Dublin Conservation Commission
Minutes
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Attending: Jack Lewis (chair), Anne Anable, Jerry Branch, Karen Bunch, Charlie Champagne, and Suzan Macy
The minutes of the meeting of Wednesday, November 12, 2008 were reviewed and approved as amended.
Dublin Lake: Karen Bunch reported that the Lake Host program was completed and was quite successful, with more volunteer hours (and therefore less cash expense) than last year. The Commission agreed that Bill Goodwin did a great job in managing the program this year.
Karen also described the town’s Vortech system, which is installed at Cemetery Cove and is designed to reduce the amount of silt, salt and other deposits which go into Dublin Lake from Route 101 and Beech Hill. The system also has a Guillotine Valve which can help keep fuel and oil spills from accidents on Cemetery Cove from going into the lake. Karen has started the process to get annual maintenance of the Vortech system reestablished by the NH Department of Transportation. She also has worked to make sure that the town’s emergency management personnel are familiar with the Guillotine Valve and its use.
Karen noted that the final water quality lab reports for Dublin Lake are now in. The tests cover three levels of the lake and test for P/h, turbidity, acid recovery and clearness. All tests were fine and test results should be viewable electronically on the NHDES website.
SB 381: The Commission discussed the provisions of SB 381, which passed the NH Legislature earlier this year. The law defines what steps need to be taken if a town wishes to support conservation activities in which the town won’t end up with a property interest as a result of the support. The Commission agreed to ask the Selectmen to propose a warrant article which would allow conservation funds to be contributed to certain qualified institutions in order to assist those institutions in taking or holding a property interest, even though the town would not hold a property interest itself as a result of the contribution. Charlie Champagne was asked to take this request back to the other Selectmen, and Jack Lewis was asked to provide the Selectmen with an explanation and a
copy of the standard form of the warrant article as prescribed by SB381.
The Commission saw no reason at this point to propose passing the second warrant article involved in this law. The second warrant article would, if passed, allow the town to contribute funds in support of the conservation of property outside the town boundaries, for example the conservation of upstream water sources. The Commission saw little practical use for this article at this point in Dublin.
Prime Wetlands: The Commission briefly discussed the recently passed law allowing municipalities to make a case with the NH Department of Environmental Services to designate certain wetlands in a town as Prime Wetlands. Such a designation would mean that the NHDES would take a very restrictive view of what could be done to the designated wetlands. The commission concluded that the benefits of going through this process did not seem to justify the costs entailed. It agreed to defer further consideration of starting a process to define Prime Wetlands at this time.
Annual Conferences: Attendees reviewed for the membership the New Hampshire Association of Conservation Commissions and the New Hampshire Lakes Association annual conferences. Both conferences were well run and informative. They covered some of the same topics (such as the Comprehensive Shoreland Protection Act). The NHACC conference was especially useful in its detailing of the recent conservation-related laws and in the ability the conferees had to exchange experiences and war stories. The NH Lakes Association conference focused a bit much on rivers, but was especially good in providing frameworks for and information on taking a strategic view of the protection of lakes and other natural resources. Continued attendance at both was recommended.
DCC 2009 Budget: Jack Lewis briefly reviewed the current status of the Conservation Commission’s 2009 budget. At this point the budget is$5800, or $200 less than last year and it includes $500 for expenses of the Open Space Committee.
New Hampshire Preservation Alliance: The Commission agreed to continue its membership in the New Hampshire Preservation Alliance.
Cell Tower: The Zoning Board of Adjustment approved the Old Peterborough Road site for a cell tower. The application now goes to the Planning Board. The Conservation Commission wrote the ZBA a letter expressing its concerns about the repairing damage to wetlands on the property from the current logging road and about the possibility that continued logging of the property could make the cell tower much more visible than it currently is.
Other Business:
- The Leighton Forest timber harvest is scheduled to take place this winter, starting almost immediately. About two-thirds of the forest will be cut, mostly to improve the forest (thinning, taking out trees ready for harvesting, etc.) but a small portion will be clear cut to provide successional forest and good habitat for small animals, something that is lacking in the relatively mature forests which now cover most of Dublin.
- Jack Lewis passed out copies of a very good publication of the New England Wildflower Society on controlling invasive plants at home.
- Jack also passed out a brief article on an aphid that appears to feed only on Japanese Knotweed. The Commission will follow the progress of the aphid to see if another biologically based means of controlling an invasive plant can be used by the Commission.
- Several commissioners reviewed the Edelkind easement on Page road. The Forest Society holds an executory interest in the easement and asked us to make an inspection. The commissioners found no problems with the property.
- Jack passed out copies of a letter he had sent to NHDES to start the process of changing the drawdown level for Howe Reservoir to eliminate its winter mud flat look.
- Anne Anable volunteered to convert the base information on SB381 into a brief article in the Dublin advocate. The article, to run in the February copy of the Advocate, will explain why the warrant article on using conservation funds to support specific activities of land trusts is needed and why it makes sense for the town.
Meeting Schedule: The Commission will continue to meet at 7 PM on the second Wednesday of each month. The next meeting is scheduled for January 14,2009.
The meeting was adjourned at 8:47 PM.
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