By Victor Tine
PLUM ISLAND — Help appears to be on the way for the area's troubled beaches after an Army Corps of Engineers report ratcheted up a sense of urgency to resolve the erosion problem.
A state agency agreed yesterday to provide partial funding for a long-sought beach replenishment project. Meanwhile, the area's congressman urged the head of the Army Corps of Engineers to ensure that work "can begin as soon as practicable."
The report compiled by the Army Corps projects Plum Island Beach Center is losing about 13 feet of beach per year, threatening as many as 26 homes over the next decade.
Congressman John Tierney of Salem wrote to Lt. Gen. Robert Van Antwerp shortly after the House passed President Barack Obama's economic stimulus package, calling for the Army Corps to assign high priority to three Essex County projects, including Plum Island and Salisbury.
Under a plan outlined yesterday by the state Department of Conservation and Recreation, sand dredged from the Merrimack River channel would be deposited directly onto the beach at Plum Island Center and in Salisbury.
DCR Deputy Chief Engineer Raul Silva said his agency would provide 75 percent of the non-federal matching funds needed to cover the additional cost of dumping the sand on shore, rather than the usual practice of offshore deposit.
Silva presented the plan yesterday to the Merrimack River Beach Alliance, a group of local and state officials, as well as organizations, such as Plum Island Taxpayers and Associates, the Plum Island Foundation and the Salisbury Beach Betterment Association.
There is an estimated 160,000 cubic yards of dredge material in the Merrimack River channel, according to the Army Corps of Engineers. Under the DCR proposal, Plum Island would receive 120,000 yards and Salisbury Beach 40,000.
State Sen. Bruce Tarr, who is also Beach Alliance co-chairman, said at the meeting that anyone with objections to the division of the sand should speak up.
"This is like a wedding: Speak now or forever hold your peace," Tarr said.
There was no audible dissent, and a later show of hands on the proposal appeared to be unanimous; although the alliance has no specific voting procedure but rather works by consensus.
One of the meeting's participants, Annapolis Way resident and Plum Island Foundation Vice President Robert Connors, had previously threatened a lawsuit to block deposit of sand anywhere but the island, but he did not object yesterday.
Salisbury Town Manager Neil Harrington also had no objection.
"The split seems fair to me," Harrington said.
The plan presented by Silva would leave Newbury, Newburyport and Salisbury with a combined $175,000 to raise to complete the funding for the project.
DCR would provide about $525,000 and take care of local and state permitting for the project.
Dredging the channel, which would be done entirely at federal government expense, has been estimated at $2.1 million.
Depositing the sand on shore would add another approximately $2 million, depending on the method used. The federal government would pay 65 percent of that additional cost.
The remaining 35 percent — about $700,000 — must be made up of non-federal money. Silva said DCR is willing to pick up 75 percent of that figure.
Tarr said the alliance would work to get the Newbury-Newburyport-Salisbury share paid from other sources of money, which have yet to be identified.
Silva said the dredged-sand deposit is only a temporary solution, but it buys time until a long-range plan is in place.
"The 160 (thousand cubic yards of sand) is a Band-Aid, but it's a big Band-Aid," he said.
Silva said he expected the Army Corps to go out to bid on a dredging contract late in the summer, which means the dredging would take place late this year or early 2010.
Newburyport and Newbury need to complete beach management plans in the next few months to expedite permitting, he said. DCR itself owns all of Salisbury Beach and has completed a beach management plan for that stretch of shoreline.
