| The Sunapee Area Watershed Coalition |
| Minutes of 5/5/05 Meeting |
| Sunapee Area Watershed Coalition (SAWC) |
| Meeting Summary – May 5, 2005 |
| Ivey Center Rm 201, CSC |
| Victoria Boundy, UVLSRPC, Facilitator |
| Members present: Terry Dancy, Town of New London; Suzanne Levine, Town of Newbury; Dean Geddes, Newbury, Ken Lawson, Springfield, Cynthia Hayes, Town of Springfield/Baptist Pond, Burton Jones, New London, Susan Crickman, Aimee Ayers, LSPA, Robert Wood, LSPA, Edythe Anderson, LSPA volunteer. |
| Introductory Remarks |
| The meeting began with a review of the agenda and minutes of previous meeting. Someone suggested that rather than list only town representatives on minutes that we list every attendee. |
| Other News |
| Terry Dancy mentioned an article in the InterTown Record on April 19. The New London Board of Selectmen meeting was covered, and the reporter also covered Terry's announcement about SAWC, its mission, time and location of meetings, and website address. Terry thought that he had noticed an article in the Argus Champion as well. |
| There is concern about a proposed development project near Pleasant Lake. The concern is that erosion is not adequately covered in the New London regulations. Colby-Sawyer was approached to assist the Pleasant Lake Protective Association with watershed issues such as these and CSC added Pleasant Lake to their 2006 Senior Program. |
| Someone mentioned that there is an LSPA educational display up at the New London Cleaners, with a section of the display devoted to SAWC. There are plans to rotate this display around the watershed. |
| Update on Northeast Rural Water Association (NERWA) meeting |
| Aimee and Woody met with NERWA and the Meredith Town Planner regarding the Lake Wakewan project (they are the other NHDES pilot watershed project grantees). They had a long discussion about how water suppliers can be involved in the effort, and how NERWA is helping to get them involved. NERWA offered to help SAWC in a similar manner (they have since been invited to speak at the June SAWC meeting). |
| NH DES Project Update |
| After NHDES staff's presentation to SAWC members, LSPA staff began drafting a list of what kinds of GIS mapping layers and data they felt is needed for SAWC, such as a map depicting areas with slopes greater than 15%, roads within 100 feet of a water body, etc. LSPA staff made these requests to DES, which will create some map layers. A CSC student will do the follow-up data analysis. |
| Issues Discussion |
| Vicky distributed an outline for discussion (below, after minutes) of issues to focus on and prioritize. The original plan was to break up into smaller groups to discuss and prioritize the issues; due to the small size we discussed them in one group. Comments in blue on the outline below were made during the discussion. |
| Next Steps/Project Benchmarks |
| Aimee reminded the group that one of the project tasks for the LSPA grant is to conduct a community survey asking watershed residents to share their thoughts on the assets, issues and opportunities within the watershed. Aimee is looking for volunteers to help draft this survey, which is targeted for distribution this summer. Some ideas for how to develop and distribute the survey: Use town master plan surveys as examples, post survey on SAWC website, use the website http://www.surveymonkey.com/ to design site. |
| SAWC website |
| http://home.earthlink.net/~sunapeewatershed/ |
| Next meeting: Thursday, June 2nd, 7-8:30 at Ivey Center. |
| SAWC ISSUES: An Outline for Discussion |
| SAWC Meeting, May 5, 2005 |
| 1. Water Quality |
| a. Pollution prevention |
| b. Stormwater management |
| c. Road proximity |
| d. Nutrients (e.g. from septic) |
| e. Sediments |
| Discussion Points: |
| · Baptist Pond and its proximity to the highway and homes. |
| · Perhaps the issue of recreation gets incorporated into the Water Quality chapter of the Plan, rather than serve as a stand-alone chapter. |
| · A Water Quality Subcommittee could look at results of water quality testing; cross-track for trends; also tackle water quantity. |
| 2. Land use |
| a. Development pressures |
| b. Land protection* |
| c. Growth management |
| d. Natural resources protection |
| e. Regulatory gaps |
| f. Enforcement gaps** |
| * Ausbon Sargent does this - we should help them in any way we can but not form a subcommittee. CSC just put together some maps focused on priority lands for protection. |
| **Several people said to steer clear of this word |
| · Springfield is the least developed but is facing enormous growth pressures, and needs help with good zoning ordinance. |
| 3. Water Quantity |
| a. Withdrawals |
| b. Water levels (Lake, pond, groundwater) |
| c. Flow issues in rivers/streams |
| d. Flooding |
| e. Water Supply |
| · If lakes make up 18% of the watershed, the rest of (the water) is underground |
| 4. Wildlife habitat and biodiversity |
| a. Riparian land protection/restoration |
| b. Wetlands & uplands |
| c. Invasive species |
| · Perhaps this category would be a subcategory |
| 5. Recreation management |
| a. Recreational opportunities |
| b. Public access |
| c. How recreation contributes to degradation |
| d. Multiple uses |
| · State control (e.g. DRED) |
| · Perhaps this would be subcategory as well |
| 6. Economic climate |
| a. Water- and natural resource-based activities (e.g. tourism) |
| b. How economic development contributes to degradation |
| c. Sustainability |
| · Look at/recommend cost of community services study |
| 7. Education and outreach |
| a. Involving people |
| b. Schools |
| c. Community |
| d. Local board capacity building/technical assistance |
| · Visit with the towns periodically to update them on information and data gathered, and perhaps use that opportunity to bring in an expert, or model (ordinance, that is), or some kind of technical assistance. |
| 8. Scenic and historical resources |
| a. Economic/tourism implications |
| b. Quality of life |
| · Some of this was done in the Lake Sunapee inventory |
| 9. Enforcement of existing regulations (and creation of new ones) |
| a. Water quality & quantity regs |
| b. Land use regs |
| c. Wildlife protection |
| Attendees Thoughts on Priority Issues and Needs: |
| · Cynthia: Water quality/septic (Baptist Pond); Land Use (Springfield). Needs: Clear zoning ordinance, education |
| · Amy: Zoning enforcement |
| · Terry: Community education |
| · Burt: Water quantity (aquifer); having technical models |
| · Suzanne: Wildlife habitat |
| Overview of Issues to Focus On: |
| · Water Quality and Supply: Perhaps these become the rallying issues to get people interested and involved |
| · Land Use, Compliance and Regulatory Climate |
| · Education and Outreach |
| SAWC: The link between land use and water quality |