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WC,
It's my understanding that flashboards are used at the dam to raise or
lower the water level, and that the dam itself is located on private
property - all of which means that the owner of the property, and
therefore the dam, has control of the water level in the lake. This is
not unusual, but is unnerving. There are documented instances of private
dam ownership in Massachusetts leading to what some call 'being held
hostage' to the whims of the owner. In one instance, the owner of the
dam supposedly told residents around the lake that unless they paid a
fee to him to help defray the costs of maintaining the dam, he'd let all
the water out. The jury is still out on whether this could have
happened, or whether the sate might have stepped in to stop it.
Personally, I don't think the state would have had the right or
wherewithal to step in, but I'm no legal-beagle. The point is that
private ownership of a dam has its ups and its downs. The right person
would hold dear the need to respect and work with the lake residents. Of
course, the residents would need to reciprocate. The wrong person...
well, that just becomes a messy issue.
Ultimately, public ownership, meaning the 'town', would be in the best
interest of the lake residents. Of course, this would bring forth those
voters not having lake frontage, and not having access to the lake,
saying... 'not with my tax dollars'. But with the town now having
purchased, or about to purchase, the remaining land with lake frontage,
that point would be incorrect, as public access would be afforded to
all. (The question would be... where, and when?) Purchase price becomes
the issue, not so much the liability. And I'm not sure that the dam
hasn't ever been made available to the town for purchase... I may be
wrong on that. Tax dollars may, indeed, become necessary to fund that
purchase, unless money from the Community Preservation Fund could be
used for such a purchase. In the long run, the costs of maintenance,
inspection, and operation would have to be borne by the town. But how
much those are? Who can tell?
Recently, a lake not too far from here, bordered by the towns of
Hopkinton, Upton, and Milford faced the same dilemma.
The dam was owned
by the Milford Water company for many years, the lake water being seen
as a backup water resource. After all those years, the value of that
lake to the water department came under review and was determined to be
not worth keeping, so the dam was to be put up for sale. Almost all the
water in the lake lies within the town of Hopkinton, and the town had a
public beach on the on the lake. The greater percentage of the residents
are in Hopkinton. So that town was approached by the a committee formed
for the purpose of trying to find a good buyer of the dam... acceptable
to all and avoiding the tangles and problems of having Joe Q. Citizen
owning the dam... even with the best intentions. Ultimately, after
having the structure tested and all the legal stuff reviewed, the town
voted to buy the dam. Funds for testing the dam and even subsequent
maintenance were made available by the state, through the efforts of the
local officials and state reps. The purchase price? I believe it was
either $1.00, or $10.00... no more.
Problem solved... the town now controls the lake level, respecting both
the needs of the residents and the needs of the dam seasonally and
otherwise, and still maintaining public access to the lake where it has
the foothold. Same could be true for Norfolk, although I really don't
know much about the water quality or anything of that nature. With
ownership of a good chunk of waterfront land, it would seem like a
no-brainer to buy the dam, too. But I'm more than sure that it would not
be easy to get many in this town to see it that way.
"Regarding the $35,000 in funds to paint the church, the church is a
historic structure and those monies came from a grant from the
Conservation Commission."
CR,
I think you might mean the Community Preservation Fund, not the ConComm,
that extra 3% we pay above and beyond property taxes and is (supposedly)
matched by the state...? Norfolk has a fairly healthy chunk of change in
their account, and has recently tapped it for the purchase of the land
noted in the discussion above.
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