Minutes 7/28/99

In attendance: {list misplaced}. Guest: Karen Pelto, River Restore Coordinator (MA Dept. of Fisheries and Wildlife, Riverways Programs)

The meeting was facilitated by Eugene Benson. Notes are by Elizabeth Karpati.

At the last meeting it was mentioned that DPW was about to hire an engineering consulting firm (Weston & Samson) for a study of the dam but this hasn't happened because DPW has no funds.
State study which concluded that trees on dam were a problem was a $5000 job, assumed a water level 8 ft. higher than it is now. State estimate for repairs (tree removal, putting in gravel) was $188,000-220,000.
Watson & Samson's letter to Town (5/19) mentioned doing a hydraulic and hydrologic study. Breach analysis would have included conceptual design for repairs, but would also have laid groundwork for a decommissioning study.
Karen Pelto reported that at Pentucket Pond in Georgetown, a Great Pond, the state is removing vegetation from the dam and putting in gravel and grass. Project is tied in with necessary road work.
Could we get a study by Tufts engineering students? Not until next year (January) but they would have to know about it in the fall.

No activities to report -- what can we do without information from consultant?

We need a "second opinion" -- how to avoid cutting down the trees on the dam.
What would be the effects of decommissioning? Trees on dam would become a non-issue. Effect on swimming area? (It would leak.) Effects downstream?
We need a breach study of the dam but we want more information: hydrology of the whole area, adequacy of drainage.
Water level is now kept about 6-8 ft. lower in winter than in summer. Would leaving the water at winter level year-round eliminate the breach hazard? If yes, could we put money into the swimming facility to make it leakproof instead of into cutting the trees and strengthening the dam?

The Town must do something so that the state doesn't think we intend to do nothing.
C.Abbott to ask DPW Director Bento: Is there really no money for a consultant? (Town Meeting didn't appropriate any because the problem wasn't known yet.) Does Bento want us to write to the Selectmen, supporting his position of wanting a study done, and asking for money for it? Anything involving the swimming facility is an issue for the Selectmen anyway.
Draft of letter to Selectmen to be done by C. Abbott and Kevin Knobloch. Presentation at August 9 Selectmen's meeting by Abbott and Brian Hasbrouck.
Conservation Commission already involved, started it all with a public meeting. Lexington C.C. will have to be involved eventually, but not with the study.

Ideas presented: Dam Cataldo Brook to lessen water flowing into Mill Brook? Do something to hold more water in Great Meadows?
Chairman of 22 Mill Street condo association reported that they had flooding on June 13, 1998 in their lower garage, and they had an independent hydrological study done (costing $7,000), which was completed in December 1998 but hasn't gone to the Conservation Commission yet.
Water from Reservoir has to make a 90-degree turn to flow into Mill Brook, and then another; it also goes through culverts, some of which may have limited capacity.
Building the condos at 22 Mill St. required widening the brook from 4 to 12 ft. Widening the culverts under the High School from 4 to 7 ft. was recommended but not done. (Football field was a lake, now filled in, so floodwater that would have collected in the lake now goes into the condos' lower garage,)
A proposal in the 1980's to put in a 36" culvert under Mass. Ave. (to carry what is normally a 20" flow) was killed by Wilson Farms, which claimed it would be flooded.

Massachusetts has 3115 dams (man-made); only a few hundred are owned by the state.
State's decommissioning program, aimed at removing obstacles to passage of fish, is 8 months old, Karen's job is 2 months old.
About 10 projects in the works, including two pilot projects, both for river dams; permitting process for these will probably take about a year.
State doesn't have money now for decommissioning studies. DEM has money for some types of feasibility studies -- Karen will check whether we qualify.
Wisconsin fairly active in decommissioning, has a safety fund for decommissioning or repairing dams; Mass. doesn't. Foundation money involved in some Wisconsin projects but used usually for ecological restoration.
Could the Reservoir be left permanently at the low winter level? Massachusetts now has some "dry dams" which hold little or no water except after a storm. Karen to check if dam can be left as is, rather than breached, if decommissioned.
Use of land after decommissioning? This question is "new territory" [pun intended]. Who owns the land under the Reservoir? In Wisconsin, a town owned such land and turned it into a park.
Who would pay for decommissioning? It would have to be the owner = Arlington, which owns the perimeter including the edge of the brook flowing into the Reservoir.
We should get conservation restrictions on the land if the dam is decommissioned.

Committee meetings would probably not be fruitful until we have more facts.
But we should have a display at Town Day, need volunteers to put it together.
Also need volunteers to work between meetings -- e.g. take photos of water chestnuts.
Reservoir user survey form is in the works, but it's too late in the season to distribute it at the Reservoir after it is ready. Distribute at Town Day? Would need people to do it.
Could a survey be sent out with the census mailing in January?

NEXT MEETING: TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 7, 7:30 P.M. Town Hall Annex, Second Floor Conference Room

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