March 28, 2024

Proposed Revisions to Rehoboth's Groundwater Protection Bylaw: A Citizen's View

Posted

As most Rehoboth homeowners realize, we all get our water from the ground. Previous concerns with protecting our town's groundwater were focused on the largely misinformed notion depicted in current zoning maps on the town's websites. These show that our principal groundwater resource was concentrated along the stream course of the lower Palmer River. This was where, in the 1970s, the United States Geological Survey, under mandate from the State, had predicted (but not exhaustively confirmed) the greatest thickness of sand and gravels. These are deposits from the last glaciation, 14,000+ years ago, and ‒ throughout the U.S. ‒ are usually associated with today's most productive groundwater aquifers, hence likely spots for high production water wells. The Planning Board has recently faced a well-known quandary we are well aware of in science (and planning policy) which I will refer to as, "A case when facts don't match the facts". This situation, of course, refers to two different sets of "facts" that don't lead to the same conclusion. In the case of our groundwater supply, Fact #1 is that the areas of water-saturated deposits of sand and gravel overburden, some tens of feet thick, along our rivers are indeed a significant source of groundwater. Fact #2, in counterpoint, is that 99% of our personal groundwater wells in the town draw water, not from this shallow sand and gravel overburden material, but from our bedrock aquifer at depths of hundreds of feet. This is because our Board of Health has long maintained that water from these deeper, bedrock wells is typically much purer than water from shallow wells that are much more likely to be polluted. But with increasing buildout and population in the town, the Planning Board has come to realize the increasing threat to even our bedrock groundwater supplies. Hence, we should all be grateful that, through a significant departure from the town's now outdated and inappropriate bylaw, the Planning Board has spent many hours developing a revised groundwater protection plan for all of the wells in our town. If approved by our residents at the upcoming town meeting, the entire town will come under the same level of groundwater protection.

Jack (John F) Hermance
Rehoboth

Comments

No comments on this item Please log in to comment by clicking here

Share!
Truly local news delivered to every home in town