A proposal by the Tisbury board of health to impose nitrogen mitigation fees on new construction within the Lake Tashmoo and Lagoon Pond watersheds came under fire Tuesday night at a joint meeting of the health commissioners and selectmen. It was the first meeting between the two boards following a series of three public hearings that the board of health held last month.
Over the course of three public hearings, the majority of those in attendance questioned the foundations upon which the proposals are based. Attendees, who included residents of other Island towns, have asked that the entire town of Tisbury be responsible for addressing the problem, and questioned the specific human health risks from nitrogen loading and the data used to determine exactly how much nitrogen is in fact in the groundwater.
Two members of the three-member board of selectmen expressed strong opposition to the fees that could cost a new homeowner as much as $3,200 annually for 20 years to help pay for efforts to alleviate nitrogen loading.
The sparsely attended meeting was originally scheduled to be held at the board of health office in the Tisbury town hall annex, but was moved at the last minute to the Emergency Services Facility due to a faulty projector in the town hall annex, according to health agent Maura Valley.
Board of health member Malcolm Boyd chaired the meeting in the absence of board of health chairman Jeffrey Pratt, who was ill and did not attend. The meeting lasted for an hour and a half before Mr. Boyd abruptly adjourned it in the face of opposition from two of the three selectmen and a handful of attendees.
As he had throughout the public hearing process, board of health member Michael Loberg, who has spearheaded the proposal, described the proposed regulations and their intent, which is to stem the flow of nitrogen into the two major Island bodies of water by imposing a graded tax on new construction.
“I’m just not in favor of the way, not in your attempt — so I don’t mean this disrespectfully — but the way we would generate the fees for this,” selectmen Tristan Israel said. “I think they’re not fair.”
Mr. Israel did applaud the board of health’s efforts to map out the problem and propose a solution; however, he said he had a problem with the methodology of the regulations. Mr. Israel called for a more egalitarian and holistic approach. He said he was concerned that the proposed mitigation fee would indiscriminately affect young people and new homeowners, and it would place a large strain on affordable housing. Mr. Israel suggested spreading the fee out across the town, noting that the community is faced with large expenditures — the elementary school, the high school, and now the current wastewater issues.
Selectman Larry Gomez echoed Mr. Israel’s comments. “How do we equalize this out for everybody?” he asked the board of health.
Mr. Gomez said that watersheds are receiving nitrogen from West Tisbury, and asked Melinda Loberg, chairman of the board of selectmen, how the community should address that problem.
Ms. Loberg said that, although West Tisbury’s portion of the watershed is about 20 percent, they have “not yet come to the table” regarding the proposed regulations.
Ms. Loberg, who is also a member of the town wastewater committee and married to Michael Loberg, supports the board of health’s proposal. She said the town needed solutions and called for better tools and preparation in the mitigation of nitrogen.
“We as a [wastewater] committee were in favor of developing such regulations, giving at least the minimum tools to our town to address nitrogen while we’re still waiting to develop these other technologies,” Ms. Loberg said. “We worked very closely with the board of health.”
Town administrator John “Jay” Grande said that the nitrogen issue has been a decades-long issue.
“I applaud you looking at this and moving out aggressively,” Mr. Grande said. “It is a lot to take in.” Mr. Grande then went on to say, “It’s an issue that’s been out there for decades, and it’s an issue people haven’t truly addressed.”
The proposed new wastewater regulations would impose substantial fees on new developments, including additions and renovations that increase a home’s water usage. Property owners in the Tashmoo and Lagoon watersheds, under a “no new net nitrogen” policy, would be financially responsible for mitigating the effects of wastewater-based nitrogen that enters the groundwater through a semiannual fee, included in the homeowner’s water bill, based on metered water usage and an estimate that it costs the town $300 to remove a pound of nitrogen from wastewater.
The proposed regulations would require a homeowner in the watersheds to pay anywhere from $320 to $3,200 annually for 20 years to help pay for efforts to alleviate nitrogen loading.
For example, based on average water usage and use of a Title 5 septic system, the owner of a new three-bedroom home in either watershed would pay an annual fee that would total $3,200.
Under the proposed regulations, the charge could be reduced to $2,100 with the installation and use of an enhanced denitrification system, designed to remove nitrogen from the wastewater. The use of denitrifying toilets in combination with advanced systems could reduce the annual fee to $320.
Application of the fee would be triggered by the filing of a building permit with an increase in water usage, and would cease either after 20 years, when the development is connected to the town sewer system, or when the town successfully removes enough nitrogen to certify water quality standards.
On Tuesday, Mr. Loberg presented other options. One was the implementation of a board of health moratorium. Another option Mr. Loberg suggested was requiring that the best available denitrification technologies be used.
“If you’re asking someone to put in an advanced system, or requiring them to put in an advanced system, and then you’re taxing them on top of that, I’m not in favor of that,” Mr. Israel said.
One question that came up during the previous hearings was why the board of health would impose a fee without having a specific plan or technologies in place to mitigate the nitrogen.
“The issue is that we can’t do anything with [the money] because we’re just the board of health,” Mr. Loberg said at Tuesday’s joint meeting. “We can only give it to the town to decide what to do with it on town floor. It’s not our money. All we can tell you is that for it to be a mitigation fee, it has to be expensed from the watershed in which it came.”
The town can only impose a fee, not a tax. According to Ms. Loberg, only the state can impose a tax.
“You have no basis,” Don Muckerheide of Oak Bluffs said. “You have not done any testing of your wells to know that in fact you have a groundwater nitrate problem.”
“If this problem was a simple thing to fix, and an inexpensive thing to fix, we would have done it a long time ago.” Ms. Loberg said, speaking to the three people who attended the public meeting, while addressing the complexity of the issue at hand.
“When we discuss the cost of this, it becomes very controversial,” Ms. Loberg said. “The cost is daunting.”