Posted on August 8, 2022
Town officials are hoping mitigation proposals submitted in “the 11th hour” will convince the US Army Corps of Engineers to grant a permit for an October dredging project.
The Select Board voted unanimously Tuesday night to provide possible mitigation alternatives to the Corps for dredging the South Anchorage area. The town has been working for years to get the harbor and federal channels dredged. The last phase of the project is the dredging of 24-acre South Anchorage.
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On July 26, Wellfleet received notice it was awarded a $2.5 million grant from the Massachusetts Dredging Program for the South Anchorage dredge. But the dredging requires a permit from the US Army Corps of Engineers.
South Anchorage may not be dredged this year
Harbor Master Will Sullivan and GEI engineer Dan Robbins provided an update to Select Board members on the dredge project. A change in management of the project for both Wellfleet and the US Army Corps of Engineers, ongoing lobbying by FBB Federal Relations on behalf of the town, miscommunication between the parties involved, and alternative mitigation proposals that hadn’t been brought before the Select Board led to sometimes tense exchanges.
Dredging of South Anchorage may not be completed this year. That could impact shellfish farmers in Chipman’s Cove, whose cages are under mud, according to Select Board member Kathleen Bacon.
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The Corps’ position is that the dredging in South Anchorage is improvement dredging, not maintenance dredging. In order to be considered maintenance dredging, the area must have been dredged within the last 50 years.
The South Anchorage was last dredged in 1957, 65 years ago. Since then the area has reestablished itself and is now a beneficial resource, according to the National Marine Fisheries Service. As such it requires mitigation to offset the impact of environmental damage done by dredging.
Town needs to mitigate dredging impact
That mitigation can come in the form of land transfers or fees. The fee would be approximately $13.5 million, according to the calculations used by the National Marine Fisheries Service. Land transfers would be difficult because the Cape Cod National Seashore owns 70% of the land in Wellfleet. Another 10% belongs to conservation.
Two alternative mitigation proposals from GEI and Sullivan were to transfer part of the town-owned shellfish area known as HDYLTA, to be protected, as well as two other parcels transferred to the Conservation Commission at the last Town Meeting.
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Select Board member Barbara Carboni said the board needs to be part of any discussions or “haggling” between GEI, Sullivan and the US Army Corps of Engineers.
Dredging can only happen between Oct. And Dec. 31, according to Joseph Aberdale, co-chair of the Dredge Task Force. The permit from the US Army Corps of Engineers is required before a dredge contractor can be found. The contractor needs time to put staging in place for the project that will dredge 248,000 cubic yards of material.
“We’re gambling up to the 11th hour,” Town Administrator Richard Waldo said.
He asked if the project could be scaled back, but Robbins said the Corps had already rejected that proposal.
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The Corps also rejected the Herring River Restoration Project as mitigation. Dredge Task Force member Curtis Felix called it “ridiculous.” The project will restore 1,000 acres of salt marsh along the Herring River.
Robbins and Sullivan will create a list of all land transfers made to the Conservation Commission and Wellfleet Conservation Trust since 2010. That land could potentially be considered as mitigation in the dredge project.
