Protection of Sawmill, Cranberry Properties Cap Off Multi-Year Effort to Preserve Acushnet River Valley Lands

The Coalition for Buzzards Bay & Partners Successfully Protect 440 Acres of Riverfront

March 29, 2007

CONTACT:

Mark Rasmussen, Executive Director/Baykeeper

The Coalition for Buzzards Bay

(508) 999-6363, ext. 201

Laurell Farinon, President

Fairhaven-Acushnet Land Preservation Trust

(508) 998-8370

The Acushnet River flows into the sawmill pond, over the dam. Photo, Tony Williams

NEW BEDFORD, MA—The Coalition for Buzzards Bay and its partners have capped off a five-year land protection effort in the Acushnet River Valley with the recent acquisition of the former Acushnet Sawmill property and 85 acres of the Dietlin Cranberry Company. The endeavor has resulted in the permanent protection of 440 acres of Acushnet riverfront lands and has doubled the amount of conservation land along the Acushnet.

Thanks to $2.525 million in funding from The New Bedford Harbor Trustees Council, who administers the penalty funds related to the toxic PCB contamination of New Bedford Harbor, the Coalition recently took ownership of the 21-acre sawmill property which is comprised of fields, forest, riverfront, and freshwater pond and marsh on the shores of the Acushnet River in the New Bedford’s North End.   In addition, the Coalition, in partnership with the Fairhaven-Acushnet Land Preservation Trust, successfully protected 85-acres of the Dietlin Cranberry property located in the headwaters of the Acushnet River.

Acushnet Sawmill

The 21-acre Acushnet Sawmill property straddles both sides of the Acushnet River in the Town of Acushnet at the edge of the urban neighborhoods of New Bedford’s North End. Until the early 1990s, the Acushnet Sawmills Company operated a lumberyard and hardware store on the property. The hardware store burned down in 1985, the lumberyard closed, and the buildings have recently been leased to small manufacturing and storage businesses.

Acquisition of the Acushnet Sawmill property by The Coalition for Buzzards Bay will eventually result in the removal of 4 acres of riverfront pavement and buildings and restore the site’s fields, woods, and more than 3,000 feet of Acushnet River riverbank to their natural state. Other long-term goals include restoration of fish passage above the Sawmill dam as well as the development of public access, passive recreation, and environmental education opportunities. The Coalition also hopes to develop water quality, river flow and herring run monitoring programs at the site.

“The Acushnet Sawmill site, its location, buildings, and natural assets all serve as a perfect location for educating people about the natural world, the river, and watershed issues,” says Mark Rasmussen, Executive Director of The Coalition for Buzzards Bay. “The contrast of the adjacent urban neighborhood with the wonderful natural resources of this site is one of the most striking aspects of the property and offers tremendous potential for the pubic to use and discover the river and to engage people of all ages in education programs related to the River and the overall New Bedford Harbor restoration. Through our acquisition of the site, we would also be protecting land from development in a part of the City with extremely limited open space.” 

The Dietlin property is the largest undisturbed block of forest and freshwater wetland habitat in the Acushnet River watershed. Photo, Laurell Farinon

Dietlin Cranberry Company

The 85-acre Dietlin property, with its 1,200 feet of streambank on Squam Brook, is one of the largest landholdings in the Acushnet River headwater forest and is the largest undisturbed block of forest and freshwater wetland habitat in the Acushnet River watershed.  Squam Brook feeds into the New Bedford Reservoir and provides for the maintenance of downstream water quality and protection of fish spawning habitat.  Small streams such as Squam Brook have been found to remove more pollutants such as nitrogen from water than do their larger counterparts.   The Fairhaven-Acushnet Land Preservation Trust owns and will manage the property for passive public recreational use.

According to Rasmussen, protection of these properties and other, previously protected lands, prevents the development of more than 100 houses and the pollution associated with their septic systems, lawns and roadways in close proximity to the river. Also, through linking existing open spaces with new protection, the Coalition’s focus on the Acushnet has begun to form a continuous greenway along the river and secured exciting opportunities for restoration of wetlands and riverfronts.

“We are very pleased with this acquisition and grateful to the Dietlin family for being excellent land stewards,” says Fairhaven-Acushnet Land Preservation Trust President Laurell J. Farinon.  “The generosity and conservation ethic demonstrated by the Dietlin family has allowed the Fairhaven-Acushnet Land Preservation Trust to protect important wetlands and wildlife habitat on the headwaters of the Acushnet River.”

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The Coalition for Buzzards Bay is a private, non-profit membership organization dedicated to the protection, restoration, and sustainable use of Buzzards Bay and its watershed. The organization works to improve the health of the Bay ecosystem for all through education, conservation, research and advocacy and is supported by more than 4,700 members.

The Fairhaven-Acushnet Land Preservation Trust was founded in 1992 as a membership-supported nonprofit organization dedicated to the acquisition and preservation of important natural areas and farmland within the towns of Fairhaven and Acushnet, Massachusetts. The Trust has preserved more than 900 acres of coastal habitats, farmland, woodland and Acushnet River frontage. The FALPT is managed by an all-volunteer Board of Directors.