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An agreement was signed Friday between the Lake Placid School Board and the town of North Elba that should clear the way for construction of new athletic fields at the site of the opening ceremony of the 1980 Winter Olympics.

The agreements were signed in the North Elba Town Hall by town Supervisor Jack Shea and School Board President Frederick Dennin, with members of both boards looking on. The signing ended a long stalemate between the two bodies dating back to 1977 on the terms of the arrangement.

The two contracts provide for an exchange of leases. The school board gives up its 1949 lease to the speedskating oval in front of the central school. In exchange, the town board gives the school a lease dating to 2028 on the town-owned land near the horse show grounds where the new facilities will be built.

The athletic complex — to be constructed with $642,000 from the federal Economic Development Administration — is planned to include softball, baseball and soccer fields, a locker shower room building and a modern, eight-lane track. Local students have been without a track since the speedskating oval was constructed for the Winter Olympics.

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New Scarface Trail

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Construction of a new portion of the Scarface Mountain hiking trail by the state Department of Environmental Conservation was grudgingly approved by the state Adirondack Park Agency at its Aug. 21 meeting.

The new route will involve cutting a 1.4-mile section of the trail, which includes a 225-foot wooden bridge across a wetland.

With the construction of the Olympic Village, now the Federal Correctional Institution at Ray Brook, the lower portion of the well-used Scarface trail was eliminated.

Formerly, the trail began at the Old Ray Brook Road, crossed the railroad tracks near the power plant for Camp Adirondack, and then crossed the former picnic area of the old Ray Brook Hospital before it entered the forest.

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More state land?

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The acquisition of additional land in the Adirondacks by the state was discussed at the Aug. 20 meeting of the Adirondack Park Agency’s Legal Committee.

The committee wondered aloud if the state is purchasing the right lands and also asked, “How much wilderness is enough?” The answers were not readily available.

However, for a public that is welcome to attend all APA meetings, discussions such as these can be thought provoking and enlightening, even though no firm conclusions are reached.

The commissioners — Arthur Savage, Elizabeth Thorndike, John Stock and Roger Swanson — discussed the intent of the Temporary Study Commission on the Adirondacks.

It reported that there are 600,000 acres of identified land in the Adirondacks that would be ideal for inclusion in the Adirondack Forest Preserve.

“How much wilderness is enough?” Stock asked.