Posted on November 26, 2015
By Doreen Leggett, Wicked Local Chatham
In the end there were too many unknowns for selectmen to support dredging the Morris Island Cut, even though it likely would have been privately funded.
“I think we have to walk a little more slowly,” said Selectman Chairman Jeffrey Dykens.
Dykens ticked off a number of questions about the project: the amount of material that needed to be dredged, where it would be placed, the cost of the dredging, and whether the channel would fill back in after a year, a couple of months or a week. Also top on his mind was how the project would impact discussions with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which states it has jurisdiction in that area as its with the boundaries of the Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge. The town disagrees with the service’s stance and may have to go to court about it.
