View from Bare Hill Pond before cutting. (Courtesy photos)
Shoreline of Peninsula Road home after vegetation was removed.
“Clear-cutting happened,” acknowledged civil engineer Gary Shepard of David E. Ross Associates in Ayer as he introduced a re-vegetation plan for 38 Peninsula Road at a Conservation Commission hearing on Jan. 3. Shepard was there with his clients Richard and Roxanne Mace to address the couple’s violation of state and local regulations in clearing the banks of Bare Hill Pond on their property. A contractor acting on their behalf removed low-growing native vegetation and an expanse of red oak trees, many over 30 feet tall, that had previously obscured the home’s view of the pond. In November, after the Bare Hill Pond Watershed Management Committee detected the clear-cutting, the Conservation Commission notified the Maces of their misstep.
Less clear than the cutting, however, is how the homeowners’ aim to “improve the view,” as Shepard characterized the Maces’ intent at the hearing, led to violations of Harvard’s wetland bylaw and the state’s Wetlands Protection Act (Chapter 131). Both local and state law require permits for any disturbance near a wetland.
“A significant portion of the property was clear-cut,” said Shepard, “but Mr. Mace didn’t at the time realize [that] what happened was wrong.”
Shepard cited an “informal” conversation between Mace and a Conservation Commission member about “vista clearing,” a branch-pruning practice allowed by Harvard’s bylaw. The commission confirmed the conversation without naming the member.
At the hearing and in a subsequent phone interview, Shepard characterized the clear-cutting as a “miscommunication between the homeowners, contractor, and sub-contractor.” Ross Associates was not involved in the cutting. Calls to the Maces were not returned by press time.
In any case, vista clearing does not allow the removal of brush or bushes and allows only minimal pruning. The leaf canopy, says the Harvard bylaw, “cannot be reduced to less than 90 percent of the existing crown cover.”
“Vista clearing has nothing to do with what they did,” observed Vice-Chairwoman Wendy Sisson.
In a phone interview this week, though, Chairman Paul Willard said that some people might interpret vista clearing as “a right to clear-cut.”
“We just want to fix it,” he said. “That’s our goal.”
The Peninsula Road property was already subject to an order of conditions—issued by the Conservation Commission before the Maces bought it two years ago—to modify the driveway. Contemplating that fact, commission member George Watkins wondered why the owners did not refer to the order before clear-cutting. He speculated that the order might have signaled their need for an additional permit, though the clear-cutting was not near the driveway.
“I wish we could have gotten the new owners to come to us when they bought the place, to show they had read and understood the order of conditions on the property,” he said.
Mace expressed regret to the commission, saying that he “took responsibility” for the action. He and his wife Roxanne Mace, he said, were “700 miles away” at their Raleigh home when the trees were cut. The homeowners were accustomed to the “less stringent” regulations in North Carolina, added Shepard.
In reaction to the re-vegetation scheme, the commission nixed the preponderance of shrubs to replace the oaks, asking instead for a replacement of the lost canopy (only four oaks were proposed in the plan). They also objected to stump-grinding.
“It only adds to the silt,” explained Watkins.
Longtime member Charlie Gorss questioned the inclusion of hemlocks, noting that the species is dying in North America from a plague of wooly adelgid insects. White cedars, he said, were also a poor choice because they are very slow-growing.
Watershed committee member Robert Blank simply asked for replication of the lost vegetation. Sisson concurred, naming larch, blueberry, and spiceberry as examples.
Before-and-after photos of the clear-cutting came from the watershed committee, along with a letter outlining the problems caused by the increase of year-round homes on the pond. The letter notes that Bare Hill Pond is on the state’s list of endangered lakes and ponds and that a report by the Department of Environmental Protection named excessive tree-cutting and lawn installation as factors in the “declining” water quality at the pond, characterized by rampant weed growth and silt. A high level of phosphorous also pollutes the pond, the report says.
The local penalty for working in a wetland without a permit is a doubling of the usual permitting fee; in this case, the Maces paid a total of $2,800, according to records at Town Hall.
The hearing was continued to Feb. 7. The commission asked the homeowners to install a silt fence as soon as the weather allows.
