After more than two years of local review, negotiations and litigation, the Cloverleaf housing project in Truro is now moving forward. At issue for the Truro community during this time were serious concerns about wastewater contamination at the site. The final design for wastewater treatment shows that water concerns were merited and that a high-density project like the 39-unit Cloverleaf 40B project can be built while adequately protecting ground water resources.
The initial proposal put forward by the developer included minimal wastewater treatment, deploying only leach fields to treat effluent. Yet, more sophisticated wastewater technologies, including innovative/alternative (I/A) systems, exist to remove substantially more contamination from wastewater.
Community engagement on the wastewater issue was high, leading the Cloverleaf developer to add an I/A wastewater system that would cut projected nitrate contamination substantially, but in the view of neighbors, not enough to protect their households. A recently concluded lawsuit followed, which strengthened wastewater management controls to reduce nitrates even further, with a total reduction of about 70% compared to the initial 2019 proposal. The final design for the Cloverleaf wastewater system and management controls are a huge win for protecting groundwater quality in Truro, both at this site and for future developments.
When details of the project first emerged in 2019, this outcome did not seem possible. Only the Truro Planning Board flagged and understood that the wastewater generated by a high-density project would threaten the ground water quality of Pond Village, one of Truro’s oldest neighborhoods. Pond Village already had elevated nitrate levels in its groundwater and pond. A report by Weston & Sampson engineering firm, available on the town website for years before the Cloverleaf proposal, identified Pond Village as an “area of critical interest” due to elevated nitrates. The firm later recommended that I/A septic systems be required for all homes in this neighborhood.
The Truro Board of Health initially downplayed concerns about Pond Village’s water and failed to recognize the impact of Weston & Sampson’s report. Furthermore, the board failed to acknowledge the existence of a 10-year database of ground water data that supported these concerns. Meanwhile, state Sen. Julian Cyr, D-Truro, dismissed concerns about wastewater, declaring in 2020 that “If they (concerns) had any basis, I’d consider their merits. But they don’t…”
On this, the community showed their concerns had a basis.
The Planning Board’s analysis alerted local residents, who began to voice their opposition to the original wastewater design. Residents from Pond Village organized and began speaking out. A group of scientists and medical professionals called Docs for Truro Safe Water raised awareness of research conducted since 1996 showing that nitrates are likely even more hazardous to human health than is reflected in current EPA water quality standards. The group's efforts paid off.
Local residents continued to apply pressure for designs that produced even greater nitrogen reduction. Eventually, both the Board of Health and Zoning Board of Appeals encouraged the developer to come up with more effective wastewater treatment designs. The result proves that cluster development and protection of drinking and groundwater can be achieved together.
Community engagement in Cloverleaf review also led to additional benefits for Pond Village and the rest of Truro. The Board of Health began looking at stormwater problems in Pond Village. Most significantly, the board enacted a town-wide phaseout of harmful cesspools, which provide very little if any wastewater treatment, and exist largely because of loopholes in current regulations. Even Sen. Cyr may be coming around, recently telling the Cape Cod Times: “One of the biggest things we can do is support a wastewater infrastructure that enables you to build denser, more compact housing.”
Many lessons can be learned by reviewing the history of the Cloverleaf project. In hindsight, agreeing on an adequate wastewater solution should not have required the time, grief or expense to residents that the Cloverleaf consumed. Wastewater management should have been flagged during the proposal stage of the project and Pond Village residents should have been engaged more constructively in the process.
Looking beyond the Cloverleaf project, Truro must also consider adopting stricter septic design standards not just for commercial developments but for its residential neighborhoods as well. Truro’s groundwater provides 100% of the drinking water for our town and for Provincetown. It must be protected.
If Truro does not commit to higher septic standards for individual developments and homes, contamination levels in groundwater will rise inexorably to the point where regulators will step in and force the town to build centralized sewers and other water infrastructure, as is happening in other parts of the Cape. Moving from on-site wastewater treatment to a centralized system requires that piping be installed from all homes and businesses to a central plant. The plant will have to be scaled to handle dramatic variations and increases in seasonal flow, due to the influx of seasonal residents, visitors and tourists during the ever-expanding “summer.” With Truro’s relatively low density, the cost of reaching homes throughout Truro would be prohibitive.
Truro would not be able to afford the upfront and ongoing costs of a town-wide centralized water infrastructure — sewering, water towers, wastewater treatment plants and more — without substantial outside resources and/or by embracing much higher density and growth across the entire town so that there are more “users” to pay for a centralized system. This will fundamentally change the rural character of Truro. It may also affect both year-round and tourism-related business due to the impact on local roads for the years involved in such a large infrastructure project.
Truro can control its destiny, have the housing we need, the safe water we deserve, and retain the town's unique character by committing to on-site I/A sewage treatment for all individual residential and commercial properties and by adopting wastewater treatment standards that go beyond the commonwealth’s obsolete 1995 standard. Wellfleet is considering such a proposal now, and Truro should join them in being in the vanguard of water protection.
Kevin Kuechler is from Truro. He was a member of the Truro Water Resources Oversight Committee from 2002 to 2018, serving as chairman for 11 years. He was a Truro representative on the Provincetown Water and Sewer Board from 2011 to 2018. He is an advisor to Docs for Truro Safe Water.