Selectmen Balk At Plan For Funding River Restoration

     The Coonamessett River Working Group appeared before Falmouth selectmen last night to ask their blessing of an application to the Community Preservation Committee that would fund the completion of the design for the river restoration of Lower and Middle bogs.
     What they received instead was a harsh reprimand from Falmouth’s top board, which criticized the working group for going against Town Meeting by seeking taxpayer money to pay for the project. Ultimately, selectmen backed off that stance enough to approve the request, but contingent on the working group’s meeting several conditions that will include seeking a designation from the Falmouth Historical Commission that the Coonamessett River be deemed a historically significant landmark.
     The working group’s project needs the designation in order to qualify for CPC funds, which can only be given for projects that fall under four categories: open space, recreation, affordable housing, and historic preservation.
     It is that last category, Mary Kay Fox, vice chairman of the working group, said, under which her board is submitting its application to the CPC. They are seeking roughly $40,000 to complete the design of the river restoration, one-third of which was completed by ENSR of Sagamore Beach this past winter.
     The firm has already been paid more than $20,000 toward the design, Ms. Fox said, but it became apparent that additional funds would be needed to complete the work. Without the design, she explained, the town cannot receive state and federal funds to conduct the river restoration project.
     The working group has applied to the CPC to fund the remainder of the design, she said, arguing that the river restoration will protect a historically significant property in Falmouth. A study done in 2006 by Public Archaeology Laboratory, a Rhode Island consultant hired by the historical commission, looked at eight mill sites, including several on the Coonamessett River, that could be eligible to be included on the National Register of Historic Places.
     In addition, she noted that the Massachusetts Historical Commission lists 15 different objects related to the Coonamessett River as historically significant, including the river’s fish ladder, bog culverts, bog dikes, as well as surrounding bogs.
     In speaking with representatives from the Massachusetts Community Preservation Coalition, Wendi B. Buesseler of Lakeview Avenue, Falmouth, said having these recognized by the state means the river could qualify as a historically significant landmark.
     Both Selectmen Kevin E. Murphy and Brent V.W. Putnam, however, had reservations about permitting the working group to proceed with its application.
     Mr. Murphy criticized the group for putting the cart before the horse by applying to the CPC without first seeking permission from selectmen. However, Ms. Fox said, last month their chairman, Gregory S. Pinto, appeared before selectmen telling them that his group would be submitting this application to the CPC.
     Both Mr. Murphy and Mr. Putnam expressed concern that when Town Meeting approved the restoration of the river, residents were promised that no taxpayer money would be used to fund the project.
     Mr. Putnam suggested the working group should first look elsewhere before applying to the CPC. He noted that at least one organization, the Coonamessett River Trust, has raised nearly $3,000 that could help pay for a portion of the design for the restoration project. He wondered why that group has not been contacted as a potential funding source.
     While they would be tapping into taxpayer money, working group member Joseph A. Netto III said, seeking CPC funds would not be increasing the tax rate. Ultimately, he said, the CPC and Town Meeting would decide whether appropriating this money should be allowed. “Give us your blessing,” he said. “Let them decide and the ultimate vote is with Town Meeting.”
     Regardless of whether it raises the tax rate, Mr. Putnam said, CPC funds are tax dollars. “You are asking for a piece of the pie which is a limited pie,” he said.
     In addition, he said, the working group may not even be eligible to apply to the CPC because it is not clear whether the river is historically significant. Many of the items that Ms. Fox listed, he said, were man-made. To argue that a natural resource like the Coonamessett is historically significant, he said, would mean “you could designate every river in the country as historical.”
     Mr. Murphy added that the working group was rushing the process and should take more time to determine whether the river is historical.
     Sheryl Kozens-Long, chairman of the Falmouth Historical Commission, was unsure whether a case could made for the Coonamessett River. While she said the restoration needs to happen regardless of any decision her board makes, she said, trying to seek a historical designation for the Coonamessett as historical might be a stretch.
     As the discussion followed this tangent, Mr. Netto finally complained that the working group was not appearing before one board, but two.
     Since 2003, when the working group was formed, he said, he has struggled to make this project a reality. He criticized the selectmen for finding another excuse to delay the restoration. “We can come up with any obstructionist view we want,” he said. “If you want to sit on the sidelines and take potshots at us, we can do that all day long.”
     At a time when Falmouth is in need of volunteers to fill seats on various boards, Deborah Siegal of West Falmouth wondered why selectmen were not being supportive of the efforts of these volunteers on the working group. “I am getting the feeling that you are stonewalling them,” she said. “They are trying to do what the board of selectmen [originally] charged them to do.”
     Working group member Courtney F. Bird Jr. reminded the selectmen that the only decision that is before them is whether his board may submit their application to the CPC. It is not, he said, to determine whether the application should be approved or not approved. That decision, he said, resides with the CPC, the historical commission, and the Falmouth Conservation Commission, which has jurisdiction over the Coonamessett River.
     Despite some objections, selectmen voted unanimously to allow the working group to proceed with their application to the CPC, under the condition that they also meet with the historical commission and conservation commission before the matter can move onto Town Meeting.