05/05/2022 BOARD OF HEALTH Minutes

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to do all of Phase II so that the ponds are protected, but we need more information going forward before we set this in motion for 60% of the town receiving I/A's or some other nutrient control. MR. BAUMGAERTEL: We're not at a point where we can make any regulations; there's still a lot of issues to work out. I think it's important to continue to look at this subject as we get new information. Certainly, the Board of Selectmen could potentially change composition within a couple of days, I don't know whether it will but certainly we can't have any substantive discussion with them in the short term. I think we have to wait for town election to pass and see what the Board's priorities are going to be moving forward, it may change. This has to be a cross-cutting solution. It's fully within the authority of the Board of Health to require I/A systems, we all know that. It's septic system regulation, we do have the ability to do that by Board of Health regulation, but I don't think that's the best way to go about it. Maybe that's where we end up, but there needs to be broad buy-in from not only the Select Board but also there needs to be coordination with the Sewer Commission. We need to figure out exactly what is going on with the sewer plant at this point. It's not entirely clear what is next. We need to have those joint board meetings and get better informed on what the plan is going to be and how that is going to shake out. I personally think that sewering up near the ponds is the option that we have right now. I work with I/A technologies a lot and we have no solution in that area. That's pretty much what we've got for near the ponds. MR. HARRINGTON: One other thing I know they looked at in Falmouth, and the Falmouth folks sent us their information regarding the cost. What was the cost of the I/A's and what will be the burden of the citizens for purchasing and installing and then the long term maintenance that's required for them vs. the cost of the sewers. Are we going to get to the point where things are so expensive right now and the cost of the I/A systems and the septic systems, I don't know if it's ever going to be a wash but it may be close enough to go back to sewers. MR. BAUMGAERTEL: There's a lot of information that needs to go into this. There's a lot of work being at the county level. I'm personally working on a lot of these projects to try and figure out if towns do decide to go this route,to utilize broad-based I/A technologies how we can do it the most efficient way. My contention through all of this has been, if we're going to use on-site systems as part of the solution, we can't continue looking at them as single systems existing in a single person's backyard. They have to be approached fully as infrastructure. They have to be managed in that way and there has to be a utility that goes along with that to ensure that we're keeping the cost as minimal as possible to gain opportunities to get common scale to ensure quality control is followed. With sewer you know you're putting in a pipe, but as we all know there is a variety of quality of septic systems out there. Some are good, some are not. Those are issues that need to be addressed. And trying to figure out how to move hundreds of I/A system through an approval pipeline with only 2 of you in the office trying to do all this. Trying to figure that out. I worked on this for a long time. I'm working trying to figure out how the county can assist the towns in this manner. If the economics of it work out; then that's up to the town to decide if that's the route that we go, but it's always been my bent it always to make this at least as affordable, or more affordable, than the sewer option. MR. HARRINGTON: Getting back to the effectiveness of the I/A's, that area of the town that we're going to put I/A's in now that the whole sewer phasing has changed, the original MBP project told us that if we sewered nothing and put I/A in all the town at the