Joel DeStasio and Trout Unlimited colleagues survey a road-stream crossing to inform engineering designs and cost estimates as part of the MVP Action Grant: Increasing regional flood resiliency through re-designing culverts in the Howlett Brook Watershed.
Wow! Three Ipswich Rivers Towns received Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness (MVP) planning grants this year (North Andover, Reading, and Topsfield), while an additional four action grants were awarded for projects aimed at increasing resiliency and ecological integrity in the Ipswich river watershed totaling $529,825.
One goal of our current strategic plan is to ‘Protect and Restore the health of the Ipswich River for people and nature. We sought to accomplish this goal through ‘Planning and implementing a comprehensive suite of river restoration projects’. With our help, the Town of Boxford submitted and received a regional Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness Action Grant to survey and develop design plans for 12 undersized culverts in Boxford, Topsfield and Ipswich. This project expands upon the work being done as part of the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation Howlett Brook project. Initially these twelve sites would have had conceptual designs developed, however the MVP funding will help advance the plans, enabling these towns to now have 30% design plans and cost estimates to upgrade structures that are important for flood resilience and animal passage throughout the Howlett Brook watershed- one of the Ipswich watershed’s last designated coldwater habitats.
You may wonder how everything is still progressing, in these ever-changing and socially-distanced times. Well, I am pleased to say that after participating in my first remote Conservation Commission meeting on March 19 to ask for permission to access remaining Boxford sites, our community is adapting by learning new technologies to keep restoration progress (and business as usual) moving forward. Currently we are working with Boxford, Topsfield and Ipswich to gain access to a few remaining sites to survey. In the meantime Trout Unlimited National engineers are hard at work designing replacement structures for the sites that have already been surveyed.
While some alewife stocking efforts could be delayed, we are on track towards our Howlett Brook Project goals and despite the current situation we have been working closely with Trout Unlimited Nor’East, Trout Unlimited National, the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries (DMF), the Massachusetts Division of Ecological Restoration (DER) and the Towns of Boxford, Ipswich and Topsfield.
However, we could use your help! If you are reading this and live in any of the three target towns (Boxford, Ipswich, Topsfield), please talk to your neighbors (at a safe distance) about the importance of flood resilient road-stream crossings, then check out some of our virtual presentations on this project scheduled for April 7th and April 14th at 2pm (see calendar here). We understand that times are uncertain and difficult right now, but we want you all to know we are still here, albeit remotely, to protect and restore the health of the Ipswich River for people and nature.