Environmental News
Upcoming Events:
Rescheduled to Saturday, May 3, 2025 (originally scheduled for Saturday, April 5th), 9:30am to 12:30pm, Public Outreach – Mashpee, Quashnet, and Red Brook Rivers Restoration Project, Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe Government Center, 483 Great Neck Road South, Mashpee – The Town of Mashpee is working with the Association to Preserve Cape Cod (APCC), Waquoit Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve (WBNERR), and the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe on the restoration of the Mashpee, Quashnet, and Red Brook Rivers. This project is funded in part by a grant from NOAA. For additional information about this community engagement event, to attend, and/or to become a project partner, go to https://waquoitbayreserve.org/coastal-training-programs/source-to-sea.
Weekly Guided Nature Tours, Saturday Mornings – Each month, the Mashpee Conservation Department sponsors guided walking tours, which are free of charge and weather dependent. Details regarding these walks are posted along the left-hand margin at the department’s main website at www.mashpeema.gov/conservation. Walks have included Childs River, Lowell Holly Reservation, Mashpee River Woodlands, Pickerel Cove, Santuit Pond Preserve and many more. This is a great way to explore Mashpee’s wonderful array of conservation lands.
Celebrating Earth Day:
Saturday, April 12, 2025, 11am to 4pm, Honor the Earth Fair, Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe Government Center, 483 Great Neck Road South, Mashpee – Co-hosted by the Native Land Conservancy and the Mashpee Wampanoag Natural Resources Department, this event is free, open to the public, and features vendors and exhibitors (including MEC) with a shared mission of protecting and preserving the ancestral homelands of the Wampanoag. Festivities will include opening remarks by Mashpee Wampanoag Chief Earl Mills Jr., cultural crafts, traditional singing and dancing, and activities for children. More information is available here. If you attend, please stop by the MEC table and say hello.
Saturday, April 19, 2025, 9am to 1pm, Textile Recycling, Media Storage Recycling, Secure Shredding, and Composting Containers – FREE Event Mashpee Senior Center, 26 Frank E. Hicks Drive, Mashpee – The Mashpee Environmental Coalition, in collaboration with Mashpee’s Department of Public Works, will hold their 2nd Annual Earth Day event, featuring Textile Recycling, Secure Shredding, Composting Containers and Information, and (new this year), Media Storage Recycling. Textile items donated at this event are carefully sorted and clothing is re-used, if in good condition. Ripped, worn or damaged items are repurposed for a variety of consumer uses or recycled into new products such as mattress stuffing or cleaning rags. Details are available by viewing our Earth Day 2025 Flyer, the Full List of Textiles that may be bagged and dropped off, and the List of Media Storage Items that can and cannot be recycled. Additional questions may be sent to [email protected].
Saturday, April 19, 2025, 10am to 2pm, Cape Cod Canal Cleanup, Herring Run Recreation Area – Co-hosted by Americorps and the US Army Corps of Engineers, this 24th Annual Cleanup is free and open to the public. All cleanup supplies and a complimentary lunch will be provided. Interested volunteers can register online at www.capecod.gov/Canal-Clean-Up-2025.
Information Items:
Cape-Wide “Perpetual” Conservation Calendar: The Compact of Cape Cod Conservation Trusts and its nonprofit members currently maintain a Regional Calendar of Events, that is updated on a continual basis. This Conservation Calendar includes programs from villages and towns across Cape Cod, encouraging both visitors and residents to take part in nature and environmental events. The wide list of current programs may be accessed at: www.blt.org/capeconservationcalendar.
Textile Recycling Reminder: As of November 2022, it is now illegal to discard any clothing or other textile items in the trash, even if stained, ripped, threadbare, or filled with holes. The full list of items that must now be recycled may be accessed at the link provided, courtesy of Bay State Textiles. MEC is currently planning textile drives twice each year — one in April as an Earth Day event, and one in August alongside the Hazardous Waste Dropoff. Exact dates and times each year will be posted above under “Upcoming Events”. More information may be found at: List of Clothing and Textiles that must now be Recycled.
Like Ospreys? Thanks to the Friends of the Mashpee National Wildlife Refuge and Comcast, you can now watch – and listen to – the osprey nest of Rachel and Carson and their two new babies located at the Waquoit Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve. To access this live feed, click on the link below, then “Osprey Cam” at: https://www.friendsofmashpeenationalwildliferefuge.org/
Important Fertilizer Reminder: Mashpee regulates the application of fertilizer as follows:
1. No application of nitrogen is permitted between October 30 and April 14 — or at any time within 100′ of specified waterways
2. No application of phosphorus is permitted between December 1 and March 1 — or at any time within 20′ of specified waterways
Even during acceptable dates, no application is permitted before or during a heavy rainfall or when the ground is saturated. These regulations are detailed in the Nitrogen Control Bylaw, amended 2017, available at www.mashpeema.gov, under Town Clerk. However, please note that Mashpee Town Manager, Rodney C. Collins, issued a Special Water Quality Alert to all property owners asking them to discontinue the use of fertilizers on lawns and landscaped areas. This alert is available at https://www.mashpeema.gov/home/news/special-water-quality-alert-july-2021. Thank you for helping to keep Mashpee’s waterways clean!
In Case You Missed It:
Session Videos and Resources from the 2024 Cape Cod Coastal Conference – The June 18, 2024, full-day WBNERR conference entitled “Collaborating for Solutions: Practical Sessions to Achieve Watershed Plans” focused on ways that our Cape Cod communities can take action to restore water quality, reduce nutrients in our watersheds, and apply for funds to assist in implementing Watershed Plans. The full Conference Agenda, Session Videos, and a link to Grant Opportunities and Deadlines are available at: https://waquoitbayreserve.org/2024-cape-coastal-conference/.
Pond Oxygenation Workshop – A Special “Shout Out” to the Waquoit Bay Reserve for their informative, full-day workshop in November 2023 on how to manage healthy ponds by using oxygenation – and no chemicals. This technique has proven successful in lakes and ponds across the US, as well as right here on Cape Cod with Sarah’s Pond in Orleans – thanks to an initiative undertaken by the Orleans Pond Coalition. The full-day program, including agenda, presenter information, and PowerPoints may be found at the link below. For anyone interested in learning more about a fully natural way to help manage our freshwater ponds, this approach is well worth exploring: https://waquoitbayreserve.org/pond-oxygenation-workshop-learning-through-case-studies/
Monthly Board of Directors Meeting Schedule
Board meetings of the Mashpee Environmental Coalition (MEC) are held via Zoom the second Thursday of each month (January to November) starting at 4:00pm unless otherwise noted. There is no meeting in December. Please note that our Annual Meeting takes place the second Thursday in September at 4:00pm followed by the September board meeting.
All are welcome to attend. If you wish to attend one of our meetings, please contact [email protected] by 12:00 noon the day before the meeting so the Zoom link can be emailed to you.
Right-of-Way Herbicides
While our County Agencies talk to establishing individual town negotiations with transmission line owners on this threat to our potable water supply, they are fostering a divide and conquer approach threatening progress on this important health threat.
Visit for additional information.
The statement below is NStar’s March 2011,not very encouraging, position
NSTAR is the largest Massachusetts-based electric and gas utility with almost a million and a half customers in Eastern and Central Massachusetts . It has released this statement about suspending the use of herbicides for much of this year.
NStar is extending its voluntary moratorium on herbicide use through 2011, demonstrating once again the company’s commitment to working cooperatively with the Cape Cod Commission and other local officials. This latest extension will allow sufficient time for the completion of a comprehensive study to quantify and ultimately reduce herbicide and pesticide use by all users on Cape Cod.
In addition to improved mapping of private wells in 2010, progress has also been made in identifying the primary sources of herbicide and pesticide use on Cape Cod. Results to date confirm NSTAR’s IVM program represents a very small portion of the total Cape-wide herbicide use, though there’s more work to be done in documenting and sharing all of the facts. Therefore, NSTAR supports the commissioning of a comprehensive year-long study that further investigates the sources and effects of herbicide and pesticide use on the Cape and establishes guidelines toward its reduction. To lessen the appearance of undue influence on the study, NSTAR will not provide funding and will have only limited involvement in it.
With this latest extension of its voluntary herbicide moratorium comes the need for NSTAR to resume clear-cut mowing on Cape Cod rights-of-way in 2011. Federal regulations require utilities to demonstrate their compliance with strict standards set forth after the Northeast blackout of 2003. Though integrated vegetation management programs are recognized nationwide as the best practice for right-of-way maintenance to meet ecological and reliability standards, clear-cut mowing will be NSTAR’s only viable option on Cape Cod this year. Work is underway to finalize the company’s plans to resume mowing and details will be shared with the affected towns as soon as they are available.
Storm Water
Storm water, from its inception as rain or snow and via its travel as runoff across our lawns, roads and parking lots, adds to itself many forms of unwanted constituents from diverse sources. As it falls from the sky it adds an airborne contaminants to its makeup and then proceeds to include a variety of substances related to human activities.
Lawn fertilizer over-spills onto roads and driveways, the byproducts of automotive utilization such as exhaust, fluid leakage and brake pad wear combined with animal waste products plus many other items, when transported by storm water runoff, create a source of damage to our ground and surface waters that is a substantial threat. The impacts from this pollution source can be mitigated to varying degrees by the application of devices commonly identified as storm water best management practices. These devices are typically selected based upon site-specific conditions and available space.
The typical storm drains found in area roadways and parking lots do nothing to reduce contamination levels and, in fact, are worse than allowing storm flow to discharge across a vegetative surfaces. Many storm water best management practices (BMP’s) rely upon root systems and microbes for contamination controls. In Mashpee several scientific studies have established links between storm water runoff and pollution of both fresh and estuarine surface waters.
Typical BMP’S include wet or dry detention ponds and stone or vegetated swales. With the acceptance of “Low Impact Development” (LID) techniques, the catalog of devices has added, among others, surface sand filters, tree filters and constructed gravel wetlands. Recent evaluations by the University of New Hampshire have highly rated the constructed gravel wetland.
Waste Water
The nutrient over-enrichment of our ponds and estuaries and the resultant noxious/harmful algae blooms that occur are fed, in a great degree, by the minimal treatment activity available from the many septic systems standard in our area. As the population grows the resultant sewage volume also grows increasing the intensity of the problem.
Over 30 years ago residents noted the declining water quality in our estuaries and engaged in a questioning and activism activity to understand and combat this obviously growing problem. Following a series of ″jawboning″ efforts and a series of town committees addressing the declining conditions a 1997 study was funded. That study confirmed the problem and established the need for a more in-depth review of the causal factors in order to develop a mitigation plan.
The Town of Mashpee Sewer Commission has undertaken the development of a a “Comprehensive Watershed Nitrogen and Wastewater Management Plan”. Baseline data for calendar year 2001 and data developed by Mashpee Volunteers beginning in 1997 with lab analyses by the School for Marine Science and Technology, UMASS, Dartmouth resulted in a 2004 technical report for Popponesset Bay followed a few years later for the Mashpee portion of Waquoit Bay. These reports were the basis for Massachusetts prepared documents outlining the current conditions and maximum levels allowable to restore our troubled waters. These reports known as ″Total Maximum Daily Loads″ are required by the Clean Water Act and must receive approval from the regional EPA to become an official regulatory requirement. This approval has been forthcoming.
Mashpee funded the remedial planning effort by over $500,000 ($405,140 authorized May and $40,000 authorized October of 1999), plus past and additional studies with continued volunteer water sampling mandating lab analyses. The planning is intended to provide a road-map to the eventual resolution to the serious and growing decay of our estuarine waters due to nutrient pollution.
An Environmental Notification Form (ENF) was submitted to the Executive Office of Environmental Affairs. The Secretary’s Certificate (November 9, 2001) requires a Draft and Final Environmental Impact Reports. The Certificate also notes the Project is subject to joint review with the Cape Cod Commission as a Development of Regional Impact. Engineering / Scientific Support Contracts have been negotiated and a “Community Advisory Committee” established.
The planning activity is ongoing at this time and has experienced significant difficulties along the way. One major glitch has been the reorganization of the Sewer Commission from a three member to a seven member Commission with only one of the original Commissioners retained. As infrastructure plans are developed they need to be tested by the scientific community for compliance to the computer models developed for our watersheds. At this time we have a mix of compliant and non-compliant potential approaches with costs that vary from approximately $250 million to $500 million.
In addition to the minor road blocks that should be anticipated for a project of this size and complexity, there are two major hurdles that should have been addressed long ago to establish a solid planning basis.
The first hurdle is the lack of any discussions towards an agreement from the watershed participants (Mashpee, Barnstable and Sandwich for Popponesset and Mashpee, Sandwich and Falmouth for Waquoit) relating to what share of each watershed´s allowable limit should be allotted to each watershed sharing town.
The second major hurdle is planning for acquiring the funding needed to design and construct the needed piping and treatment facilities. It appears the largest source of funding will be local and may be taxes, betterments, fees or other sources. As is likely, not all properties will require connection to a sewage treatment plant, yet theoretically all properties will benefit from restored and protected waters. This raises the question of who should pay and how.
Mashpee residents should learn all they can about this major endeavor that will have a major impact on their wallets and environmental ″Quality of Life″. MEC will continue to follow the progress of the wastewater remediation activity in Mashpee as a standard item in our quarterly newsletter.