ROXBURY — Selectmen said Tuesday night that crews with two logging operations were or will be notified that they are causing silt problems at Roxbury Pond and on Hardwood Lane off Main Street.
Regarding the first, Board of Selectmen Chairman John Sutton said he notified a Maine Forest Service ranger about a Byron logging operation silting a tributary to the West Branch of Beaver Brook that feeds into Roxbury Pond. He said a Roxbury resident notified Selectman Tim Derouche about the concern and Derouche alerted Sutton.
Sutton said the ranger did a site visit and will return this week to ensure that the problem has been properly rectified.
“It’s my understanding that corrective actions were taken, so that should, hopefully, take care of that,” he said. “They did make a site visit and there was a brook being silted. From the way it was described to me, I don’t know if it was from road construction or harvest activity.”
Asked if the operation was sending a lot of chip trucks through town, Derouche and Sutton said they didn’t know.
“We’re not questioning them about the cutting operation,” Derouche said. “It was just noticed that there was a lot of sand and silt coming down a stream, which they’re supposed to protect (it from doing) that.”
“Especially with all the renewed interest in the watershed survey,” Sutton said.
Resident Matthew Patneaude said another logging operation on Hardwood Lane has had a lot of mud coming down that road this week.
Sutton said he and Derouche spoke with Gordon Gamble, who represents the land owner, Wagner Forest Management, and learned that the person doing the logging didn’t have permission to do it, so Wagner will follow up on it.
“The unfortunate thing is the (Roxbury Riders) ATV Club spent a lot of money water-barring that road and putting more turnouts in this spring — again to prevent erosion — and that’s all been destroyed,” Sutton said. “The landowner is aware of it.”
Patneaude said there was also a piece of equipment that was parked beside the road and leaking oil, but someone put a bucket underneath it.
In other business, Derouche updated the board on projects for capital roads and summer roads. The Town Office parking lot, new cemetery road and village road have been completed.
All that remains to be done by contractor Swasey is a small list of things in the lake area and Horseshoe Valley Road area, Derouche said.
“There’s notching and sealing cracks, remove two poles, repair a couple of beams on the bridge, unplug a culvert at 43 Main St., and a driveway entrance needs some rock,” he said. “That’s not my driveway, by the way. They’ll be coming this week or next to finish all that.”
Derouche said the total budget amount remaining for the combined capital and summer roads accounts is approximately $25,992.70.
“So there shouldn’t be $5,000 left of work, so we’ll be carrying over roughly $20,000 toward the paving,” he said. The Town Office parking lot hasn’t been paved yet.
Selectmen and the Planning Board are also trying to determine how many of the town’s 300 properties have holding tanks and which have septic systems to ensure that none have been leaking into Roxbury Pond.
“We just spent a lot of money on a watershed survey,” Sutton said. Property owners who have had their holding tanks pumped out should have receipts for the work that the code enforcement officer could check to verify this, he said.
Toward the end of the meeting, Selectman Michael Worthley and the board publicly thanked volunteer Roxbury firefighters Matthew Patneaude, his brother, Roland Patneaude, and Dale Roberts and his son Brandon Roberts for helping with the late August rescue of a rock climber on Tumbledown Mountain.
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