By Nicholas Brown
Staff Writer

A rowing club that has been using the boat ramp near the district courthouse in Hooksett may soon have its first formal agreement with the town, despite using the ramp for the past 20 years.

The Hooksett Town Council has asked the Amoskeag Rowing Club to draft an agreement regarding the use of the public launch following some recent citizen complaints that its members have been monopolizing the Merrimack Street location.

June Larkins, the club's president, said the trouble arose over two isolated incidents, when informal regatta events led to congestion in and around the boat launch.

For years, the club has provided a boathouse - one they built adjacent to the launch in 1987 with the town's permission - for several area schools' crew teams.

Larkins said Manchester High School Central's crew team twice used the location as a home site for informal weekend races against other schools.

"I didn't know the magnitude," said Larkins, adding that the events brought an inordinate number of spectators and competitors, congesting the boat launch and parking on the launch's access road.

The agreement, already drafted, would eliminate such events, and limit the number of parking spaces available to the club, Larkins said, adding that the club plans to present the agreement to the town for approval before the end of June.

Doug St. Pierre, the Hooksett town councilor representing District 1, said he's "disappointed" with the rowing club.

"There needs to be free and equal access to everyone down there," said St. Pierre. "By their own admission, the club has had several hundred people there at once. That little spot just can't support that."

St. Pierre said club members have repeatedly blocked a fire lane adjacent to the launch and have ignored ordinances that require cars be parked only on paved surfaces.

St. Pierre said also the town will work to maintain control of the land surrounding the launch, citing that the boathouse built by the club is an example of "how squatters get their rights."

"I'm not going to allow squatter's rights there," he said.

Despite complaints against the club's use of the launch and adjacent area, club members contend that their presence largely benefits the area.

"We feel our presence there adds some security," said Larkins of the club, which has about 40 regular members, about a dozen of whom can be found using the launch early weekday mornings in the spring and fall. About 150 students from schools including Central, the Derryfield School, Concord High School and Southern New Hampshire University, also use the launch.

Larkins said club members regularly pick up trash in the area, often including empty beer cans. She added that the land adjacent to the boathouse used to be an informal dump, and that club members led efforts to clean the area before construction.

"We've had, as far as I can remember, a very good relationship with the town," said Larkins, a club member for the past six years, though president for only the past two months.

Lisa Dirth, a crew coach for the Derryfield School, said she enforces a 60-second rule for her teams - the teams have to be off the launch within 60 seconds of the boat being in the water.

Dirth added that she's witnessed some incidents of people hassling crew teams by purposely blocking the launch.

"There have been people on their Jet Skis who will sit in the way," said Dirth, a coach for the past four years. "They'll sit there and watch and laugh at us."

Dirth said also that people on personal watercraft or in powerboats have done doughnuts around her team while in the water.

"The town has been great," said Dirth. "But there are some people who, for whatever reason, take their anger out on the water."