A second Con Comm meeting is set for Thursday, November 1st at 8:15 PM, where discussion of the proposal will continue. Please attend -- your presence shows the Con Comm that people care about protecting Spy Pond!  Also, if you are able to help with legal expenses, please visit https://www.gofundme.com/protect-spy-pond.

Close to 60 members of the public attended the 10/18 hearing.  Also present were developer Scott Seaver, his wetlands consultant Mary Trudeau, and his attorney. Town Counsel Doug Heim was also present.

At the meeting, public opposition to the proposed settlement was strong and clear.  We heard from many members of our community including Clarissa Rowe, Head of the Arlington Land Trust and John Worden, member of the Arlington Historic Commission.  We believe public pressure made a difference. We stopped a “rubber stamp” of the proposed settlement, and some members of the Con Comm raised additional questions about the settlement proposal and asked Seaver to provide more analysis, which is why the meeting has been continued.  At the next hearing, we need to continue to tell the Con Comm that we expect them to uphold Arlington’s Wetlands Bylaw and Regulations and stop this terrible proposal from going through. Seaver is required to prove that reasonable alternatives are not available or practicable before any intrusion into the protected buffer zone can be authorized, and he has not met this standard.  We know that reasonable alternatives are available, including one house, or two smaller houses located farther away from the wetlands. Please see a diagram of the proposed build here https://goo.gl/3SMrdk.  The protected buffer is Spy Pond's primary defense against negative impacts such as nutrient runoff, water pollution, siltation, erosion, vegetation change, and habitat destruction. Spy Pond is our treasure and we as stewards need to insist that Spy Pond be protected for this and future generations.

Summary of the 10/18 Con Comm meeting:

Before Seaver’s presentation and public comments, Con Comm chair Nathaniel Stevens stated that the Con Comm does not see this project as precedent-setting because they look at each case on its own merits.  We appreciate that the Con Comm may see it this way, but it is likely that the developer community will see it as precedent-setting for building within the buffer zone, if Seaver’s proposal is approved. If allowed, the settlement will give other developers “license” to use similar tactics and steamroll over Arlington’s regulations with threats of lawsuits. This will take further resources from our Town, and hinder the Town’s ability to enforce our own regulations.

Seaver’s attorney and wetlands consultant argued for approval on the basis that the two houses in the new proposal extend only slightly less into the buffer zone than past designs, and they claimed that pulling the houses back farther from the wetlands would be infeasible because of cost and not being able to fit a two car garage.  It is stunning that Seaver continues to present proposals that are not substantially different from their past designs, even though they have been repeatedly asked to show alternatives. Arlington’s regulations require Seaver to prove that reasonable alternatives are not available or practicable, and he has not met this requirement.  Reasonable alternatives are available, including one house, or two smaller houses located farther away from the wetlands. The protected buffer is Spy Pond's primary defense against negative impacts such as nutrient runoff, water pollution, siltation, erosion, vegetation change, and habitat destruction. Seaver’s continued dismissal of our town’s requirements is not the right strategy for Arlington and building near our wetlands.  

The public comments part of the discussion opened with Attorney Elizabeth Pyle representing the abutters noting that Seaver has failed to prove that reasonable alternatives are not available, as is required before any work can be permitted in the 100-foot protected buffer, and mitigation plantings cannot be traded for building in the protected wetlands buffer zone.  She noted that there are multiple other reasonable alternatives for this site than the 2 houses Seaver proposes deep in the buffer zone, including two smaller houses, one large house, etc. Attorney Pyle also noted that if the Con Comm were to allow this proposal it would be against their previous decisions, and considered arbitrary and capricious, and the town is risking a lawsuit from citizens asking it to simply enforce the regulations on the books.

Several town residents spoke.  All who spoke opposed Seaver’s proposal.  Speakers included Clarissa Rowe, Head of the Arlington Land Trust and John Worden, member of the town Historic Commission.  Both town leaders urged the Con Comm to uphold our town’s regulations. Clarissa Rowe praised the Con Comm for being stewards of our town’s natural resources and to continue to do this good work.  John Worden criticized the settlement as one that was giving away the store, and there could have been a better agreement reached such as two houses with one house entirely outside and the other only slightly in the buffer.  John Worden shared that over the many years he has been an Arlington resident that he has witnessed the growing pressure by developers on Arlington’s resources, and that we have been slow to change our regulations and that we must fight this or risk crossing a tipping point to unsustainable and irresponsible development in our town.

The Con Comm continued the hearing to 11/1 and asked Seaver to present reasonable alternatives, something he has not done since 2016, though the question of reasonable alternatives has been raised multiple times since then.

We will post details for the 11/1 meeting as the time approaches.

Also, thus far a small group of neighbors have been funding legal costs and have started a Go Fund Me to assist with that effort.  Please contribute as much or as little as you can: https://www.gofundme.com/protect-spy-pond