2000-BOARD OF HEALTH - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

MINUTES June 1, 2000 4 BOARD OF HEALTH where all of this stands. Now, as far as I can see there was, as Mr. Bliss has laid out, no regulation at the time that Life at Mashpee was granted a permit that would require them to have a denitrifying septic system. There is one now, but there wasn't one at that point. As far as I can see, going back in terms of looking at the 99 Restaurant and Cooke's Restaurant, which were approved previous to that regulation as well, from looking through the records it would appear that the situation was that the 99 and Cookes both came forward with a standard Title V system with a regular leach field and a reserve leach field and the Board of Health made a recommendation that they might want to consider putting in a denitrifying system because of the proximity to the Mashpee River. To which, it would appear from looking through records, both of them said, well if we do that, what sort of relief can we get in return? And your assessment was that they could avoid putting in the reserve fields. So, there was a basic agreement that they would put in denitrifying systems in exchange for not having the reserve areas. From looking through the information I'm left with this situation that that's sort of the path that was taken for the 99 and Cooke's and that Life at Mashpee never really got to that point. If it had gone forward without the Talanian property being presented, it might have gone that way based on what I see in the minutes in terms of the discussions that were held. I've got two sets of minutes, one in '98 and one in '99, saying something along the lines of"an understanding" to put in a denitrifying septic system." Mr. Ball added, "I guess, Ed, with Life at Mashpee, the reason we didn't pursue it as much as we did with the 99 and Cooke's Restaurant is because they came in front of us and said that they were going to hook into the Talanian and they are going to have an amphridome system and that's probably the best one around. That's probably why we didn't pursue it that much. I'm assuming that if Talanian property wasn't involved in this, we would have tried to talk to Life at Mashpee to try to get them to put in a dente." Mr. Bliss stated, "If an applicant decides to voluntarily do more, that's neither here nor there. The fact of the matter is that the requirement is whatever it is. The Board issued a Title V..." Mr. Eichner interjected, "I understand that. I'm just trying to explain to you a little bit about how we have gotten to the point we are at right now. I can understand that the regulations are the way the regulations are and I just would like to get a clarification from the Board that we have a clear understanding of... If for example if Talanian wasn't approved, there was no amphridome system that was going to go in there, what would happen?" Mr. Doherty responded, "It was probably regular practice that we would have encouraged the use of those systems prior to the three of us actually coming to grips and passing a regulation requiring it. Myself and Steve have been big proponents of the systems for quite some time. I think it was probably eight years ago the Ruck system was fust placed before us and it all started there and then they got bigger, they got better and they got more readily acceptable by the engineers. As we started to track some of these systems and we saw what they were doing in terms of performance, we said, hey, we kind of like this thing. Anytime a variance was requested we now had a new tool and a new lever to say, well if you want the variance, what are you going to give us? Denitrification would always be thrown out on the