Conservation Commission

MINUTES OF THE LACONIA CONSERVATION COMMISSIONS June 1, 2016 CITY Hall Room 200B Approved at the July 6, 2016 meeting I. CALL TO ORDER: Dean Anson opened the public meeting at 6:00 PM. LACONIA MEMBERS PRESENT- Dean Anson, Deb. Williams, Lisa Morin, Marnie Schulz, Mike Foote and Dick Christopher OTHERS PRESENT- Steve Smith, Steven Smith Associates and Pat Tarpey, Winnipesaukee Watershed Association Review of the minutes of the May 18, 2016 meeting L. Morin made a motion to approve the minutes as amended. The motion was seconded by M. Foote. The motion passed 6-0 II. New Business: 1. PL2016-0075SU 326 Endicott St East MBL 165-72-11 a proposal to subdivide one lot into 7. The proposal will remove what is currently a paved parking area adding seven-single family homes in its place. S. Smith presented the proposal to convert what is currently a vacant parking lot to a 7-lot residential subdivision. The 7-lot subdivision will be served by Laconia municipal sewer and water will be supplied by the Lakes Region Water Company. The proposal is to reduce the impervious lot coverage from 80% to 40 %. All lots will meet minimum frontage requirements. Street trees will be added and placed away from any powerlines. An Association will be proposed to manage the utilities coming on site. S. McPhie passed out the Technical Review Committee comments from the TRC 1 meeting. The Conservation Commission had no additional comments. M. Foote made a motion to approve the project as presented with the existing TRC 1 comments in place. The motion passed 6-0. 2. PL2016-0075SP waiver for sidewalks 34 Park Street MBL 350-175-37. The proposal will remove a boat storage/wash facility and construct the same with a different configuration. The new proposal will improve existing off site sheet flows. Substantial improvements were made to the property since the current owners acquired it. The existing oil water separator has been in place for quite some time. Silt sock will be installed around the site during construction. Four street trees will be added in the limited green areas. Roof and parking lot runoff will be captured and sent to the new stormceptor filtered and then flow into the existing catch basin system. The surrounding land uses are predominately boat storage and repair. All members were in agreement and had no additional comments to add to the TRC 1 memorandum. M. Foote made a motion to approve the project as presented with the existing TRC 1 comments in place. D. Christopher seconded the motion. The motion passed 6-0. 1 III. Old Business: 1. Milfoil subcommittee update. Include Black Brook Milfoil removal proposal. Pat Tarpey was excited to offer funding for small milfoil removal projects in the amount of $2,000.00. S. McPhie explained Jon Jude and Spinnaker Cove talked about adding a small section of Black Brook to their already awarded NHDES milfoil contract. The contract language allows this to be done. The projects scope included removing the thick clump of invasive milfoil from the mouth of Black Brook and removing problem areas from around the Spinnaker Cove docks. As always the Diver Assisted Suction Harvesting (DASH) method will be utilized due to the close proximity to the Laconia water supply intakes. The total cost estimate for the milfoil removal would be $2,800.00. Spinnaker Cove Yacht Club would pay for half with the grant picking up the other half. P. Tarpey indicated that she could provide a portion of the $2,000.00. D. Anson requested P. Tarpey pay Aqua Logic directly to reduce the delays due to the current City budget process. No decision was entertained due to the fact S. Perley was not in attendance. Aqualogic will reach out to S. Perley, Chair of the Invasive Aquatics subcommittee. D. Anson also agreed to communicate this exciting idea to S. Perley. Black Brook is currently classified as an impaired water body for the chemical phosphorus. D. Anson questioned if NHDES defines the word impaired as: obstructed by sediment or the presence of a particular contaminant? S. McPhie would request that answer to be part of the report provided by Mr. Murawski. D. Anson requested S. McPhie follow up with Amy Smagula of NHDES on the status of applying the Paugus Bay outfall Granit data layer on top of the milfoil infestation layer. Amy Reardon, GIS Manager, of Public Works created the layer with input from the Con Com. S. McPhie indicated he had already forwarded the completed layer to Amy Smagula a few months ago. He would contact Amy Smagula and see if the map layer overlays would be completed for publication in the final Paugus Bay Invasive Species management plan. L. Morin made a motion to request D. Anson follow up with S. Perley on this item. M. Foote seconded the motion. The motion passed 6-0-0. 2. Discussion and updates to the Conservation checklists The members of the Laconia Conservation Commission (Con Com) looked at all three examples of the checklist and provided some spelling corrections and general suggestions. They preferred the simple word CUP checklist rather than the more detailed Excel one. Mr. McPhie explained they still want us to maintain the Excel long checklist so the Con Com can consistently refer to relevant environmental questions when varying site plan applications come before them. He will also come up with an abbreviated version of the checklist with attached appendix. The final product should be able to be loaded onto the City of Laconia web site. IV. Liaison & Sub-Committee Reports: 1. Permit Sub-Committee review and updates A handful of permits were received and reviewed. Most of the permits were for dock repairs in kind with only minor additions. 2 V. Other Business: 1. Subdivision/ Site Plan update See the above items presented tonight. 2. Commissioners Comments D. Anson reviewed the first meeting of the Lake Winnisquam Watershed Association. Dave Jeffers, Executive Director, of the Lakes Region Planning Commission hosted the session. L. Morin and S. McPhie were also in attendance. Discussions were preliminary with a suggestion to meet later in the summer to follow up on today’s discussion. D. Anson and L. Morin attended the regional NHDES meeting for those concerned about the inability of the Wetland Bureau to have enough staff to enforce their regulations. Local assistance may be needed to enforce the many wetland permits issued for docks, retaining walls, and tree cutting. D. Anson suggested pooling all current Community ordinances and choosing the best one to consistently apply. Creating a super ordinance from new suggestions was also suggested. S. McPhie explained that most Towns do not have sufficient staff to look at these items. The advantage Laconia has is they have the Wetlands conditional use permit (CUP) process that captures many teardowns and rebuilds that impact wetland and water body buffers. D. Anson commented on the recently reviewed Natural Resources section of the Master Plan. A summary “for discussion only sheet” pointed out four major goals. D. Anson wanted to designate an individual responsible for each goal. A time frame for completion of each of those goals will be needed. One major goal was to form an Agricultural Commission. It was determined that L. Morin would head up any future Agricultural Commission with D. Christopher supporting that effort. Resident Q. Broillard also expressed an interest in agricultural pursuits and may be a good candidate for the future subcommittee. S. McPhie explained due to staffing constraints when the Agricultural subcommittee is formed we should limit meetings for the other three subcommittees. The other subcommittees include streams, open space, and invasive aquatics. Meetings should be held on a regular basis but limited to only a few times a year unless a project requires extra attention. The Con. Com. priority list is as follows: Invasive Aquatics, Agriculture Commission, Water Resources, and Land acquisition/easement expansion. D. Williams explained her Lake hosts program may not be able to fulfill the Weed watcher training necessary to meet Amy Smagula Paugus Bay Plan. It was hoped if volunteers were not available that Jon Jude could complete the requirements this year. All members were looking forward to attending the Annual Lakes Congress meeting. The City will pay for all Con. Con. members that want to attend. M. Foote explained the ongoing Knotweed problem at the D’Angelo's sandwich shop site. S. McPhie added we are following up with the spring cutting and management of the knotweed at Taco Bell. This is required before we release the landscape security. The property at 118 Main Street also had knotweed issues that are currently under control. We will need to follow up on that site in the spring. L. Morin explained the Tardif Park rain garden demonstration project will need some adjustments. It was suggested that we add some rain garden criteria to our ordinances and site plans as well. 3. Staff Comments 3 VI. Old Business: 1. Brook Subcommittee updates Signage for Jewett Brook is still on schedule. 2. Update on 30-foot waterbody buffer research and presentation The final step for the 30-foot buffer ordinance adjustment presentation to the City Council will take place soon. It is hoped the other item the Con Com has been working toward will be accomplished soon. 3. Non-Public Session concerning land acquisition per RSA: 91: A: II (d)–(roll call vote required). There was no need to go into non-public session VII. Adjournment: L. Morin made a motion to adjourn the meeting. The motion was seconded by M. Foote passing 6-0. 4