Posted on November 19, 2018
Before Orleans officials can meet with the Cape Cod National Seashore and state environmental and county officials about dredging Nauset Harbor they’ll have to first sit down with their neighbors.
The majority of the to-be-dredged channels and tidelands lie in Eastham.
?“We can’t scoop one grain of sand without [Eastham’s] approval,” Selectman Alan McClennen noted at a recent meeting, adding that Orleans needs to proceed “ASAP to get this done.”
He told town administrator John Kelly: “Get back to (Eastham town administrator) Jacqueline Beebe and find a date to meet in the Eastham library. Eastham has (only) signed off on $29,000 of the $50,000 of work,” referring to the Woods Hole Group’s consultant fee.
Both towns want access to the great Atlantic Ocean for their fishermen and recreational boaters. But town officials are not on the same page about the scope of the proposed project.
Beebe on Oct. 26 notified Kelly that her board of selectmen “did not have a consensus that we want to proceed with the dredging.”
The Eastham board has concerns about the impact on Eastham’s estuary, the back of their barrier dune and salt marsh. As such they are seeking to have a working relationship with the Wood Hole Group, rather than just pay half of Orleans’ cost of hiring the consultants.
“I understand this is frustrating,” Beebe wrote. “But I think it is the result of a lack of process between the two boards around this project and the two towns being in two different places about the project.”
There may be two different places but there’s only one entrance to the marsh, and shoaling behind it is preventing the fishing fleet from traveling reliably from Town Cove, Priscilla Cove or even Snow Shore to the entrance, so they’ve had to anchor out just behind the barrier beach dune.
It makes access very difficult, and the channels can only be navigated safely during limited moments (less than two hours) either side of high tide.
“Eastham has not signed off on the full complement of work,” Kelly lamented. “They’ve also engaged a consultant from the Center for Coastal Studies. They are concerned about the impact on the backside of the spit and dune.”
While Beebe was hoping the Eastham selectmen would commit to at least one phase of the work (splitting the $100,000 cost) she had urged Kelly to set up a meeting between the boards.
The Woods Hole Group has installed tide gages at the marsh entrance (as of Sept. 27) to determine tide flows and elevations so that the dredging volume can be determined.
It also did bathymetric (underwater depth) research behind the dune barrier on the Orleans side to consider alternative channels, and it began setting up the red tide pilot project; Orleans needs to demonstrate to the National Seashore that the red tide cysts in the dredge spoils will not survive drying out, so the spoils could be utilized to enhance Nauset Beach without spreading the toxic algae into the Pleasant Bay system.
Woods Hole Group also is working on setting up a meeting with state Department of Environmental officials and that gathering would include Orleans and Eastham officials, the Seashore, Coastal Zone Management officials, the Army Corps of Engineers, the Division of Marine Fisheries and others.
Orleans and Eastham would have to be preaching from the same book at the meeting otherwise it won’t run smoothly.
“It’s foolish to meet all these people without first meeting Eastham,” Selectman Mark Mathison said. “We have to get things resolved here first and then go up (to the meeting in Lakeville) with a united front and make sure they are hearing the same thing — Eastham/Orleans, one voice, one message.”
The selectmen also approved a charge for the proposed Dredging Advisory (or steering) Committee. They’re supposed to work with the consultants and Eastham on managing and evaluating the project as well as other projects at Rock Harbor and Pleasant Bay.
Source: Wicked Local
