Cathleen Drinan
Express correspondent
Spoiler alert: this article is full of opinions and emotions. I no longer represent the Town of Halifax and this column is my own.
I was asked to “cover” the online meeting of the City of Brockton Department of Environemental Management meeting Aug.3, discussing the Resource Management Plan for Monponsett Pond (RMP), prepared by its consultant CDM Smith out of Providence, RI.. I put the word cover in italics because there is too much to cover in a short article.
The water quantity and quality issues and practices for the City of Brockton would require at least a white paper to summarize all that has happened (and not happened) over the many decades. It really needs someone to choose the topic of Water Resource Management between Watersheds as his or her PhD thesis to sufficiently cover this topic. The topic should/could be fairly simple if nature, science, and water management were respected. Yet, it has been politicized and complicated for so long, it takes patience to pick apart the tangled threads. I don’t have that patience anymore.
I do have many questions, though.
Before the online live review of CDM’s report, I started to read the report. It is 161 pages long, available online at https://brockton.ma.us/news/resource-management-plan-for-monponsett-pond/ It is not the length that prevented me from finishing reading it. It was the content and the memories; memories as the health agent, of working with others on numerous grants to help the Monponsett Ponds, of being a member of the Central Plymouth Water District Advisory Board and so many more. At the time, those activities were filled with purpose and hope. Everyone needs hope, right?
From the RMP:
“Humans impact freshwater systems, particularly when water sources serve multiple uses.
Monponsett Pond, located in Halifax and Hanson, is one such water source, as it serves as a drinking water supply for the City of Brockton, cranberry bog irrigation source, aquatic life habitat, and a community and recreational asset.
This report addresses the Resource Management Plan (RMP) requirements of the May 21, 2019 amendment to the Administrative Consent Order (ACO), Enforcement Document No. 0001010.
The ACO defines the RMP as recommending “metrics and procedures for Silver Lake diversions and Stump Brook Dam operations intended to improve Monponsett Pond’s water quality and ecosystem while maintaining Brockton’s drinking water supply reliability.”
(Me: Stump Brook Dam operations are going to improve Monponsett Pond’s water quality and ecosystem while maintaining Brockton’s drinking water supply reliability? Show me how!)
“The amendment to the ACO requires the RMP include the elements listed below, along with the report section(s) where the requirements are addressed.
a. Establishment of monthly Monponsett Pond elevation goals or some other metric on which to base Stump Brook Dam operating procedures to balance the needs to providing:
§ Stump Brook flow
§ Better flood control, including reduced need of flood control diversions to Silver Lake
§ Improved flushing of West Monponsett Pond
§ Fish passage
§ Adequate water depth for bathing, fishing, and cranberry cultivation
§ Impoundment to provide adequate water for Silver Lake diversions
(Me: Fish passage? Why is there even a fish ladder when fish cannot reach it?)
“Compilation of a recommended actions list and prepare a preliminary feasibility assessment of additional measures that could be performed by others, including but not limited to, the Towns of Halifax and Hanson, area cranberry growers and residents to improve water quality in Monponsett Pond, such as: programs to upgrade septic systems; improved stormwater management, installation of a control structure between EMP and WMP, and utilization of alternative procedures and/or technologies, and chemical treatment.
*** “Implementation of recommended actions list prepared herein is not the responsibility of the City.”
*** (Asterix, underline and bold are mine alone.)
“Pond levels are controlled by natural hydrology, a dam on Stump Brook and diversions to Silver Lake.”
(Me: What is natural about this situation???)
Brockton’s water emergency resulted in the 1964 legislation, adding the Monponsett Ponds and Furnace to the city’s water supply. Why hasn’t the legislation been removed? Surely, emergency legislation is not supposed to last forever!
The first engineering company Halifax worked with was Princeton Hydro in 2013. They concluded that the current quantity and quality practices for the Monponsett Ponds could not be sustained. Their conclusion remains as truth.
Other questions: Why are words such as reciprocity, stewardship, restoration, gift, hope, and love missing from the Plan?
The word watershed does appear but in an unnatural compartmentalized context. Here is an example: “The ponds are part of the Taunton River watershed. The natural routing of water is from Stetson Brook to EMP, through the culvert to WMP, and out to Stump Brook, which flows into the Satucket River, a tributary of the Taunton River.”
There is more to it than that AND water is being transferred from one watershed to another. That is wrong!
§ “The 1923 Chapter 91 license, noting that this document refers to a reference point that most likely has been disturbed/lost. Information will be gleaned from this document, to the extent practicable.”
(Really?? Lost information? How do you glean from that?”
§ “Discussions with Massachusetts Historical Commission, and town engineers and/or historical commissions in Halifax and Hanson on available historical mapping of Monponsett Pond.”
(Halifax has a town engineer?)
As the live online meeting was nearing a conclusion, a guest, Pine DuBois, asked questions about the quality and quantity to Jones River and Silver Lake. Jonathan Hobill, of MA DEP responded each time that this report was addressing the Monponsett Pond.
Again, I ask you, how do you take a chunk out of a watershed, compartmentalize it, and ignore the undeniable connections to other areas and water bodies in both the same and nearby watersheds? It makes no scientific sense!
As I believe there is no easy way to wrap this up, I conclude with the words of Mavis Staples: “What do we do with this history now? Do we go in like a surgeon? Do we go in like a bomb?”
I am not alone in wishing the band aids and minor surgery would cease and desist and the “emergency” dams are bombed away!
For an informative FAQ, please see what Jones River has prepared.
https://jonesriver.org/facts/brockton-water-supply-faq/
Cathleen Drinan is a freelance writer interested in public health, art, nature and more. She can be reached at drinan.cathleen@gmail.com