2009-Annual Town Report - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

Report of the Sewer Commission To the Honorable Board of Selectmen and the Citizens of the Town of Mashpee The Commission's Watershed Nitrogen Management Plan / Effluent Pipeline Preliminary Design (WNMP) project, intended to identify the most cost-effective approach to reducing nitrogen in each of our coastal watersheds to levels that do not harm the bays, moved forward significantly in 2009 with the testing, for their ability to meet nitrogen targets for the Popponesset and "Waquoit Bay East" estuaries, of five alternative scenarios for providing wastewater treatment in Mashpee and the portions of the Popponesset and Waquoit Bay watersheds in our three neighboring towns. As reported in previous years, the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) Massachusetts Estuaries Program (MEP) has modeled nitrogen loading and pathways, and established nitrogen loading targets, for both the Popponesset Bay and Quashnet River / Hamblin's Pond / Jehu Pond watersheds ("Waquoit Bay East"), as well as for Barnstable's "Three Bays" watershed, a small portion of which lies in Mashpee. The recommendations from these reports were used by DEP to set formal nitrogen targets, called "TMDLs" (Total Maximum Daily Loads) for each of the sub-embayments of our estuaries. TMDLs, to be enforced by DEP, are required by the federal Clean Water Act, and the DEP TMDL reports have been approved by EPA under the Act. The Town is faced with the need to identify how we will meet those targets. The only remaining portion of Mashpee not covered by an MEP report or TMDL is the extreme western part of the town, including most of the Johns Pond Estates, Winslow Farms and Childs River West subdivisions. These areas will be covered by an MEP report for Waquoit Bay, Childs River and Eel River which is being undertaken jointly the Town of Falmouth. (Mashpee Town Meeting has funded a $23,625 portion of the MEP report costs.). The report is scheduled to be completed in June 2010. Once TMDLs for most of our watersheds were determined, our engineering consultant, Stearns & Wheler, LLC (S&W), completed a Final Needs Assessment Reportin April 2007, analyzing existing environmental resources and demographics, existing wastewater infrastructure, wastewater flows and nitrogen loading, nitrogen loading targets, development of wastewater nitrogen priority areas, a summary of needs and a discussion of funding opportunities. In November 2007 a "Final Technology Screening Report" was delivered, identifying all of the potential wastewater treatment, sewering and effluent discharge technologies and identifying their favorable and unfavorable characteristics, costs and effectiveness. At a series of meetings with our Community Advisory Committee (CAC) and consultants, five alternative scenarios were developed for dealing with wastewater nitrogen. Four scenarios were developed by Stearns & Wheler (Draft Report delivered March 2008). One involves leaving existing private sewer systems in place and public sewering of the rest of the watersheds, one uses acquisition of some of the existing private treatment plants as the basis for a municipal system, one abandons all of the private plants and creates a large traditional public sewer system for the whole area, and one presumes that each of the towns in the Popponesset and Waquoit watersheds "goes it alone" rather than cooperating on the most cost-effective watershed-based approach (intermunicipal cooperation and cost-sharing will be a major issue that must be addressed by Mashpee and the surrounding three towns). A fifth scenario was developed by a 194