Westerly ― A lawsuit filed last week against the Town of Westerly is pitting private property rights against claims that a constitutionally-protected right to public access to beaches is being threatened.

The Watch Hill Fire District, a quasi-municipal agency, and the Watch Hill Conservancy filed a lawsuit May 4 to settle a dispute over a heavily-used pathway to Napatree Point Conservation Area in Westerly, known locally as Fort Road, that the town claims is a public right-of-way.

The lawsuit comes after two recent Town Council meetings at which members discussed the right-of-way and voted to take various actions. One vote included making a request to the state Coastal Resources Management Council to include the town’s declared right-of-way on a Watch Hill Yacht Club dredging application. The council also voted to have the claimed town right-of-way surveyed.

At an April Town Council meeting, some residents had urged the council to take action to guarantee public access to the pristine beaches at Napatree before the fire district and conservancy began charging for access or cutting it off altogether.

Most of the approximately 10 speakers stated that the fire district and conservancy were planning to close off public access and there was nothing to stop that from happening if there was no deeded right of way.

A May 4 press release by the fire district said the town’s actions would threaten the conservation area as well as public safety and reduce public parking near Fort Road.

It noted over 40,000 visits to Napatree in 2022 and quoted an unnamed spokesperson as saying, “The Fire District has provided the public with access to Napatree Point for decades and will continue to do so in a manner that is consistent with ecological preservation, and subject to laws, statutes, rules and regulations promulgated by the federal government, the State of Rhode Island and the Town of Westerly. No one is denying access.”

The lawsuit, filed by Providence attorney Gerald J. Petros of Providence on behalf of the fire district and conservancy, names various private individuals and entities, Westerly town officials, the Town of Westerly and the State of Rhode Island as defendants.

The four-count complaint asks the court to declare the fire district and the conservancy the owners of the property and reject town claims to a 20-foot wide right-of-way which currently allows public access to Napatree by way of a narrow sand path.

It also asks the court to state that the town has no right to the property and seeks an injunction barring the town from marking or constructing a right-of-way while the suit is decided.

Petros did not respond to a request for comment.

According to the complaint, the federal government bought two lots on Napatree Point and built Fort Mansfield in 1898. Five years later, the four homeowners on Napatree Point granted the government a private easement allowing the government access to the fort and clarified the easement more fully a handful of years later to be a road that existed at the time.

The easement, as recorded in Westerly land records, does not provide public access to the right-of-way, and specifies it is for use of the federal government including officers, agents, employees and individuals doing business with the government, presumably at the fort.

The complaint alleges that the agreement was never renewed or replaced and ended when the government stopped using the fort in 1926, and after the 1938 hurricane, when all of the homes on the point were destroyed and not replaced. It argues that due to this, the easement known as Fort Road has not existed or been used for nearly a century.

It further cites a state law stating that, if not recorded in a deed for forty years, rights-of- way and easements are no longer valid, and, as such, since originally recorded in 1903 and 1909, the easement has not been recorded specifically enough as land changed hands to meet the legal standard.

The complaint states a 2007 review of land records by a town-contracted title attorney found no evidence to support the town’s claim that Fort Road was a town road.

In 2008, the Town Council voted to recognize it as a town road.

The suit argues that the council exceeded its authority because towns cannot claim private land without the use of eminent domain.

Council members at an April 17 meeting discussed a 2008 resolution that gave them the right to have the property surveyed in order to determine the precise location and boundaries of the right-of-way. The councilors said the resolution should be accepted as valid, because any challenge to it should have been made 15 years ago when it was passed.