10/20/2014 Annual Town Meeting - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

To protect taxpayers and property owners from the potentially huge expense of a court-mandated sewer infrastructure program, the Town of Mashpee has developed a range of strategies to protect our environment and demonstrate that we can deal with this problem ourselves including the expansion of shellfish harvesting in the Town estuaries, better management of stormwater runoff, and development of the Watershed Nitrogen Management Plan. The Nitrogen Control Bylaw, sponsored by the Board of Selectmen and the Environmental Oversight Committee, is the next step to improve water quality and reduce the potential burden on taxpayers and property owners. Without any real cost to taxpayers, this Bylaw adopts common-sense "best management practices"to reduce nitrogen from lawn fertilizers from getting into our bays, ponds, streams and groundwater, while also allowing us to have attractive, green lawns. The Cape Cod Commission has estimated that if Mashpee can reduce the nitrogen getting to our estuaries from lawn fertilizers by just fifty percent, the Town of Mashpee could save up to $40 million in wastewater infrastructure costs -which could mean nearly 1,000 fewer homes would need to be severed. The Bylaw, similar to Bylaws passed overwhelmingly in Falmouth and Orleans, is designed to do just that: clean water and fewer burdens on taxpayers and property owners. The Board of Selectmen recommends approval by a vote of 5-0. The Finance Committee recommends approval by a vote of 5-1, 1 absent. Motion made by Selectman Carol Sherman. Motion: I move the Town vote to approve Article 13 as printed in the warrant, with the exception of the phrase "or take any other action relating thereto." Motion made and passed to dispense with reading of article at 7:30 PM. Motion made to indefinitely postpone article is defeated at 7:53 PM. Motion passes at 7:55 PM. Article 14 To see if the Town will vote to amend the Zoning Bylaw as follows: Amend Section 174-240.3. by adding a new second sentence reading as follows: "In addition, the application shall indicate any portions of the site which lie within the areas mapped as High Sensitivity or Moderate Sensitivity on the maps of Pre-Contact and Post-Contact Archaeological Sensitivity included in the Final Technical Report of the Archaeological Reconnaissance Survey prepared for the Town of Mashpee by The Public Archaeological Laboratory, Inc. and dated December 2011." or take any other action relating thereto. Submitted by the Planning Board 12