable for the house because it is currently classified by Falmouth as a family dwelling. The foundation has been trying to get Falmouth to allow further conditional uses, such as meetings of the Falmouth School Board.
“We’ve had conversations with them for a better part of a year,” said Falmouth Town Manager Nathan Poore. The foundation “hasn’t done a lot with it.”
The Cianchettes both live next door to the mansion; neither are UMaine alumni.
