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VOICES FROM THE BLUFF SBPF Speaks AN INDEPENDENT SERIES
Our house is about a dozen houses south of Sankaty Light. Just a year ago, we moved it back away from the edge of the bluff as far as we could toward Baxter Road. We were about 30 feet away and now we are now about 95 feet away. How long have you been a member of SBPF? I got involved at the beginning of the beach preservation effort in the early 90's. Why did you join? My family has been coming to 'Sconset for just short of 50 years, since my two brothers and I were children. My parents built our current house in 1962 and the emotional attachment that we have through now three generations is hard to overstate. This spot has a special place at the center of all of our lives from our kids to my 82-year-old mother. When we first started coming here, there was a path that led from our house down the then gently sloping bluff to 200 feet of dunes and beach grass and then, finally, the beach. When the beach grass started to wash away we were happy because the long walk to take a swim got shorter! We have watched this landscape wash away over the past four decades to the point that the bluff in front of our house is now a steep sand cliff and the top edge has begun to crumble away. If there is reasonable way to protect this beautiful part of the world, and our family's history, we want to support it. I don't know if the current beach nourishment plan will work, but similar efforts succeed in many places on the East Coast, so why not try it here? It's privately funded and the potential benefits to 'Sconset and beyond seem to clearly outweigh the risks and potential negative impacts that have been identified. Respond to the following statement in whatever way you feel is appropriate: You're wasting your money - Mother Nature is going to take your property no matter what. Beach nourishment is working in all sorts of places from Florida to New Jersey, but there is no guarantee that it will be successful here; however, since it is to be funded by private voluntary contributions, not public or government funds, the risks are being borne by people who have decided that the chances of the project being a success are worth the potential financial cost. The real question seems to me to be about whether there is potential harm in trying. I can't understand the idea that it is somehow "wrong" in trying to "fight" natural phenomenan. Following that logic, is it also wrong to try to find cures for disease? Is it wrong to rebuild the New Orleans levees that protect it from Mother Nature? (Actually, some people think it is!) Potentially harmful effects of such efforts should be identified and investigated. The SBPF has spent three years and millions of dollars on these strenuous environmental reviews. But once the potential negatives and mitigating actions have been studied and evaluated, it is time to add up the costs and the benefits and decide where the balance lies. For me, other than the financial risk, which is being borne by private contributors, the benefits far outweigh the negatives. Why isn't moving your house or the houses of those on the ocean side of the Bluff to a new lot inland an option? We may need to do this at some point in the future, and we are lucky to own a vacant lot on the other side of Baxter Road. But this isn't the case for many on the Bluff anymore, and it really isn't rele- vant anyway. The point is that this is a problem threatening a whole community. If some way of stemming the erosion of the 'Sconset shoreline is not found, it won't be that long before the rest of Codfish Park and then 'Sconset Village itself begin to wash away. We have already lost about a third of the Bluff Walk and Sankaty Lighthouse will be moved this fall at great expense. Property taxes from Baxter Road are already plummeting and eventually Baxter Road itself may be lost. Doing nothing has been costly to the community and will get more costly in the future. Moving forward with the project provides a real opportunity to learn whether beach nourishment can work in Nantucket, and protect 'Sconset and the Bluff. That will benefit the whole island and other communities on the New England coast. The Patriot's Day storm this year proved fairly convincingly that terracing of the bluff is no match for wind and waves, is it prudent to stop using this form of bluff stabilization or keep going with it and why? The terracing has always been a limited stopgap measure and was never meant to be, or allowed by government regulation to be a permanent way to stabilize the bluff. To comply with today's environmental regulations in Massachusetts the terracing is designed to wash away on purpose in large storms. Permanent structures that would withstand a big storm cannot currently be approved in Massachusetts. While it may be a reasonable way for some people to protect their bluff temporarily, it is not a substitute for a more long-term measure. For our own home, we have decided at this point that the costs of temporary bluff protection are too expensive for us and we are not participating. When the terracing components get washed down the bluff, the waves scatter the timbers and jute fiber matting to beaches north of you and pretty much everywhere around the island, what do you have to say to the people who own those beaches? If the long-term beach nourishment gets installed and succeeds, the terraces will not be on the front line of defense in a big storm. The new beach will be the thing that washes away, not terraces made of jute bags and timbers. Until the new beach is built, it is the responsibility of people who build the temporary terraces to clean them up after anything is washed away. As I understand it, this has been done pretty well so far and should continue in the future. The Town has required fast cleanup and a financial deposit on account with the Town to guarantee cleanup as a condition of its permits for terracing, as it should. Much of the opposition to this beach nourishment project is coming from charter and commercial fisherman concerned about losing their livelihood and from wildlife advocates who, along with the fisherman, are worried about how the dredging of sand from the shoal, construction of the new beach and long shore drift of the sand over time is going to impact shorebirds and their food - what do you say to these people? These potential harmful effects are exactly the kind of issues that should be at the heart of the discussion. I am a long-time supporter of the environmental movement and wanted to be sure of potential negative environmental effects before supporting this project. Three years and millions of dollars have been spent studying dozens of potentially harmful effects, including the ones mentioned above. The problem for project opponents is that when you look at the actual facts from these studies, they don't support their case. Opponents are sometimes correct that there will be negative impacts from the project, but these impacts have been analyzed, measured and determined to be small and short-lived. Let's look at the question of harming the striped bass fishery. I spent about an hour on the ferry recently with a bass fisherman concerned about the project, listening intently to his description of the problem he thought he faces. It turns out that the studies in our environmental reports show that there will be minor damage to the bass habitat. There are currently about 3,000 acres of "cobble bottom" which is viewed as a key to the striped bass habitat. It should be noted that this habitat has increased significantly over the past 20-plus years as the beach has washed away, in the process exposing a greater and greater amount of cobble bottom. When the new beach is put in, it is estimated that about 105 acres or, five percent of the cobble bottom, will be covered with new sand, far less than used to be covered naturally by the much larger beach 20 years ago. In addition, as mitigation, the project will be creating a "new" cobble bottom with acres of concrete railroad ties to offset the amount that will be lost. Claiming that this impact will destroy this fishery just doesn't stand up. Opponents have also argued that the dredge bringing sand to the beach from three miles off shore will churn up the bottom and cause major damage. In fact, the dredge will make about four trips a day for a few months and can be directed away from the most popular fishing spots for July and August, the months most important to the fisherman. The impact will be temporary and limited to a path a few hundred feet wide over a three-mile beach. As for impact on shorebirds, their habitat has been decimated by the eroding beach. It turns out that they are actually going to end up better off. For example, over the last decades hundreds of acres of piping plover habitat has been washed away to the point that only a very small part of the beach area to be rebuilt is considered plover habitat today. Building the new beach will create a lot of new shorebird habitat. Ironically, if the project is successful, respecting this new shorebird habitat could become a problem for re-permitting future re-nourishment efforts. In sum, it is possible to be both a strong environmentalist and supporter of this project. Claims of environmental damage can be used as a way to oppose a project by people who are either unwilling to take a balanced view or who have another agenda, but they just aren't supported by the studies the SBPF has conducted. Good planning and a cooperative logical approach can accommodate the legitimate interests of environmentalists, fishermen and the beach project. If the beach nourishment project works, which parts of the island should it be applied next to? Wouldn't it be great to have this project succeed and then have that discussion! Is there anything you want to say that I haven't talked about today, anything else on your mind that concerns SBPF and its efforts? The way this issue has sometimes been described, as a populist battle between wealthy property owners looking out for themselves and local people, who are being asked to risk serious damage to their community, is way off base in my opinion. The facts tell a very different story. I feel optimistic that this story is finally getting out now. Is Nantucket (and the rest of the country for that matter) becoming a place where the rich are doing better and better and the middle class is falling behind? I think it is and that this is a problem that our country should address. I, for one, am not a big fan of all the changes to Nantucket as it becomes more and more of a jet-set destination. But, does that have anything to do with the facts and merits of the 'Sconset beach project? By stopping the 'Sconset beach project, will the Town have landed a blow for a fairer economic playing field? I just don't see the connection. People need to look at the actual facts and make up their own minds based on logic and reason. In my view, we are fortunate that there are enough people in 'Sconset and Nantucket with the financial means and desire to pay for a project like this. If it works, we can all benefit. People who are not in a financial position to fund the effort don't have to. The government and taxpayers are not being asked to contribute anything. We are also very fortunate that wealthy people decided to donate hundreds and thousands of acres of open space in the 50s and 60s so that so much open space has been preserved on Nantucket. Why not view this effort as a similar, pioneering undertaking that could be a benefit to us all? Somehow the idea that this controversy is about whether local people can stand up to the selfish interests of wealthy Baxter Road property owners, sounds exciting, but doesn't have anything to do with the facts of the situation. People need to look rationally at the small potential negatives and significant potential benefits and not be distracted with bogus unsubstantiated arguments that appeal to some preconceived ideology. I This week The Nantucket Independent continues a series of interviews with members of the Siasconset Beach Preservation Fund to get behind the meeting rhetoric and to learn why they joined the fight to slow erosion of the Bluff in 'Sconset. We encourage and will publish opposing viewpoints in a form of a letter to the editor, a perspective or an article. Email: don@nantucketindependent.com or mail: 15 North Beach St. Nantucket, Mass., 02554 |
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