Spring is here, and the growing season is now underway. The negative consequences of the illegal fencing and deforestation on the property being developed have been felt for many months now, and the situation is only growing worse.
Our primary, and often repeated, request to the NEC and City is that the rules be obeyed. The intent of the NEC's own Development Permit decision and site plan approval must be respected, and the area outside the development zone must be regenerated and maintained as a naturalized and protected area. While the intent to protect the naturalized area is implicit within the documents, it now needs to be made explicit.
Once the development rules were broken, we asked the approvals be amended to include the following enforceable conditions:
1) In addition to the Tree Protection Zone and Landscape Plan, the meadow in the southeast corner of the site and east of the amenity zone should be recognized as a long-established deer yard that must be maintained in its naturalized, un-sodded, un-paved and un-fenced state. This is a small portion of the property owners 7 1/2 acre site, but it is vital to the well-being and safety of area wildlife.
2) The parameters shown on the approved plans must be respected and strictly adhered to. The illegal fencing that currently extends far beyond what is shown on the approved plans must be removed, and the required construction fence be erected in the much-smaller area where it is supposed to be. Required tree protection fences should be erected around those protected trees that still remain, to prevent further harm from the development process. Wildlife must once more be freely permitted to access and use the decades-old corridors they have come to rely on, in order to reach shelter, water and the forest beyond.
3) Wildlife are suffering, and we cannot afford another season of out-of-control destruction. The deer yard must be respected and remediated now, not at some vague time in the future. It should be left free of development and debris, and allowed to begin the process of naturalization now, in the growing season. Protected trees that have been illegally removed must be replaced around the deer yard’s edges, to enclose it once more. It should be remediated with good-sized indigenous plants that can adequately shelter deer, not seedlings, and these should be planted by professionals, not destructive contractors.
4) The property owners should be required to adequately remediate the deer yard and wildlife corridors before they proceed with any further activity on the property. Lax enforcement only acts as a reward for breaking the rules. They should not continue to treat wildlife and foliage as trash, just because nature stands in the way of ill-considered, detrimental whims. All the soil and debris currently piled up in the meadow area must be removed and stored deposited either in the approved development zone or removed off-site. This is crucial to allow for a full growing season in the deer yard area, to help maintain it as a naturalized area and to allow for wildlife movement.
5) The property owners must be told in no uncertain terms that they must confine the fenced-in, denaturalized back yard portion of their property to the parameters shown on the approved plans – at the northern end of the house to be built, where their NEC-approved pool, deck, patio, cabana and fenced-in area are supposed to be. That is their back yard – not the deer yard site to the east of their three-car garage.
6) Appropriate fines should be levied, and a letter of credit should be required to ensure that these conditions are met.
7) In light of many infractions already committed, if these safeguards cannot be achieved, then serious consideration should be given to revoking the NEC Development Permit entirely.
These deer should not be trapped along the perimeter.
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