DEP Original Agreement with Lisbon‏

 

DEP Consent Agreement

The Town should publicly disclose the detailed proposal to DEP. The 
public, Conservation Commission, Water Commissioners, ARWC, and 
environmental groups should have had the opportunity to provide input. 
Interested and credible parties with good working relations with DEP 
would have had a real opportunity to enhance the local environment.
 
Other communities around us are getting cash grants from the State of 
Maine for environmental projects. We likely would be awarded a grant if 
the administration was environmentally pro-active and not adversarial 
toward the DEP and local interests.
 
Lisbon has two models for managing our utilities and the results are 
clear. The Water Dept. is overseen by a board, with minutes and open 
public participation. Their public complaints and system operations 
issues are discussed and resolved in the open. The Sewer Dept. does not 
cooperate with the public on any such basis.  The environmental 
contamination by the Lisbon Sewer Dept. is the result of lack of 
visibility and accountability. For instance, there is no disclosure of 
the complaints from the Huston Park area related to the months of sewer 
line back-up or the system failures at the Sabattus River boat launch 
dumping perhaps millions of gallons of raw sewage into the river.
 
This clearly illustrates the need to keep the Water Dept. oversight 
structure. Bringing the Sewer Dept. under the same management would also 
serve the community better than the present system.

Submitted by: Steve Warren