One was submitted. I confirmed that I ran out of ink today. We have 4:30. >> Yes. >> On December 17th, this is a meeting of the water quality management committee. Um we have a agenda that is focused
strongly on the concept of attenuation how it occurs where it occurs and it will lay some groundwork that will I trust get incorporated into the wershed management plans >> um as to where the priorities might be
>> future board of health action as to >> where other folks will need to be upgraded to an IIA under certain conditions. Um first thing first item on the agenda is to hear from Kevin Kroger. Kevin is um a
recognized scholar when it comes to um soil groundwater. You were at um the USGS for a number of years. Kevin to the microphone. >> Uh you know he also was chaired the board of health. um but he's here
tonight um to sort of summarize a paper you wrote close to 20 years ago now. >> Yeah. Everything I'm going to show you is really old. Yeah. Um >> like a >> Yeah. So I can see already based on
conversation with Ken on the the walk-in I didn't exactly prepare a presentation on that paper. I brought in other materials to talk about more broadly the topic of uh nitrogen attenuation. Yeah. So for people that
>> we we just the paper got distributed to everybody on the board. So I'm sure they've read it and and will have many detailed comments on some of the >> you know assumptions and >> Ken can probably he just read it again. He can answer them for me. But um uh so for people that don't know me I came
here in 1997 did a PhD in the the valley yellow lab at at Boston University um posttock to wood solution graphic institution and at USGS down in Tampa Bay Florida came back to the USGS office
here and I'm just wrapping up at the end of this month 21 years at that office and doing an early retirement there. And I'm I'm working now with the Yale Center for Natural Carbon Capture and a couple
of private companies called Sylvestm Climate Associates and and Vesta and um guest investigator at Woods Oceanographic Institution as well. And my work since 2012 has been on um um
climate change mitigation, coastal ecosystems, enhanced weathering of minerals to capture carbon dioxide and mitigate methane emissions. But before that, from 97 to 2012 and sometimes since the focus was on nitrogen loading
uh from watersheds to estuaries. And so you can see in this graphic, everybody's probably seen this graphic. This is from the bala at all nitrogen loading model showing the main sources of nitrogen to a watershed atmospheric deposition
fertilizer applications and wastewater and then the pathway of transit through um the watershed into the estuary. And so we see the arrows going through uh what's called the vados zone and the
soil. So the vadosone is unsaturated mineral soil above the water table. So the the water and whatever it's carrying the nitrogen, the organic matter all percolates through that in this case sand and gravel uh uh aquifer right
before it reaches the water table and then it transits in a more horizontal direction towards the estuary and discharges uh through what we can call the seepage phase or the submarine groundwater discharge zone uh into the
estuary. So that's the path. How do I advance slides? >> Um, there's a keyboard >> keyboard in there as standard. There we go. >> Thanks. Yeah. So I think there's all there's agreement among just about
everybody that there's a certain amount of nitrogen removal in these two blue circles in those uh uh septic system moderate if it's a standard title 5 system and then also in the plume as that water the initial transit of that
water and nitrogen through um through the groundwater. um the the length of that um active zone with denitrification in the plume. Um I imagine this committee's thought about that a lot more than I have in in recent years. Um
but what I think you want to know about is that first red circle, how much nitrogen might be removed in the groundwater during longer transit. And then I'm going to note as well that there's loss at that seepage phase as
well. There's evidence for that. And so I'll talk about both of those really starting with that seepage phase first. So I'm going to show some data and it's going to get a little bit technical but don't worry about the more technical details. um shows some data from several
sites, several estuaries around on Cape Cod, Grape Pond, Green Pond, Eel Pond, uh Child's River, Quashnet, Hamlin, Yahoo, Sage Lot, and then some of the systems over in Papanessa Bay as well,
um and Kunameset Pond even we sampled around there. And um the methods, a lot of the methods are about sticking a rod with perforation at the end into the >> what what they just spin the microphone
towards you because we are on TV. >> All right, I'll stop stepping out. >> I don't think I pick you up very well. >> Okay, thanks. Um, in addition to the Cape Cod sites, three sites on Long Island, New York, which is geologically very similar to to here, uh, in the
state of Delaware, quite a bit of work there, a little bit in Maryland, and then, uh, some work in Tampa Bay as well. Um, so these are all sandy aquifers with nitrogen from these various sources moving through them. And uh
and so we yeah we use these rods and we go through the up above the tide through the title zone into inner title zone and into the the subtitle and we collect a lot of samples and we analyze the chemistry. And so this is what it looks like at the discharge zone to the
estuary. I can't help it. I'm going to keep walking towards that screen. Um so in the top left that's salinity. Okay. And so we're looking at a cross-section through the head of Aoy Bay. And the white uh zone is fresh groundwater
coming underneath the unsaturated sediment above it and then um discharging into the estuary. The red indicates salt water and then we have a mixing zone between those. We have a mixing zone shallow and we have one deeper and a little bit farther off. And
on the top right we have nitrate concentration and on the bottom right we have ammonium concentration in those zones. So we we can have nitrate or ammonium moving in plumes of uh enriched groundwater
um towards the coast. And you can see under the saline zone it's it's all ammonium. Um so in general when we talk about nitrate that's going to be oxic conditions and when we talk about ammonium and
organics a little different but um it's tends to be under more chemically reducing low oxygen or anoxic uh conditions. Um so going to talk about those forms of nitrogen for a minute. Um here we have
on the y ais we have redux conditions or is the is the water reducing or oxidizing. So at the top of the graph that's oxidizing there's lots of oxygen around the bottom of the graph there's little or no oxygen. Um and then we have
pH on this graph. And the reason we put these two together is they because they show us the thermodynamic stability of different chemical compounds. And what we see, this is comparing data from the head of Koi Bay and uh and Tampa Bay.
And the Tampa Bay system is very different. It has a lot of ammonium. It tends to be very chemically reducing suboxic and anoxic in the groundwater. And um so thinking about why why are
these different we can see that mostly the compounds conform to those thermodynamic stability limits. Mostly have ammonium in the in the ammonium stability zone. We never get up into the nitrate stability zone throughout all
all these samples. We're at most we're in the nitrite zone which means nitrate is just barely stable in the groundwater in a lot of locations. Um so what that means is it's almost reducing enough to reduce it and convert it into N2 gas the
ditrification process that we're interested in. Um so it's a it's a difficult place for for nitrate to persist. We can look at this in a different way. On this y-axis, we have the percentage of the inorganic
nitrogen that's as nitrate. So, this is nitrate divided by the sum of nitrate and ammonium. And you can see that throughout this whole reducing area and even up to a fairly oxidizing zone, it's
almost all ammonium. We don't get any nitrate until it becomes more oxic at the right side of that graph. and again conforming pretty well to the the expected stability zones. Um so why
why do we have those differences? We can look at we already and this is not random. We already had information that suggested that the thickness of that vadosome the unsaturated soil above the water table has some influence on all
all of this. And so what I'm showing here, this includes data as well from uh I think this this also probably has Long Island, New York data on it, which some of that I'll show in a minute. So on the top graph we have redux conditions.
Again, higher on that graph is more oxic. Lower on that graph is is more anoxic. And we can see that we don't get the really reducing conditions except where the vadosone is quite thin. So in other words, the water table is very close to the soil surface. Um and then
when we get a little bit thicker vados zone up to 10 m 20 and on up um it's more oxidizing conditions. And we can see again that that percent of of the inorganic nitrogen is nitrate conforms
reasonably well to to those those uh controls. So we have thin vadosone, high water table, a lot of ammonium and then we have thick vadosone, deep water table and a lot of nitrate.
So here's here's the where a lot of this data comes from. This also has has Cape Cod data on it. But if we look on the left top there, we have Manasset Bay. That's near the glacial marine. a lot of
the wershed is you can see Long Island is just like Cape Cod. It's the same. Um and then on the top right you have um Northport Harbor also on the marine and on the on the south side we have uh Patchog is the name of the town and
that's in the outwash plane. And so the outwash plane has the thin vados zones and more ammonium, not much nitrate. And the other sites have mostly nitrate in the groundwater. So that's just noting that that's
different than the classic um conception of how groundwater and aquifers work in terms of chemistry. Um here this is from a slump and van Capellan uh product but it's it it's maybe originally from a classic
textbook. Um and what they're suggesting is that the more time that the groundwater spends in the aquifer traveling into deeper flow paths, it becomes more chemically reducing. We see exactly the opposite here. We see
shallow young groundwater near the soil surface being very reducing having mostly ammonium and we see that the deeper groundwater underneath a thicker vados zone typically um having more oxic conditions.
Um so what about nitrogen losses? Um just briefly in the in the discharge zone to the head of Aquoy Bay, we have mixing between on the left the nitrate plume um with dark circles and an ammonium
plume with with open circles and actually that I think those no yeah okay never mind. So that's correct. Um and just showing briefly that on the right that the stable
isotope ratios uh go up get heavier as um we have apparent loss during the mixing of these two plumes. So it's not an even mixing. It's a non-conservative decrease in concentration in the isotope ratios go up. And I can say a lot more
about that, but just when we get the right water masses mixing together in that discharge zone, we tend to get some denitrification and some removal. It looks like it can be significant. Um, so the three Long Island sites, uh, throughout all of these sites, we
collected samples and measured the concentrations of N2 gas and argon gas in the in the samples. And I have to acknowledge Anne Giblin and Jane Tucker at the Marine Biological Laboratory for making their instrument available to to measure these, especially Jane who's the
one that pulled her hair out to keep it running. Um, so N2 is the product we're thinking about when we talk about ditrification. There are other processes we could call it just microbial N2 or
just just excess N2 gas in the groundwater as an indication that that it was either nitrate or ammonium or organic nitrogen and through chemical processes ultimately became N2 gas and then it's inert. It it's going to be lost up to the atmosphere eventually
it's it's out of our way in terms of utrification. Um, and the argon is an indication of how much air is in the sample. It's just a na um a passive tracer of air content
which tells us the temperature it was recharged at, the elevation, how many bubbles are dissolved, all those sorts of things. So we use the argon and other information to correct for those. And so if we have more N2 gas in the water than
the than the argon would indicate that we should, that means there's there's been denitrification happening. So that top graph, that's from the Patchog site on the southshore of Long Island, um, out on the glacial outwash plane. And
you can see way off to the right the the x- axis there is the N2 gas and the y- axis is the argon gas. There's a lot more N2 than we expect in this graph. We expect the as much N2 as as in the solid
uh circles there. If it were totally conservative it would be falling along that line. There's a heck of a lot more. 200 micro moles of of N2 gas indicates 400 micro moles of nitrate ditrified and
70 71 um micro moles per milligram. So what's 40 / 7? Shouldn't have said. So five six6. Yeah. Um so 6 milligrams denitrified there. Quite a bit or more.
Um then if we look where we have a somewhat thicker vadosone in the middle here, we do have some excess N2, but it's less. And then when we have the thickest vadosone again where there is some excess N2, there's been some denit nitrification, but a whole lot less.
Um, and summarizing that a little bit more. >> So, you're assuming that's because there's no anoxic conditions that exist to convert the nitrate tan to ex >> in the thick vados area. Yeah, exactly.
Um so summarizing all this a little bit top right graph is redux conditions again on the y- ais and vadosone thickness on the x- axis and you can see that it's reducing with thin vadosone oxidizing with thick vadosone.
Oxygen is similar though it's a little bit messier on the top right. Dissolved organic carbon which is the organic matter source that would drive ditrification. If you don't have any organic carbon, you you generally are
not going to get significant amounts of denitrification. Dissolved organic carbon shows a very strong relationship with vadosone thickness. So we have a lot of DOC that is able to make its way through the soil through the unsaturated zone and into
the groundwater when the water table is shallow. Then it can drive ditrification. then it can consume oxygen and and cause reducing conditions where we have a thick vados zone. I mean just imagine passing um some some waste
water through 60 m of a sand column um and it's not just a saturated sand column. It's a unsaturated air filled sand column that it's passing through. Almost nothing survives that except for oxygen and nitrate. That's about it. Um
so we have very low DOC and then we have a lot of denitrification where um where the vados stone is thin and and much less where it's it's thick. um
a student at Stonybrook um provided a further hypothesis on why the um the unsaturated zone thickness would matter which has to do with um reintroduction of new oxygen into the
unsaturated zone when weather fronts move across a landscape. So you have 50 meters of air inside the pore spaces of some sand and gravel. you get a high pressure front coming through, it compresses that air column that
introduces new air with new oxygen. And then when the low pressure comes through, that springs back up and it refreshes the the air over time. You can imagine if you had a unsaturated zone that was only 2 meters, the degree to
which that spring would compress with those pressure fronts is going to be a lot less. And importantly, if that compression happens below the the O horizon and the organic rich parts of the soil, then you're adding new
oxygen into a sand column where there's no organic matter to consume that that oxygen later. So uh vadosone processes have important influence on redux conditions and therefore nitrogen speciation losses of
nitrogen in the aquifer primarily through denitrification. There's another process but it's not worth talking about. Loss is greater when the vados zone is thin the water table is shallow and smaller when the water table is deep. Vados zones are thickest on the
marine and near the marine and thinnest in the outwash plane near the coast. This might suggest greater nitrogen loss in aquifers from septic systems and watersheds that are near the coast um than from systems that are farther
away that have to transit through a thick unsaturated zone. Um but there's uncertainty in any one location in terms of how much nitrogen loss is going to occur until you go measure it. There's also, as this this committee knows,
there's a lot of uncertainty in groundwater transit times as well. So, we've been looking at groundwater transit time maps. Um, but we know there was a lot of uncertainty in how f how long it would take the plume from the wastewater treatment plant to reach Snug
Harbor in West Famouth Harbor. There were estimates and then those got longer over time as we're waiting for changes. is not it's maybe harder to to predict groundwater hydrarology than it is to predict the behavior of nitrogen I would
suggest. So um there is there is uncertainty in these things but I have this this map Don Walters a USGS provided for me when I was a grad student of the vadosone thickness the unsaturated soil thickness for this area
of Cape Cod and you can see that um up on the marine it's very thick and thins towards the outwash plane and and towards the coast and so that leaves us in a um maybe somewhat unexpected
position when we want to decide whether um whether to use distance from the coast as an indication of um how much nitrogen load we expect to the estuary from a partic particular septic system.
This is different, I'll note though, from the question of how much nitrogen is removed very near the the septic system in that plume that's close to close to it in the initial transit period. And I haven't looked at
literature on that recently. Um I'm not sure if if if that's been part of the discussion here. Um it's kind of a separate it's a separate issue. If there is significant nitrogen loss immediately in the young plume right after it's left
the septic system, then you would want to manage the septic systems that are very near the coast, whatever that number is. If it's 100 100 meters, 200 mters um but beyond that, a more
uh nuanced approach to managing based on proximity to coast, I would say there's a lot of um a lot of uncertainty in doing that. Excellent. >> Yeah, >> I think that's it. >> Yeah, we're just we're just really sort
of picking up and tackling, you know, what what's happening with the nitrogen and, you know, so you feel like I just got a master's uh course in uh what may or may not be happening. I don't know if anybody else >> can.
>> Well, I had a several things that I thought about first regarding West Felmouth Harbor. There's a that's a 100 foot thick dado zone the where the fa waste treatment plant is. >> Yeah. >> So it's not surprising that it's all
nitrate by the time it gets down to the water table. >> And it actually seems to take like 2 years or more to for that to transit that vados. >> Wow. Uh and I I think there's might be some
retardation in the some re retention. >> Mhm. um somehow >> yep >> in the bet zone so that even after you stop you know inputting
uh nitrogen it continues to kind of seep out >> because you know we found the based just on the time from the initiation of operations when they started spray irrigation at the
wastewater plant to when The well 19 saw the first increases in which is at the shore. Well 19 is a town well goes down approximately 80 ft right at the shore was 12 years.
>> So even though the groundwater flow model said it's a seven years >> it wasn't seven years. Uh and then once the uh they added the dnitrification
module and drastically reduced inputs from the plant from down to 3 milligrams per liter and a similar really slow response observed at the shore. and only in the last few
years have we really seen in that same well 19 >> you know meaningful declines. >> Um >> go ahead. >> So that's one observation just from that particular location >> but even in the areas where we have thin
what you probably would call thin betos zones. Mhm. >> Um I mean, you know, around Little Pond on the western shore of Little Pond, >> it's primarily nitrate. >> If you get into the peninsulas near the ocean,
you're getting ammonia. >> How thick is the veil of sun? >> Well, I assume maybe. So, that was going to be a question for you. How thick does it have to be before you get to nitrate? Say it's Say it's 10 or 15 feet. Yeah. So it's 15.
>> That's 3 m. >> 5 m. It's going to be in this range, right? >> Yeah. >> Yeah. So it's ramps up very quickly. >> Yeah. It's a steep slope. Yeah. Uh so for all intents and purposes I
think >> most places >> right and and your own data one of your other papers I I looked at and something like 70 to 80% of the total dissolved inorganic nitrogen was
typically on average was nitrate >> right so >> but there are locations where it's it's not >> yeah if you get down to well in again in the area that I'm most familiar with recently ly is that you know down the end of
uh Marav Vista Street there that's all that's almost 100% ammonia in our wells. >> Oh, is it? >> Yeah. >> Locally recharged. >> You get down if you get down deeper than a meter or two in the you're you're into
ammonia. >> But you're also into saline waters. So it's your observation about the relationship between salinity and >> is spot on there. >> Yeah. >> Um
but you uh the thing that I think we have to think about though is regardless of what the science says right is that D from the point of view of loading >> has taken a very conservative
>> attitude. We're not, you know, they're not going to give a lot of credit for attenuation because I think it's there's so much uncertainty about how much attenuation may or may not be occurring. So the whole MEP process really ignored
for the most part attenuation except for this number where they said if if the water enters a surface water body first >> yeah you get some >> then we're going to say 70% is lost >> right and that's the MEP model >> right >> right
>> even though Ivan's model says there should be some attenuation along the the flow path >> and I am from that camp. But I am looking at the data in a in a um an objective way
and it's quite obvious there's a lot more N2 gas with a it well sorry >> that's on log >> different question well yeah but it's but the main point is even where you have a thicker vados zone all of these points that are falling to the right of
the solid um solid uh symbols even where you do have a thick vados zone there's removal I mean those numbers on average are maybe 20 which would be you know a half a milligram maybe a little more. Um, so there there is
removal, there is denitrification, and >> I don't >> I know you I know and I'm just saying it's >> but I just don't think we get credit for it. And I don't think we will get credit for it because there's too much. It's it's like when you build a bridge, right? You don't build it
>> to be exactly the strength needed for N cars. You have a safety factor. >> Yeah. I mean this one as well losses at the seepage phase are obviously not in any of the the models but I I
not totally sure what that means. If the the model assumes more conservative transport and therefore a larger load than what we think is real and yet the estuaries are in whatever shape they're
in. Then maybe the The idea that we've been overestimating loads means we've been underestimating how sensitive the estuaries are. >> Well, that could be. So, you know, I came to the conclusion number of years ago, it really doesn't matter what the exact number for loading is as long as
we use consistent criteria, we know the impact on the estuaries. Yeah. >> Right. Uh the other thing one other point I would make is that almost all the areas where we have severe impacts along the south coast and the outwash plane very high
density housing very near the shore. So there's not much transit time and >> Mhm. >> uh thin vadosone comparatively thin but thick enough to get nitrate >> and there probably isn't time >> for a whole lot of denitrification
>> right >> uh and you know again again looking at what happened in the little pond system almost the response in the groundwater was within a year or two or three >> of when the sewers went online. It was
very rapid which frankly surprised me. But >> so, >> but actually that was consistent with some of the USGS modeling for that same peninsula. >> So, >> yeah. >> Anyway, those were my comments.
>> Good. Good. Other members of the board? >> Yes. I've got a couple of questions. If if you've got a saturated water column that's this thick
inland and it's becomes compressed because it's got salt water underneath it as it approaches the shore. What happens to the horizontal velocities of the groundwater under that condition is do you get jetting? >> It if if by jetting you mean
acceleration >> acceleration because you're compressing it vertically. Yeah, >> because it's trapped between the upper soil or the water table, the top of water table and the salt water that's underneath it. And then the other thing I'm thinking about is the effective
thickness of the vados zone is much greater than its vertical depth because the water particles are moving at an angle, right? None of them are moving vertically, right? And and the only mixing forces
there would be diffusion, right? There's no turbulent >> mixing. >> No turbulence. Uh just uh one point on that. Usually we assume that before water hits the water table, the motion is vertical.
>> It's vertical, right? Yeah. >> Yeah. >> So that's the that's the depth of zone and then it slides off horizontally. >> Yeah. >> Jonathan. Yeah. >> I guess I had a question on on the paper I read.
>> Okay. Maybe not exactly related to this because you focus on the vados zone here, but in the paper it seemed like there was um nitrogen loss through the friatic zone because as you go along the horizontal pathway of groundwater flow and in your example, you have about 5
kilometers of flow from the source to the the sink, you get a a you know a decrease um in the amount of nitrogen that's present. So as you get really close to the source of the injection of the nitrogen, by the time that's reaching
its final um depositional spot, you've lost 80% or so of the nitrogen. So clearly there are processes of attenuation, denitrification that are occurring in the aquifer. >> Yeah. >> How do I mean and and you focus in this case on just really the vad zone. So you
really have to put all that together to come up with what you think the final attenuation is going to look like along the flow path of the of of the water as it reaches its final resting spot in the esttoary. >> Yeah. Yeah. And you know I haven't I
haven't myself tried to reconcile this work which came after the work you're talking about which was the uh the valley plume and the westmouth harbor plume. Um I don't know exactly what the I mean you just mentioned in
west with harbor unsaturated zone zone is really thick. So why would we get removal there? I'm not I'm not really sure. Um it it may be you know it may be that what the way we think
about it is that the thickness of that unsaturated zone is a powerful control on the chemical conditions in the groundwater in that aquifer. So, it's going to influence both the rate and the extent of ditrification of nitrogen
removal, but that doesn't mean that it's it's going to prevent it altogether. So, even if you do have a thick unsaturated zone, and we see that in our thickest on Long Island, that unsaturated zone is um is quite thick. Where was that? Yeah. Up
to 50 meters. um uh you still get denitrification. So if you have a thick vados zone, a low rate of denitrification, but a very long flow path, then you're going to over
time you're going to remove some of that material. And there's, you know, we have to remember too that there's there's um organic matter or other chemically reduced compounds in the aquifer itself other than the organic matter we're introducing to the from the surface and
those can drive nitrogen loss as well. So I think um that would suggest that there's a there is an interplay between the idea that uh
um from areas farther from the coast here thick vados zone low rate of denitrification but very long flow path and therefore more time for that slower rate of denitrification to occur.
versus thinner vadosone and a faster rate of denitrification and a less time for it to occur. What the net of that is I don't know. Um >> well I think your paper shows it. I mean it it clearly you know the relationship
aren't you know the R squar isn't very good but the overall logarithmic curve fit to the data >> shows you're going from 80 to 20% nitrogen loss over that yeah >> you know four or five km flow path. So clearly things beyond the bet zone that are causing denitrification, significant
denitrification. >> Yep. And that had you probably remember and I don't I don't know what long what the length of that flow path was. >> Oh 5 kilometers. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. But when you're the shorter the flow path, the less nitrogen is lost.
It's intuitive that you know along the flow path you're getting ditrification. Then the longer flow path you're losing 80 to almost 100%. >> Yeah. So it's having a major role the friatic zone >> and that graph as you mentioned it's a has a logarithmic shape to it. There's a
wide spread >> closer to the source and then it narrows to a higher rate of loss farther from the source. The other thing that we don't know from that is what um what the water is encountering when it
gets farther from from the source could be encountering and mixing with water that's recharged from different locations. You know, it's because there's the continuous recharge on top of that water. >> And although mixing is limited, it's not
nil. It does happen, especially with a 5 km flow path. That's a long time. >> Mhm. Um, so that could be a factor as well, but you know, we don't have very many places with a 5 kilometer flow path. I
think >> it's common. >> Um, can you go back to your very I think it's your very first slide, the schemat diagram. >> First slide. Uh, that >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Okay. Now, there's only one house
here, but it's got some of the geometry I want to allude to. >> Okay. >> If there was another house further upstream over to your left >> Mhm. on the other projector. For instance,
is the affluent from that event. In addition to going through its independent path to get to here, does it then go in the same place to get to the estuary or is it underneath?
>> Uh because to the extent that it's in the same place >> Mhm. >> then you don't need any math or any chemistry. this simple logic to say that the stuff coming from further away has all the same things happening to it
that the stuff coming closer has plus the extra on its way to get there. >> Yeah. So, as you can see these lines that are curving once it hits the water table. What that's indicating is that
when when water hits the water table, it will immediately start to move mostly in a horizontal direction across that water table. And then when new water comes in on top of it, you add more layers, right? And the water that the older water gets deeper while new layers of
water get added on top. But there is mixing. It's not like they don't mix at all. There's a certain amount of mixing. And so that older plume from farther away, if it's pretty close to this house,
you know, could easily uh mingle to some degree with the plume from this house. particularly because this is one of the things that's complicates what we're talking about here too is the way the groundwater behaves in a developed landscape is different than it would in
a natural landscape. um working with the the USGS water office um in in Northboro. We did a study here on Eel Pond uh several years ago and then they did one a little bit farther out east and on Great Pond, I
guess, which I wasn't involved in. But there was a lot of discussion about whether plumes of water leaving a septic system are denser than than water in the ambient because they got a lot of salt in them, right? And so um they may they
may dive deeper through some of the native water that's there in which case predicting their behavior exactly is harder. Um, but we we saw features out on the um
Eel Pond, Eel River watershed right at the coast that were a little hard to understand, including some extremely high nitrate concentrations that uh wasn't clear where they came from. >> Well, it's impressive work and the chemistry is way over my head, but
>> thank you. >> There's so much variation. I I don't Is there any way we could use any rule of thumb from this in designing and and you can't say more research is needed? >> No, I'm not going to say that. I don't
even do this anymore. So >> decision any any value we get from this. Yeah. >> We have to get now. >> Yeah. Yeah. Understood. So I mean I think if it were me and I were just coming up with something, I would think
about the houses that are very close. And um we could look at the literature. I haven't done that, but uh the the reason the Valella model talked a lot about the houses closest to the coast
was because there was an understanding based on the literature that was used to develop that model that in the plume immediately after the septic system, there's a particularly high rate of denitrification. So, you wouldn't want to truncate that
and put septic systems right on the coast, right? Because then that just goes straight in with no chance to be attenuated. But, uh, so how far in to go, I don't know. I don't know if it's 100 meters, 200 mters. It would be worth looking at the
literature on that. There's a lot coming out of that. There used to be a lot coming out of Canada on that on that topic. Um, and then beyond that, if you were me, I I would treat them all the same because
because there is a lot of variability um and maybe um interacting and counteracting um processes. Again, transit time versus
rate of denitrification going to make it hard to predict. Anybody in the audience have a question? Okay. >> I have a >> Okay, Jen got his hand up before you,
but you're next. Peter Hargraves, Precinct 9. I'm so out of my element here, but trying to reduce it to the things a citizen can grab on to. I'm wondering if what's been said a couple of times and the last thing that
was said means that we have to question how worthwhile it is to put IAS into systems that are miles away from the shoreline. >> Thank you. >> Jed, not a bad take away.
>> I you need to step up to the microphone. >> I know. I'm just trying to think whether I should um I actually I I think I I think for regulatory reasons I cannot speak >> quum >> because there are >> board of health. >> There's we have a quorum on the board of health here. So I can't >> you're not I think you're I think you're
fine because you're not you're not you're not you guys aren't discussing or debating something that's a border of health issue. You're going to stand up as a citizen to talk to this conversation. You can't at least at least my my opinion would be you're not >> you're also in public. You're not hiding
it. You're not having a secret meeting of the three of you. >> And I could leave because I think I think it's okay. >> It's your choice. I'm just saying >> Well, that's more of a comment to this. All right. Fine. >> Yeah. I think I
>> Jed Goldstone Precinct 2 and we we'll caution Kevin not to respond to your comment. >> It's fine. Um this is this is so so I want to actually agree with Peter that this is actually this is a hund00 million question >> as at least a hund00 million well no the
the immediate question of how many IAS to put in it's about a hund00 million question so this is not a this is not a trivial difference from what the MEP the the debate over the MEP model or or using
the mo the most accur accurate most recent data and and science to support a very very expensive decision and plan. And so I just want to encourage you when thinking about this to not to to think about it as a hundred
or a $150 million question and to put it to the state that way. not not to to put it to the state that you know the difference between a model that was developed 25 years ago and one that is more accurate
is not a trivial question. I would just I this is like the first meeting where we've kind of asked to this this board to get information on what's happening beyond the the past models which were very static. each home
has this number times this expected whatever. We're now trying to take it to another level because we recognize we're going to be making decisions about how fast and where IAS go in and we're trying to get as much of an
understanding of what's truly going on. And um just hold hold your words for one second. You know, the next piece we're going to pick up right here is going to at least touch upon what some other communities have done, you know, in terms of border health regulations,
which are don't appear from anything I can look at to be sort of scientifically based. They're just like 100 sounds good or 150 sounds good or 50 sounds good, you know. And so we're recognizing you guys have done, you know, on the board of health. You put a putting a
regulation out there. >> It's it's not the last regulation I think you're going to have to put out. So we're trying to get a conversation going. This is to me it's phenomenal. I hadn't even thought about everything going on in the VTO zone and and and some of what you just said to us
tonight. It's kind of an eye openener about you know you know I would have thought you know a deeper soil column would be better and what you're saying is no you you want it it it keeps working and doing something but really the shallow one is in terms
of the whatever. So um that's where I'm at. Go ahead Steve. Well, I like Jed's comment and I think the obvious response to it is to ask everybody what about the following approach.
If the totally conservative approach was to put in let's to keep the numbers simple 100 IAS that's representative of many more over 20 years. Then if you divi if
you draw lines around the estuaries moving further and further out in increments of 120th of the total amount and you start near the shore and each of those 20 years you put in that many IAS
until either the 20 years is up or you've noticed that the estuary is clean or is obviously going in the direction of clean. Is there anything wrong with that? >> It's a concept. Concepts are not wrong.
>> All right. If >> if can I respond to one of the comments or no? >> Absolutely. >> So, just miss Mr. Hargraves. Uh, so I just want to be clear that this bottom right graph, bottom left graph here shows very little in the way of
nitrogen removal in the watershed. And that one is similar to something up on the other side of 151. Okay, it's up towards the marine high.
Not much nitrogen removal. This one is more like something out closer to the estuaries. in the top left has a huge amount of nitrogen removal and it's it's like uh
like the areas in red with the thin vados. So, I don't know that we have science to tell us that there's no reason to put an IIA on a system north of 151 and there's every
reason to put one on a system south of 28. We don't have any data to tell us that that's better. And I think that some of the picking numbers out of the air that you were talking about, Steve, uh, I mean, I saw the one from maybe it was Chesapeake Bay
where there was 30% assumed loss. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> 50% 80%. Those definitely are made up numbers. There's no way that those are >> basing that other communities around here, you know, Tisbury, other places, Mashby, they've had their own board of health
setback regulation. One of the things that we'll get to see over the next several years is in places where you know Tisbury's put it in you know then we're going to start get to count how many homes been been converted over in Tisbury where are they located is there a change in the nitrogen concentration
in the receiver you know we're going to be able to maybe reverse engineer or reverse you know if you say oh there's you know 200 homes went in around whatever in Tisbury you know x distance fly distance and the
you know the nitrogen numbers have dropped down and it's kind of like what happened in um little pond Ken you know uh you know you get you have some great little things showing the the ch the changes in time right >> as a function of of sewering >> we're going to I think over the next few
years because people are doing this now it's slow but it's starting to happen we will be able to see and that will help too because we got a 20-year period to put things into place we're going to get watershed plans and the wershed plans are going to recommend things in fiveyear increments. You know what that'll be, whether it's, you know,
something new every year for 20 years or whether it's something new every 5 years or what it is. The watershed plan is going to pop some of that stuff out over the course of this year. >> And then as we implement that those things, >> hopefully because a couple communities are ahead of us on the watershed planning, particularly when you get down
to the Orleans end where they've, >> you know, they they're doing certain things already, you know, we can start to see how water bodies are responding. We'll go from watching things get worse to seeing things get incrementally better. I hope so. >> Yeah. >> You know, anyways, that's that that's my
two cents. Okay. Um I think we'll move on to Kristen. Thank you so much. Um >> pleasure. Yeah. >> Good talk. I promise mine is not nearly as technical. But it's technical.
>> Kristen Raftton, ScienceWarses. Um, so what I put together is a very, very broad overview of um, the concept of IIA buffer zones or septic setbacks. Um, as Steve said, what other communities are currently doing as far as
implementation, other communities that have similar um, characteristics to Felmouth and Cape Cod. So for the purposes of this discussion, the buffer zone is a distance from a surface water body with which within a
septic upgrade would be required or sewer if it's available. So buffer zone distances are typically based on groundwater travel time, soil perme permeability, how much nitrogen attenu attenuation is possible, the local
hydraology or as Steve has said any round number pulled from the sky. Um so some of the common threshold buffer zones range anywhere from 150 ft to a,000 ft um for any wetland resource
area. So that includes all surface waters. So not just your title surface waters. So within 100 100 feet that's covered under the wetlands protection act. Anything beyond that is a local or regional regulation.
So some of the towns around here that have implemented buffer zones they have a buffer zone between 150 ft and 500 ft. They have also stated that there will be no new systems within 150
feet. But in that 150 ft to 500 foot buffer zone, that applies to new construction, increase in flow or any failed system that's being replaced. That applies to any surface water again. So not just tidal waters. So rivers, streams, lakes, ponds. And their
performance standard for that regulation is 19 or better. In MASHP P, their buffer zone is within 1,000 ft. They've got new construction, increased flow or any other installation or upgrade of a system.
And they are also any surface water. But beyond that, pretty much any wetland resource area. So any bordering vegetated wetland, salt marsh, inland coastal banks. Um the buffer is 1,000 ft for all of those. Performance level of
19 or better. in Tisberry, they have what they call the watershed district. Um, which is pretty much whatever portion of the equivalent NSA is out there that's not in a sewer area.
Um, so that is their triggers are new construction, any replacement or upgrade of an existing system, increase in flow or property transfer. So again, that's anywhere in the watershed district that's not in a proposed sewer area. and their performance criteria is 13 or
better or showing 75% nitrogen reduction. The town of Barnstable has a committee that meets about monthly um which the initial goal of the committee was to advise for updating the CWMP but they are talking
about all of these IIA regulations and watershed plans out there. That committee is proposing to town council a thousand foot buffer zone outside of their planned sewer areas. And their planned sewer areas have been well defined for quite some time. They
haven't defined any triggers, but from what they've looked at that thousand foot has the potential to impact 2100 properties. Um they are also looking at any surface water. So again, not just tidal surface water and they are
sticking to whatever happens to be on the best available nitrogen reducing technology list. So Long Island again similar to Cape Cod conditions out in East Hampton, they have defined sensitive environmental
zones. So they claim to be defined by groundwater travel time and the proximity to the surface water. and they say that generally covers properties within a thousand feet. I didn't find any science behind why they ended up there. But that applies to new
constructions, any expansions or system failures. Again, it's roughly 1,000 ft from any surface water body. And the criteria on Long Island is 19 or better. Brook Haven, their buffer zone is 500 ft, which is new construction or a
substantial renovation. all surface waters and a performance level of 19. So the Chesapeake Bay has done a little bit more work, not necessarily has all the science behind it, but they also have 1,000 ft of surface waters, but
they also have 200 to 500 ft of any open channel MS4. So that's the combined sewer storm water systems. Their triggers are new construction and any system replacement again all surface waters. So their performance criteria is
5 mg per liter. If you're between 100 and 200 ft and anything from 200 to 1,000, it's 10 milligrams per liter. >> What do they use to get five? >> Yeah, I was wondering the same >> the same place they get the numbers from that.
>> Um I don't know what their top system is off the top of my head. >> We ought to find out. >> Yes. Um, I'm sure it's not one that's used in Massachusetts clearly. Um, for Falmouth, our new regulation is
anywhere within a nitrogen regulated area and it's for new construction and substantial renovation. >> No, not substantial renovation. >> Okay, I take that back. >> So, we cross that off. >> Yeah, you can cross new flow. >> New flow.
>> New flow. Whoops. >> New construction. um within the nitrogen regulated area. Those are the nitrogen sensitive areas, any nitrogen impaired watershed, that's on the 303D list, districts of clear critical planning concern, public and
private water supply protection areas, natural resource protection areas, drinking water resource protection overlay, and town of Falmouth is 10 milligrams per liter or less. So, as I said, Chesapeake Bay has done a
little bit more trying to put some science behind it. So, the paper that I sent to the committee, this is one of the tables that came from it. The state of Maryland has agreed to these nitrogen delivery factors for what they're using
for their modeling. So, they say within 1,000 ft of tidal waters, you get 80% nitrogen delivery. So that's pretty much equivalent to what we use up here. We apply a 25% attenuation factor to all of
our septic systems. Um, from the MEP report, >> is this is delivery one minus the attenuation in the ground or is it something about the IIA? If the if if the >> all probably if the concentration
>> going into the the subsurface absorption system is 85 milligrams per liter they're saying 80% of that 85 milligrams per liter is going to get to the water body. >> It's 20% attenuation. >> Yeah. So it is it is one minus the attenuation. >> Right. Yes.
>> Yes. So they're saying 20% attenuation here. We say 25% attenuation for title 5. So they say within 1,000 ft of other waters non-title you get the 50% attenuation. So that's again if you're
freshwater you've got the pond attenuations. Um and greater than 1,000 ft from any water they're saying that there is a 70% attenuation. So a 30% delivery. So again I did not do anything in depth.
This was just very high back of the envelope. So Cape Cod, the groundwater velocities are typically cited at 1 to two feet per day. In general, if you look at the watershed delineations and where your less than 10 year travel time
line is, which was delineated by USGS, and you draw a line from the surface water, and you divide that by 10 for a rough estimate, knowing that it's really not proportional in there, you get about a foot to two feet per day. I've also
seen local ranges cited at anywhere from a half a foot to 2 and 1/2 ft per day. So for the next round, those are the ranges that I use. So kind of more on the extreme ends. So if Falmouth were to
put a,000 ft buffer zone on any surface water only within the D designated nitrogen sensitive areas. This is what the map looks like. So you have almost 16,000 parcels that are in
those in 1,000 ft of any surface water. When you take out the ones that are already sewered or plan to be sewered, you have about 10,600 remaining. So if you look at the groundwater velocity, again, the half a foot to 2 and 1/2 ft.
Your travel time roughly could be capturing at a th00and feet anywhere from 1.1 years up to five years and less. So from the surface water that that parcel is near to not to the estuary
if you look at 500 ft buffer zone because why not? That's a nice round number as well. Um >> I like your logic science. I mean, a couple years ago, we looked at 300 ft. So, why not pick a new number?
So, 500 ft. Um, you see, we're down to about 10,000 parcels instead of 16,000 parcels. When you look at what is proposed for sewing or already sewered, we're back to another 6,600 parcels, which is the same number that we came up
with in the geo boundaries of number of IAS. >> Yep. >> So, I had a question. This seems to be the same as the geo boundary exercise in a way. >> In a way, except the geo boundary like up here in Great Pond where you got Kuna Messet and Jenkins Pond, those weren't
part of the geo boundaries because the geo boundaries started from the estuary and went north. Um, so this is any surface water then also including Kunameset River, um, any of those ponds, but it is very similar.
>> You're not you're not wrong. I don't think what you've correct me if I'm wrong but I don't believe you've yet said okay if all of these parcels got IAS and these areas got sewed per the comprehensive wastewater management plan >> what would be the short what would be
the shortfall that we would not make the TMDL right next questions >> right there's no evaluation of this >> because that was what was nice about the geo boundary approach is that it was tied to the loading >> right I'm getting there >> okay >> patience um So if you're looking at
parcels that are 500 ft away using the half a foot or 2 and 1/2 foot per day of travel time um that's anywhere from 6 months to 2.7 years of travel time from the to the respective surface water.
Again that is not anything actually evaluated. That's just a very rough estimate. So what I did to Ken's point back earlier this year there was funding from the natural resources nitrogen sensitive area for a couple of
wersheds. One of the wersheds that was looked at uh was the cluster of Meganset Fiddler's Cove and Rans Canal. within that funding project. Um, GHD calculated updated
septic nitrogen loads for all of those estuaries. And what I did was took that to how much nitrogen removal had to be done to meet the TMDL for today's water use numbers.
So the parcels in light green are parcels within 500 ft of a surface water. So that includes um the ponds and the estuary. This blue, this dusty blue
color, that is what came out of the grant funding of what parcels would be needed to upgrade to IAS. if you were also considering the alternatives. So the shellfish, the fertilizer and the
storm water credits. So the red areas, those come from the surveys that marine and environmental services did as far as shellfish suitability. So those are the areas that are currently being pursued as part of
the townwide aquaculture plan. So I also looked at it on a subwatershed basis. The MEP has the recommendations of how much should be removed from certain subwaterheds. So that's why
placement may look odd, but the parcels in light blue, if you get all of the other alternative credits, is what would be needed to meet the TMDL under current data for the >> Let's just just stay where you were for
a second. So that graphic is saying that under a watershed plan roughly half of the area if we just arbitrarily use 500 ft would need to go to IAS. So forcing everybody to put IAS in just based upon
500 ft for at least this location is overkill. >> Yes. >> Thank you >> Kristen. while you're on that again because the disparity between the two branches of Rain's Canal >> really stand out here. So
>> with the shellfish and the fertilizer credits and because you have Cedar Lake that does a tremendous attenuation potential with all of those alternatives, you don't need to do anything on the North Fork to meet the TMDL
>> according to the numbers. people decide. I mean, you're going to have people on the southern side of things here pretty unhappy that they're next door neighbors. >> That's the poster child for the fairness argument. >> Yep. Um
>> dying. >> And again, it's >> you've got the subwhed lines in there. Yeah. >> Just following what those lines tell you. >> Yeah, I'm I'm watching them. Um so if you look at basically what the updated
geo boundary so the contingency plan would be without any alternatives. So no fertilizer, no storm water, no shellfish again on a per subwaterhed. So it's the same parcels in light green that are the
500 ft boundary. The dusty blue is what you need to achieve the TMDL for both forks. and this purple color, which is what the original color is, but when you put it on green, it means dusty blue. Um, those are additional parcels that
you would need to get to the TMDL for the Southern Fork because of the subwaterheds that they fall into. Um, and that's specifically, you know, these are in different subwaterheds than these are, which is why these ones
aren't included. Um, so that's what it looks like for this watershed. So, as I said and as Kevin said and everyone has said, there's the scientific rationale for establishing certain buffer zones seems to be lacking
or it's really really hard to find what was used for establishing the regulations. a one-sizefits-all approach. So 500 feet, thousand feet may not be appropriate for every watershed, but every watershed could certainly benefit
in some way from a standardized buffer zone. It may not be enough to meet the TMDO. It could be overkill. Um, each wershed pretty much needs that individual evaluation. Can >> Can you backtrack to your draft? Uh,
come back one more there. Good. Um, you know, you you you chose 500, but if that to me looks like that might, you know, if the if the initial number was 200 or 250, you might be not overshooting
by too much. I mean the >> it depends whether people follow the fertilizer reduction and whether people whether the shellfish die that year or Right. >> Understood. But you know the board of
health is going to at some point have to wrestle the outcome of the watershed plans and um we'll see where we'll see where that all goes. Okay. Uh I'm going to start all the way at the firing. Jonathan. >> Um, yeah, I get back to Kevin's paper
and and the data and when you're unfortunately his his data ends at 3,000 ft away. So all these limits are much closer,500, but the spread he gets is from zero to roughly 45% attenuation.
That's that's real data. So, I understand what you're trying to do here, and that makes a lot of sense in terms of meeting the TMDL. It almost says you don't need a buffer. It's like, what do I need to do to get the nitrogen down so I I meet the the scorecard that
we have to achieve. Yep. >> And by putting numbers, buffers in that's almost causing the problems where, you know, people are within a buffer, but one part of the watershed has to do it, the other part doesn't. Then there's a lot of explanation that has to occur, a lot of education of the
people as to why, you know, the neighbor's spending $45,000 and and I don't have to spend anything. >> Yep. >> You know, so but the bottom line is you're trying to get to a TMDL and a contingency versus a non-contingency set of plans. >> Yep. >> Irrespective of what the buffer is.
>> Couple couple ideas. The definition of an alternative is anything that's not sewering or a septic upgrade. Is that correct? all of our alternatives that we've all talked about. >> And this is
half serious and half not serious. >> But >> are we supposed to be able to tell which >> I'm not going to smile during the serious part? >> 50% smile, >> right? But we could solve a lot of explaining
and not worry about a lot of science by deciding what our TMDL reduced need is in each watershed. And given our citizensry fund is for something called Powerball and Megaillions,
we could have a lottery and whatever the lottery blesses your property with travels with the deed. And think how that would simplify explaining to people that are on the edge of their seat wondering why do I
have to do this? And my brother-in-law is laughing to himself over here, and I'm being unserious here, that he doesn't have to spend 45 or what in a few years is going to be 65 or $85,000 because it's not going to get cheaper. It's only going to get more expensive. But anyway, just I I want to throw that
wild card into the >> Oh, I appreciate that. >> into the deck for discussion. >> Go ahead, Steve. You're next. >> Um, another plug for my one year at a time for 20 year plan. first because I think Jed made a really
good point and because I don't think gambling is better than rational fairness. Um, if you do it in 21-year tranches, the rate of installation per year is the
same as four fiveyear tanches because in the fiveyear tanches, you're not going to all put them in the first year or the fifth year. You've got to spread it out from just because of the limit by the number of plumbers and back cooperators.
And if you do it every year, you increment it. You start with the ones really close who are getting the most benefit because they have the waterfront property and where you think you're going to get the biggest effect and generally expensive
houses too. So it's sort of a a socioeconomic fairness angle, but but also you get your scientific data every year. You especially that first group >> where it's going to get into the the not
get into the uh estuary very fast. your measurements in the estuary will be available right away and you and then even the second group is not that much further away and you can begin to plot all kinds of wonderful graphs and begin
to predict where you're going to stop. Whereas if you do it in fiveyear increments that okay you have to wait for the five years to end and then a couple years to value the data and by that time you're already the second five years you're
halfway through the whole thing. That's all the um the the fertilizer component. Um, so that's assuming that across the entire watershed
there's a fertilizer regulation that's reducing fertilizer loadings to all the parcels in that area, right? >> Yep. Um, you probably don't know the number off the top of your head, but be interested to find out to be able to start to
quantify the the overall value of a fertilizer rule in terms of these number of pounds come out, you know, the the total cost whether it's, you know, 100 parcels at 45,000 versus 400 parcels at 45,000, you
know, because the the fertilizer credit is real, but it's extremely difficult to implement because people are will fight it at the state house level tooth and nail. Um, the one place where they've sort of done this is down
Cape where they had a couple of big golf courses that they were able to convince to change and people are trying to monitor where that's at and if they're being effective. But um you know I'm just thinking that of things that we look at over the next several months, one of them might be to choose one of
these little areas and try to quantify, you know, what does it mean for fertilizer reduction and and what's the sort of benefit, you know, the dollar benefit inside that because >> I think we're going to need to be working really hard to educate people
about why a beautiful lawn is allowed to turn brown in August cuz it's hot out and it as it rained >> saves saves water, saves fertilizer. >> Person and I exchanged emails about what last month before I had to go away and we talked about the Cape Cod Country
Club and did some calculations on how much I think it was 215 kg per year of nitrogen that's not going to be delivered. And then if you take 2.7 kilograms of nitrogen per house from an IIA, you can calculate how many homes will not have to um go to IIA because
we're having less nitrogen being delivered by the golf course fertilization. It's probably the most quantitative thing that I've done. >> Yeah. And and and we learned today that because that golf course is so far away from the estuaries we're concerned about. >> Yeah. >> It it it'll help the ponds
uh over time, but probably not the estuary. Okay. So um just no I'm trying I'm trying to march down here quick. Aren't the golf courses required to use slow release so-called organic fertilizers?
>> I think the answer is >> I think in Felmouth they are >> the answer is yes. >> Yeah but I think still the nitrogen is going to go down. >> Yeah but it changes the >> they're putting 25% attenuation in there or 75% attenuation only 25% nitrogen is
credited. Let's let's let's keep main conversations going. >> Yeah, there there's a lot to digest here, but to think about what are we trying to accomplish as a community, as a committee, an advisory board uh to the
select board which would set policy. All those existing mandates from other communities that you showed as examples, their impact probably will be as Falmouth's is the order of magnitude of a 100 systems a
year. Not very many. Um and there are currently surprisingly over 3,000 IAS on Cape Cod. some good, some not so good, and some
useless. But that's that's a huge number. There's something like over 700 on Nantucket. But all these new mandates aren't going to move the needle very much and therefore will not impact the estuaries very much in my lifetime,
maybe in yours, but this is a very very slow process and may not work and to the satisfaction of D. I think it's important to remember that the D default that really started people and communities thinking about watershed
planning is you don't do something every house on that town will have to put in an IA and born kicking and screaming was finally dragged into the realization they better get on and submit a notice of intent that they will do watershed
planning otherwise everybody would have 5 years to put an IIA in the town of Borne. So that default mandate still hanging out there. We're going to do within the next year a watershed plan to cover the
all the estuaries as I understand it and say here's what we intend to do as our 20-year plan. And it'll be some sewering. It will say something about IAS and it may just simply say we will be evaluating on a rolling basis IIA
mandates. But if the mandates aren't accelerated to do more sooner, then the only thing that's going to help estuaries is the sewering. And that's, as we know, a very expensive and very
tedious long process. Within the next year, we'll start digging for great pond phase one. And then probably 8 10 years down the road, we might be doing Great Pond phase two. And in that interim, we
might have done 500 to a,000 IAS, but I think that's an optimistically high number given the current mandate. So, we need to think about what we're trying to accomplish. The bottom line is to clean up the estuaries. And if we don't do it
effectively and the state's not seeing the results, they will drop the hammer. And even more importantly than that, we won't have clean estuaries for our children, grandchildren, and whoever come after us. So that's my pitch to
think about where we're trying to get and how this it almost seems to me like we're we're trying to delay it and kick that can down the road and the can will not get any cheaper and go any further if we don't move quicker.
Um, that's all I want to say now. >> Ed, I did not know you were an optimist. >> Well, what can >> So, you know, I think we can debate forever
uh you know exactly how much the loading will be reduced by doing strategy X Y or Z. Um, which is why I think somewhere along the line in the MEP process they said, "Okay, we're not going to worry
too much about the exact amount of attenuation. We'll give you some credit if the water goes into a surface water body and that's it." uh and probably why uh I think the EP might be skeptical about fertilizer reductions because how
do you enforce it and and etc. So I guess my question we started on this route which I thought was very good of these uh watershed plans that were grounded in
the idea of meeting the TMDL. How much do you have to do to meet the TMDL and work backwards from the shore? You know, X amount of properties, >> the contingency plans we saw over the last, >> right? X amount of properties are sewed. That's clear. We're we have a pretty
clear sewing plan. I think it makes a lot of sense. >> Uh and then if we also do this many homes on IAS, we get there. Uh and we gave some credit for shellfish as I recall. I don't know if we did much for fertilizer >> in the geo boundaries. None of the
alternatives were considered because that was a contingency plan. >> Contingency plan says you can't, you know, if at year five you're not getting the reductions predicted from shellfish and permeable reactive barriers and storm water etc etc. The D is going to
say you have to go implement. >> How do they know if you're getting the reductions? >> That's a different question. >> Right. So the other thing that pops into my mind uh and and Steve you were talking about this is you know sort of adaptive
approach as we add more homes how much is do we see reduced in the nutrient inputs that you only know that if you measure it right uh >> measure >> there's there's no monitoring
plan that is routinely part of any of I thought there's an annual monitoring of >> of the surface water. Yes. Of the surface water. But that's not necessarily telling you. >> That's the bottom line. >> It is the bottom line. But that that can
take a very long time to respond. If you you know that might take 15 or 20 years you or for you to see if you know you've reduced the groundwater by x amount and you've met your loading standard that
way uh then the rest of it is waiting for the ecosystem to you know what a little >> right that's that's kind of my point is maybe that should be part of what we're thinking about at the same time >> I mean all of those systems your your presumption that there is not going to
be any monitoring as a bad >> No, I'm not presuming that. I'm just saying it's necessary >> if you if you in the watershed plan and what they talk about is there is an obligation to do monitoring. >> Okay. So, as the watershed plans developed, there's going to be some
>> chance to give input as to what is an effective monitoring plan. Okay. So, that's I just want to be clear that we're not doing certain monitoring now, but the wershed plan is going to obligate us to do it. the watershed plan will I like the geo boundaries and just adding to that
adaptive management and how far out in the geo boundaries we go will be tied to response of some x y or z. >> Yeah. Okay. All right. Audience comments questions the audience. Okay. Steve um time out
doctor George Topoulos and I'm not representing the board of health. >> Just state what precinct you're in then you're a citizen. >> I think three. >> Okay, good. >> I vote at the high school. So I I think that >> Google knows.
>> Yes. Well, my son often says, "Dad, if only there was a way we could find out." Uh so I first I have a question about fertilizers. Um are you is are the the regulations you're talking about are for households as well as golf courses and such. I mean
there already is a regulation in phalmus for um but if we don't know if no one knows how much fertilizer is being used you have no I now you have no idea what regulating it how much reduction you're
going to see. So inside inside the MEP model there was a presumption you know based upon a broad view of how people fertilize or use fertilizer. It's not down to specific lots or whatever >> here but the MEP model had atmospheric
nitrogen fertilizer nitrogen storm water nitrogen septic nitrogen. Did I miss any anything Kristen? Those are the big four. Right. >> Right. So, so the model has got something built in for that. And I think Kristen just when she was doing this,
she sort of said, well, you know, here's another >> little bit we can, >> you know, just >> potentially. Yeah. >> But it's a came from blue numbers essentially. >> It's it's sounds like >> it's a number from other
>> that somebody else pulled from was not specific to any. And then uh in terms of having a lottery, I think most of the public is going to view the watershed plans as sort of a lottery in lottery in
that you're going to come up with a number of the number of houses and then you're going to draw some lines as to where those houses are going to be. Uh, I just to emphasize what Stephen
said before. I think this emphasizes the fairness question. And if you distribute the cost of everything that's going to be done as part of this, then the neighbors are the same whether they sewer,
do nothing, or put in an IIA. And as Ed said, if we don't get on this, our greatg grandandchildren aren't going to see any difference in what's happening. >> Thank you, Steve. You had another comment.
>> Yeah. At the risk of bringing up a whole another thing. >> Don't do it. >> There are these things. >> Take a break. >> There are these things called freshwater ponds. Um, did did I hear Kevin say that if the nitrogen laden groundwater first
goes into a surface water, which for instance a fresh pond, and then goes in a stream down to an estuary, it's 70% attenuated. >> Kristen knows because she she's brought this up multiple times about
>> so >> this going through this water >> just for clarity. Yeah, I didn't say anything about >> Oh, sorry. utility >> in the MEPs the some of the ponds they actually studied and assigned a databased attenuation
um others they arbitrarily assign a 50% attenuation for freshwater >> because to the extent that that's a large percent it tells you that it's a waste of time to put things around freshwater pond to the extent that Kim
Kmart is here it would drive the people that live there nuts if we went along that. >> Well, don't forget that's for >> it's a conflict of interest that we need to address. >> Yeah, we're working on it. >> Okay. Any more comments?
>> Thank you. This was uh again thoughtprovoking. >> Yes. you know, just to help everybody who who is in the audience and or maybe watching this at 4:00 in the morning because they can't sleep. It's on M MTV or whatever
we have, whatever we have. So, the estuaries that are on the Buzzards Bay side are by and large areas that we're not going to have any increase in sewer potential for. Whereas as the outfall
keeps progressing forward, there is a potential to expand the areas that will be sewer for the south facing user which again would impact the extent of IAS that have to go in. So there's kind of two distinct groups of estuaries um that
we keep looking at. Um Kristen chose the the rand canal one because a the scale of it is pretty easy to work with right now. Um, and the number of variables are probably more manageable. Uh, >> we had updated numbers, too.
>> All right. The next item on our agenda um is a recommendation to support the board of health memorandum on fair distribution of cost and boundless efforts to meet water quality targets. We had something
on this before. It went back for a rewrite. I got a email uh midafter afternoon from Ken who has um some thoughts on this. So, do you want to start off Ken with where you're at on this?
>> This was the uh letter about fairness. >> Yes. >> Well, I just thought it was uh overly wordy and indirect and could have been stated more succinctly, but I like the overall sentiment of it. Right. So,
not wanting to violate the open meeting law, I only sent it to Kristen and you. >> Correct. >> But I did produce um I mean I can send you my revision. >> I'll give I'll
>> give this one to Steve because >> I I might make this sort of suggestion. Um so two two members of the board can communicate. the other. Steve, >> you can have this one if you want. >> But I guess what I would say is, you know, >> three copies.
>> We don't have to vote on this tonight. We could table this. Okay. >> Yeah. >> Steve, you can look at what he wants. >> Can I say something first? >> Yep. Let me finish saying >> and then we can bring it back up at the next meeting. Okay. >> We do not have >> I'm not saying okay till I get to say something.
>> Okay. Go ahead. Um, uh, there was an original version of this. I sent it to, uh, Tom and Ken because they're our best editors. They came back with some good suggestions. We put it
in. It came up at a meeting. Ed ha Ed had a substantial objection about sewers. I let him put in everything he wanted to there. And uh then you send it to Amy. She made
some changes. We put those in. The whole point of this is not to make the decisions. It's simply to alert the select board that as soon as possible, they should appoint some sort of
committee, which might be this one or a subset of this one, right, >> to look into this area. So I really don't want to waste time. um arguing over even another delay on the
just for grammar purposes. >> No, is to get it to the select board as soon as possible. >> I agree with you. It wasn't just for grammar. Um and when I got here, I showed it to Ed. >> Can I say that you thought it was okay?
I I didn't see a great deal of difference between Ken's thoughts and what you and I, Steve, had agreed to. Steve Leighton, not you, Steve Rafferty. >> Um, and submitted and then Amy put some
things in. I think we're there. So, I think that your version be uh passed right now. >> I'm sorry. I make a motion that we vote on the most recent version from Ken. >> I have read it.
I think you got to read it. Chris, could can we put up Kristen? >> He's made he's made a motion. Is there a second? >> Sure, I'll second it. >> Okay, >> I wrote it. >> There's been a motion made and seconded to send a letter
on fairness to the board of selectmen. I really do want to read it. But yeah, discussion. >> So So >> does anybody want to have any discussion on this >> discussion? Can can we put up the version that was there prior to Ken's
comments tonight that was an input of Mr. Leighton and myself and Amy had some things and that I don't see a great deal of difference. But if we could put that up, people take a look at it and then I don't know if you can put up Ken's
and then we could vote. >> I think I sent it to you, didn't? >> Yep. They're both up at the moment. So, this is the original one that went around as a meeting item on Monday, >> right? And I Okay, so that's what I was responding to. And I wasn't trying to
change the meaning of anything. I just thought it could be stated with about half the words. >> I just read it and I have no problem with it. >> So Ken's version.
This is Ken's version without any of the edits, >> but with all the typos. >> Yeah. Well, you have to fix. >> You're going to do a clean copy, right? This is This is the clean. That's That's mine. That's the original. >> Do you need an extra?
>> Did you Did you have something? >> So, here's the difference. That's the red line version. Flip it over and I accepted all the changes. That's what it looks like. >> So, so for everybody's benefit, the the document currently before us for a vote says to the town of Falmouth select
board from the water quality management committee. The water quality management committee supports the recent memo from the board of health to the Falmouth select board, urging the select board to find the fairest way to spread the cost of sewers and IAS among the town's property owners.
Falmouth's efforts to restore the health and well-being of our coastal and payments will be expensive, but are necessary and benefit our entire town. However, an inequitable distribution of costs among property owners in Felmouth could reduce support for the town's
nitrogen reduction and watershed planning efforts. The water quality management committee or a subcommittee of the water quality management committee volunteers to serve as the designated group to examine and evaluate options for fairly distributing and easing the financial burdens of
implementing wastewater mitigation. Such a subcommittee should also include representatives from the finance committee, the board of selectmen, and the board of health. We acknowledge that no plan can be perfectly fair due to varying property characteristics, property owner circumstances,
implementation time frames, and the complexity of the expected overall watershed plan. However, the committee should endeavor to prepare a fair and simple financing plan that accounts for factors including hardware, installation, connection, operating
costs and sewer fees, as well as tax credit credits, residential tax exemptions, low interest loans, betterments, and direct and indirect benefits and costs to property owners. Finally, any cost sharing or financing plans should be created concurrently
with the development of the watershed plan so that the finance plan can be integrated with the rest of the town's long-term capital budget and to win community support. >> I move we accept that as displayed up there. And I think Well, was that your
motion already? >> The motion's been made. >> That's right. That was your motion. Come on. I just We're procedurally motion's been made. >> Seconded by Ken and we want to discuss I just wanted rather than having people try to read the thing off the screen or people are at home. >> I like what you did there.
>> Um I would make a friendly can I make a friendly amendment or somebody else have to do that? I just the second there are three paragraphs. The second paragraph the last sentence such a subcommittee should also include. I would prefer to
change that to could also include. >> Well, we're making a recommendation and if we think it should be a certain way, we should say should. >> I agree. >> I want to leave that up to the select board. >> Well, aren't they looking to us for advice? >> Up to them. They're just >> It is up to them. We're just saying
should, not must. >> Okay. Whatever. I'll >> I mean, don't you believe that it should >> out of this committee? I I'm blunt for could, but I can see that that's >> I was trying to I was trying to channel you. I thought Steve thinks
>> there's a there's an amendment that's been proposed. Is there a second on the amendment? >> I thought Ed seconded Steve's >> No, no, he did. So, >> so not hearing a second on the amendment. The amendment is is is is is dismissed. >> Proceed. >> Oh, I see you're talking about this most
recent amendment. >> He just said he proposed an amendment, >> right? So, we're just moving ahead with any discussion of the seconded motion >> to support it as written by Ken. >> Okay. >> Added. Is there any further discussion?
Yes. >> On on the letter that I just read? >> Yes. >> Go ahead. >> Couple of things. Um, I would change the fairest to a fairway because I think
you're setting an impossible >> golf course. >> Yes, exactly. One with one with um slow release nitrogen on it. But um, no, I would just change it to a fair way instead of the fairest because that you're going to get into intense
discussions about what is the fairest way. Also, I would spell out >> that's that you're you're on the second line, correct? >> The second >> Yeah, the second line in in in the in the draft. And then in the second paragraph, I would do the select board, not the board of select.
>> Yes, I know that. >> Spell that out. And also, in honor of the gravity of the board of health, I would spell out board of health. And um I think that's it. My Oh, there's an the earlier draft had an extra paragraph in
it. Where's >> Wait, let me let me see if I can >> you combined it. >> Find it. >> I might have put in a >> No, no, it wasn't one you did. Um, >> finally >> I think I put a parag extra paragraph return in there. >> Yeah, I think.
Yeah. No, the new the new your draft doesn't have the sentence that had the extra paragraph. I'm done. I'll quit. >> Steve, we could shorten this by accepting his suggestions. >> Yes. I would also like to point out that I sent it to you two guys first, >> right? >> To prevent exactly this waste of time.
I'll go ahead with whatever you want. >> Okay, Jonathan. So, so, so, so momentarily that you're proposing an amendment. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> For for I think >> those minor changing the BOS and >> of course >> B that doesn't have to be amended, but
you're basically asking to to find a fair way. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> I'll second that. >> Okay. So there's been motion made and seconded to change in the second line the fairest way to a fairway. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> Sure. I >> Yeah. I
>> All right. Go ahead. >> I fully support the letter. I'm just concerned about the last sentence of it on the timing of this plan relative to the construction of the watershed plans which I understand will be done this year. I think this is going to be a very
complex issue and it'd be great if it's ready for when the wershed plans are, but knowing what I've seen, it's may take a long time to hash this out to a final plan because we're talking significant amounts of money that are going to be in discussion. I don't know
how that gets voted on. Um, I'm just concerned that the timing tied in it. It would be great if it happens. I don't think it's it's a mustave. >> Well, don't forget it's a recommendation. >> It should be, not must be. I just want can I I I want to address your your concern in the watershed plan. There is
a component to look at the costs and the and and and the ability to finance it. So there's there's already in the watershed plan. What Steve is advocating through this is that from the outside looking in we try to identify how to make things fair. Okay?
Because it's not it's not necessarily true that the watershed plan is going to pick up the fairness. Okay. >> And one of one of the purposes of this >> it is a big lift. >> Also, one of the purposes of coming up
with a fair plan is to get support for the watershed plan. >> Right. Very good. I >> I agree. Just the timing is what concerns me. >> That's what I'm speaking to. >> It'll happen. >> How do you use it to get support if you don't have it?
>> Kevin, please step up to the uh podium. Uh, so I I wrote the overwordy and what other whatever other draft. Yeah. Yeah. My but no, it's I agree. But um I just I understand what you're saying, Jonathan.
To me, that seems like it's going to take I mean, it's extremely complicated. It's well described in the letter how complicated it is. But at the same time, I wonder, can we actually start to implement a plan before we have all of that worked out? Because we're going to
go to the first homeowner and say, "It's you. You got to put in a system." And we don't know exactly what benefits they may or may not get. You know, we have to have the formula worked out before they can pay for it. I think >> just a thought.
>> It will behoove this special committee to work as fast as they can and no faster. >> Yeah. And the committee will only be making recommendations and not implementing policy. >> Right. >> Okay. Get the doctor. >> From precinct 3.
>> From precinct 3, we believe we welcome the doc. Um, so I I would make the suggestion that it would be good in fact to have the fairness plan before the public knows what the watershed plan is
because one of the ideas uh about best ways to develop fairness plans and have them supported is that the people who are deciding if it's fair or not don't yet know what group they're in.
>> Yes. because of human nature, we tend to uh want to vote in our self-interests even if we're not aware of it. >> Thank you. I I have a pro procedural question. I I feel as though, you know,
we seldom put something this formal in writing to the board of selectmen. So, I would say that we all need to we could take a vote, but we all probably should be signing this eventually. Yeah. Okay. >> All right. So, we're going to find a pathway to sign it. Whether that's
>> something come back at the next meeting, we all sign it because we made the edits and whatnot. Okay. >> I agree. >> Okay. All right. Just >> quick quick comment >> to uh the Dr. George's comment about, you know, we should do this because, you
know, when people see it, they're going to say, well, which group am I in? We've already put people in a group. There is an IIA mandate already established. There are over 300 IAS currently in Felmouth. They didn't get any extra help
>> and the recent mandate of new construction increased flow has no subsidy component. Pretty much any other community in the region including the islands don't have
a subsidy with a couple of limited exceptions with very limited available funds. So the horse is out of the barn. >> The mandates are there. How do you say to the people that have to put one in next month >> that you now are going to subsidize those to get it a year from now?
>> The horse is out of the barn. And and Mr. Chairman, I'd like to move the question. Let's vote. >> Okay. >> Is it going to be like David Vier saying you said too much? I can't move the question. >> The letter as amended signify by saying I. >> Thank you. >> Okay. The next item on the agenda.
>> Move the question. Next item on the agenda, I'm going to ask for a motion to table this next meeting because we are at 20 6 which means we have 10 minutes for reports of members and staff and devote minutes of prior meetings. Um, can I get a motion to
>> so moved? >> Okay. So, all those in favor of tableabling item four to the next meeting signify by saying I >> I >> Yes. Um, now we're moving on to reports some of members and staff and I am going to take one moment uh to touch upon the uh
the water infrastructure investment fund because uh it's been pointed out that perhaps we've misspoken as to what the whiff is. I want to clarify that currently the town raises through the property tax uh about a
hundred for this year they're estimating about 127,884,366 >> roughly >> roughly and and and the percentage is applied to the property tax not to raising the overall tax rate by 3%. So
it it talks about raising more revenue than the amount of revenue currently being raised. So that's a 3% increase in revenue or a 2% increase in revenue or 1% increase in revenue. That that that's the clarification. So um reports of
members and staff. I have one item. Uh roughly a week ago, the town took bids on the Ticket uh phase one sewers. Um the good news is that uh we've got multiple
uh biders. The even better news is that all of those biders and particularly the low bidder are um are measurably below the budget. Um so that means that as we move into calculating what the betterments are going to be, the
estimated betterments we've had floating around are likely to come down by a certain factor, whether that's 5% or 10%. I don't want to venture too far out there yet, but um it's it in the bidding environment we're in, it's good to know that people are interested in working in
Falmouth. >> Yeah. >> Um and so we are in the award stage right now. This will get awarded uh probably over the next couple of weeks or the first or second week of January. And
construction will start up probably late January or early February. and will continue through for about a year and a half. >> So, the good news is the estimates were good. The market is good for us and uh we're not we're not staring at, you
know, any shortfall in the in the funding. Um and uh so that's that's what I have for reports for my report on that. >> Ed, you usually have something to report. >> Sure. >> Do you want to cover the uh folks on
Sandwich Road? Um you you requested some information >> got some information but it wasn't much that you know the Easterly has applied for their groundwater discharge permit for a system to to serve the 300 odd
apartments. Um their the proposed permit that the D will be issuing because it seems to be a foregone conclusion they will issue it is for 10 milligrams of nitrogen. um not what the town wanted. Town wanted
five and they're going to try for five, but they're going to be required to meet 10. >> I'm going to clarify this. Okay. >> Okay. >> I I will just because um they they are obligated to have the the the system perform at 10 or less. If they exceed
10, they're in violation. However, there is a total pounds of nitrogen annual limit. That annual limit is based upon five. So they will need to run it. >> Wow. >> At at five or better. >> Yeah. >> For most of the year to make their
annual limit. But you know >> how often do they have to report? >> Yeah. >> There's a monthly report. I'm pretty sure there's a monthly report. >> Yes, it's a monthly. >> I I I could read it. But so they didn't turn around and say you must you must treat it five, but they said your annual
your annual average has to be five or less. They must treat at 10, but they have to average 10 up. So, so discharge permits typically like on the outfalls are they'll tell you can't exceed a certain number ever, but
you know, overall the total total be below something. Okay. >> Okay. Um, one other thing if if I may. um on the PRB project for Snug Harbor, which we have a grant in place and a number of inind contributions from
various entities to make that thing happen. Um Salt Pond Area's Bird Sanctuaries, which is their formal name, who was in a butter to the project, has signed an agreement to allow access to their property. We need
a signed agreement from one other for a minimal plan we worked on just this morning for some various reasons. But I think an important thing is for people who may want to donate to the project and possible extension of the length of
the PRB. Salt Pond has agreed to be a designated nonprofit organization that would accept donations earmarked for the project and then they would use those funds to directly pay vendors. It's the simplest way to get around a lot of
restrictions on donations to the town and soliciting donations. So, it was a very generous gesture and took a while to discuss this and get Salt Pawn to agree, but they have just this past week said, "Yes, we will be the designated
donor recipient for that project." So, um, we've got some issues to work out on and hopefully get into the concoma in the next couple of months. >> That's it. >> Thank you. Jonathan, uh, do you want just do you want to do an update on the House bill or did you Yeah, I did you
see Dave Vieira's note? >> Yeah, I there's a delay for one month. It's House Rule 27, so it was supposed to be December 16th. Now, the decision on the bill will be January 16th. >> So, I I would like to reach out to all the members of the committee. Um, I'll try to get an email out tomorrow or
whatever. We need to do the what I would call the next level of outreach to any organization or group on the Cape that we think might be impacted to say now is the time to drop a letter of support in in favor of this article. We've got another another window to push another
group of people to to to chime in. Okay. So Tom, >> I wanted to circle back to um the Saxon issue. Um, how rigorous is D on enforcing >> regulations and what sort of penalties
are involved? >> I don't know the penalty scheme right now >> and they're saying okay. >> Yeah, I I don't have that in the in front of me. But I do know that >> as long as they're rigorous because >> for example, they've come out come back to the serest once or twice because their system wasn't >> wasn't performing and they had to get
somebody in and upgrade it. Similar to what the board of health did with the you know the glam camping just you know >> the numbers aren't there. You got to you got to fix it. So >> good. >> All right. Thank you. >> Any other any other committee conversations?
>> Okay. >> Not hearing any. Um go ahead Steve. You want >> mentioned to you before the meeting that I was going to mention this. >> Go ahead. Um, as you may know, Steve had to give the annual report to the select board on Monday and so I listened to it
on FCTV and um, it one more example, the fact that the chairman has to do 10 times more work than the rest of us. So, we all owe him some thanks. But >> a fool is born every minute >> and some of us thanked him already.
>> But no, that's not that that's just covering myself. It's true, but that's not my main point. You got you got three minutes. >> Okay, one minute for no it'll take less than I think the three I noticed three things in from the comments of the
select board this presentation. One is on PRBs but also on sewers and IAS. I think it would be useful if we had a printed version, maybe even on our website or at least a document that we
all knew which had the range and the average nitrogen return on investment for these different quantities because otherwise you have people thinking, "Oh, this is the magic bullet. They're doing this research. They're going to come up with this thing and put PRBs everywhere
and we won't have to have sewers or IAS." And of course we all we all know qualitatively that that's ridiculous. But we should be legitimate engineers and scientists and
developers and have a dollar figure a milligrams kilograms per year per dollar figure for different or ranges for different technologies just to keep the conversation uh rational. The second thing is
nitpicking, but I think it's in everybody's interest. That little pond graph of nitrogen concentration versus time. I thought we were going to fix that with fitting it with two lines, one before the sewer and one after. That's
completely legitimate science, and it makes it look much better. Ken Ken Foreman gave a presentation uh at the SIPA science and uh we're going to ask him to come in because he's got several different ways of looking at the data and it's clearer when you look at
Ken's work. So he's going to be on a future agenda. >> I did send you that figure though. I don't know if you >> my timeline was >> understood. >> But I it was good Ken and I and I really think it's something we're going to bring up at another meeting because it it does really kind of bring the point home better. And and the last thing is
that it was obvious to me from the comment of some of the select board members that they are not yet aware of the board of health letter. >> Oh, >> what? >> Interesting. >> I don't know the details of how they work, but I think that their
material and agenda is set for them by town management. Town management chooses when that goes to them. Whether there's another channel, >> I don't know. Oh, I leave it up to anyone who wishes. >> Oh, okay. Can I get Can I get a vote on the Does Did everybody read the minutes?
Are they good? Can I get a vote? Can I get a motion and a vote? >> I move that they be accepted as written. >> Second. >> All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> All right. Can I get a >> move for adjournment? Can we express our thanks for the calendar? >> Yes. >> Thanks.
>> I like the centerfold. Oh, you Oh, not everyone got the calendar. >> And the science was very well attended by the way. Ken and Amy spoke and did a great job and had a lot of people. I couldn't believe how many people were there. It was standing room only. >> Simple science was great. >> Yeah. And the beer was good, too. >> There's one coming up beer. There's one
coming up another week or so. >> Yeah. They've been doing them all fall, and I think it's been pretty successful. >> Yeah. And there's more in the works. I'm I'm trying to I talked to >> So, I get I get an email from um the Cape Tech Council now, and I'll
circulate what I got the other day to everybody. Okay. So they list things that you can go get a breakfast at the Cape Cod Community College and hear about carbonization in the soil or whatever and you know fiber optics. >> Yeah. >> Anyways, um I have I have an a motion to
adjourn. Was it seconded? >> Yes, it was. >> All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. I. Great.