The latest twist in the ongoing effort to rebuild Plum Island's deteriorating Beach Center dunes is maddening to anyone who wants to see Plum Island survive the losing battle it has been fighting against the sea.
We were expecting to see the beach replenishment begin this fall, but now it appears it won't start until at least January, smack in the middle of the nor'easter season, the very conditions that have caused so much devastating damage to the beach.
Blame the bureaucrats.
It's been widely known for at least two years that the dunes at the Beach Center are being eaten up by the surf at an alarming rate. In the scope of the island's long beachfront, it's a small area — about a quarter-mile long or so. But these are the most important dunes on the island, for they protect the hub of roads that most people use to get on and off the island, and they protect important junctions in the recently installed water and sewer system. These dunes are the last wall of defense against a disaster.
There's been an admirable alliance of government agencies, elected officials and residents who have come together to hash out plans to save the island and replenish the beach with sand from the Merrimack River mouth channel. The group has managed to overcome differences — personal, philosophical and political — to unite around a common goal. That's a rare thing these days, and it's the way things should be.
But two "problems" have suddenly emerged that will be delaying all that hard work.
An obscure state board, the Natural Heritage and Endangered Species program, has raised "concerns" that the plan will have an adverse impact on piping plovers. Just about everyone who lives around here knows of the piping plover. That's the tiny bird to which we surrender six miles of prime Plum Island beachfront each year in order to provide habitat to the dozen or so nests that they build. That's a pretty generous gesture to a bird that, even with so much real estate devoted to it, is struggling to survive.
Apparently that long stretch of beach isn't enough, at least in this obscure state board's mind. Their last-minute meddling and "concerns" are helping to delay the replenishment of the beach. Perhaps the members of the board (none of whom live anywhere near Plum Island) ought to take a walk along the six miles of beach, and then at the end of that arduous trek honestly ask themselves if this region has done its share to protect the dainty birds that nature itself has been savaging.
The Army Corps of Engineers has also had a bureaucratic hiccup, by failing to send out necessary paperwork to beachfront homeowners until last week. That will cause delays.
It's unfortunate because the Corps has been responsive and a well-respected team player in this effort to save Plum Island. The Corps' main goal is to open up the sand-clogged channel of the Merrimack River, which has become extremely dangerous to boaters. There have been some harrowing near-sinkings this year; this dredging is a matter of preserving human life.
These latest problems — in particular the piping plover sideshow — speaks to the suffocating amount of bureaucracy that we've allowed our society to become choked by. Too much common sense is washed away by minor government agencies that are too mired in their own agendas to see there's a bigger picture.
Let's get this project off the ground and ignore the special interests.
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