Harvard residents Timothy Turnbull of Peninsula Drive and Jay Turchetta of Bolton Road asked the Bare Hill Pond Watershed Management Committee Tuesday to allow a slalom course for water skiers in the pond’s south cove. The course was set up last year in July and August under a temporary permit, pending consideration of the bylaws. Harbormaster Bob O’Shea revoked the permit in August when the rules had not been revised.
At the May 29 committee meeting, chairman Bruce Leicher said that he had discussed the issue by email with Town Administrator Tim Bragan, who told him that the pond committee had no role in this decision other than sharing its ideas. The harbormaster and the Parks and Recreation Commission have the major role in the decision, according to Leicher’s summary.
Turnbull and Turchetta noted that they had already met with Parks and Recreation, who had referred them to the pond committee. Turnbull said that there have been multiple water-ski courses on the pond during the past 40 years.
Turnbull added that he wants the course “to be open for more than just us,” saying that he and Turchetta had taken a proposal for a water-skiing club to the parks commission.
Harbormaster O’Shea told the committee that he had received three written complaints about the water ski route, which he said follows “an unsafe pattern.” O’Shea added that such requests for private use “can snowball, with more and more people asking to do it.”
“I would not approve any kind of private use unless the town endorsed it,” O’Shea said.
Committee member Robert Blanck said he was concerned about encouraging the use of fast boats on the pond. Such boats, he said, increase turbidity by stirring up the water and also spread millfoil by breaking up the plants.
Leicher explained that the harbormaster has jurisdiction over the issue. If he says no, Leicher said, the next step is either an appeal to the state or a request at Town Meeting for a change in the bylaws.
Turnbull later told the Press by phone that he thought the next step was further discussions with the harbormaster and Parks and Recreation about how to update the rules governing routes on the pond and adjust the map accordingly. Any adjustments that involve changes to the bylaws would require action by Town Meeting.
“We want to do this the right way,” Turnbull said.
