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The Lakeside/Trappe East residential and commercial project on the northeast side of Trappe was billed as a way to save the financially struggling town, The Washington Post reported Monday afternoon.
But some opponents fear the 2,501-home development, which could quintuple the town’s population, will change Talbot County’s rural character and caution that its wastewater treatment system could cause environmental problems.
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More than 150 people largely filled the curling rink at the Talbot County Community Center to urge state environmental officials to deny a wastewater discharge permit for the Trappe East/Lakeside wastewater treatment plant.
Nearly three dozen spoke during the Thursday night public hearing on the Maryland Department of the Environment’s draft permit for the project, which would allow an annual average of 540,000 gallons per day of treated effluent to be sprayed onto farmland near the Miles Creek.
The crowd applauded every speaker, who each supported the denial or withdrawal of the permit, with most concerned about the environmental impact on the relatively pristine Miles Creek. The condition of Miles Creek is dramatically different than La Trappe Creek and an unnamed tributary of La Trappe Creek into which Trappe’s existing wastewater treatment plant discharges its effluent.
The unnamed tributary, La Trappe Creek, and the Choptank River — into which La Trappe and Miles creeks flow — are all impaired and conditions in the Choptank have been getting worse, not better.
Several speakers also challenged MDE on its failure to enforce permit limits of existing sewer plants and to ensure compliance with the federal Clean Water Act.
Tom Hughes said he has been concerned about the town’s existing plant for more than 20 years.
He said he had stood up in a similar meeting two decades ago and “asked the MDE representatives there how they could consider allowing Trappe to increase its wastewater plants discharged into La Trappe Creek when there was already way too much nitrogen, phosphorus and fecal bacteria in it.
“Here we are 23 years later, and absolutely nothing has changed,” Hughes said. “La Trappe Creek is still grossly impaired and the town is reportedly again violating its discharge permit. We have an ongoing public health hazard in La Trappe Creek and the MDE has known about it for decades.”
He said he had sought 2021 data about La Trappe Creek or the unnamed tributary to compare to data from 1998 and 2003 and had gotten little response and no information from MDE.
“Six weeks have now passed and I still haven’t gotten a direct answer to my simple question,” Hughes said.
Choptank Riverkeeper Matt Pluta said the permit should be “withdrawn and reprocessed as the surface water discharge permit that it is.” (The permit is being processed as a groundwater discharge permit as the treated effluent will be spray irrigated onto farmland.)
“MDE is responsible for setting the limits and conditions for discharging treated sewage in the state,” he said. “And these groundwater discharge permits are issued under the assumption that no pollution will end up in the groundwater or the river.
“This idea that zero discharge will occur is legal fiction. For too long the state of Maryland has been hiding pollution loads under these permits that are damaging our rivers,” Pluta said. “The Choptank River is already impaired and recognized by the state and federal agencies as trending in the wrong way and incorporating more pollution; water quality conditions in the Choptank are getting worse. And it seems that we’re prepared, through this permit, to let that pollution trend continue.
“In fact, in 2015, USGS reported that 70% of the nutrients in the Choptank come from groundwater, which is exactly what this permit is regulating,” he said. “Here we’re talking about a groundwater discharge permit for which the state believes zero discharge to the groundwater will occur.”
He said more than half of the groundwater discharge permits on the Eastern Shore are in non-compliance with permit limits and conditions.
Pluta also said groundwater discharge permits for treated effluent aren’t “even applying common farming practices.
“When the farmer puts down nutrients they do it at the right time and the right rate,” he said. “When a wastewater operator applies nutrients, they do it to control volume, their incentive is to control volume and put as much down as they can.”
While comments largely focused on the permit for the new treatment plant, Tom Alspach of the Talbot Preservation Alliance argued that MDE could not consider the Trappe East project separately from the town’s existing plant.
“You can’t do that. It’s not intended to be a separate undertaking by this developer for this one particular permit,” he said. “It is integrally related to the existing plant. The two facilities are going to be connected by a pipe. It is is intended that flows will go back and forth for an indefinite period of time.
“Ostensibly the first 120 houses from this new development to be served by the spray field are to be connected instead to the existing plant,” Alspach said. “That 120 can be an illusory number, there is no limit on how many houses can actually be connected. The only people that can limit it are the Town of Trappe and the developer. They may have no interest in limiting it if the circumstances are such they can accommodate more.
“There is no period of time limiting for how long the new houses in the Trappe East project may be connected to the existing plant. Those things, again, are a matter of contract between the town of Trappe and the developer,” he said, suggesting home sales would be slow and the spray field would not be developed “for a long, long time” and the developer would pay connection fees and send sewage to the existing Trappe plant “for as long as they can.”
“So in essence, you’ve got to look at these two things together, they’re going to be part of one system,” Alspach said. “And you gotta find a way to keep the new houses from connecting to this existing plant and exacerbate the problems you’re already having.
“I know you applaud yourselves for the fact that despite testimony that the (town’s current) plant is failing that there has not been that many exceedances under the permit,” he said. “That’s because the permit has such lousy standards. It’s not an ENR (enhanced nutrient removal) plant, which is the state of the art (and which) the new facility is going to be built to.
“It’s not even a BNR (biological nutrient removal) facility. It’s less than BNR,” Alspach said. “It’s so bad that MDE would not even allow 11 houses on Howell Point Road to be connected to the plant that have septic systems, because it’s not at least a BNR standards. And you can’t use Bay funds to do that connection.”
Anne Hill said she lives on La Trappe Creek and worries about her grandchildren.
“I’m not a scientist. I’m not an activist. I hate public speaking. I would rather be home. But I came out here because I’m a grandma,” she said. “And I live in constant fear that one of my grandchildren is going to fall into that creek and get seriously sick. It is that bad. You’ve seen the reports. This is a real issue for me. I have a well, it’s a real issue. I’m not talking about maybe, maybe not; this affects my life today.
“I really get upset because every single person has kicked this can down the road. I listened to the planning commission. I listened to the county council. They all said whoa, MDE will take care of it,” Hill said. “You are all gatekeepers. Every single one of us is a gatekeeper to these waterways and we cannot keep kicking the can down the road.
“Where’s the person that’s going to say no, I am responsible for these waterways. It is my job … to stop these things from polluting our waters. You are all gatekeepers, please be a gatekeeper. I’m just a grandma.”
Jim Smullen focused his comments on the need for “quantitative enforceable language” in the permit. Smullen has worked in water resources, engineering and science for 49 years, representing large dischargers for the last 31 years.
He said the state agriculture department”has requirements for 75 days of no nutrient application by farmers on cropland and pasture land.
The Trappe East permit talks about 75 days of storage, but does not detail December 15 to February 28, as a no-spray period, Smullen said.
“The permit needs to do that, that’s critically important,” he said. “The other thing that permit needs to do is to tell the applicants that there is no other way to get rid of sewage once the prohibition is on for no spraying. The permit should say they should have contracts in place for waste haulers for when they can’t spray that’s taken away to other sewage treatment plants. You cannot have a situation where they argue that we need to spray because the tank’s full.”
Smullen also said prohibitions against spraying based on precipitation, high winds, freezing conditions, or saturated soil conditions needed quantitative limits “to make those an enforceable part of the permit.
“So much rain. Stop. Such a temperature. Stop. (D)on’t allow the operators to make subjective decisions about when to spray and when not to spray,” he said.
Alan Girard of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation said there were issues with several analyses in the permit and some factors, such as historic precipitation and extreme weather potential, had not been considered.
At the start of the meeting, Dr. Suzanne Dorsey, MDE’s assistant secretary, said the “hearing is focused on the proposed discharge permit” for Lakeside/Trappe East, but acknowledged concerns about the town’s existing plant.
“MDE regulates the Trappe plant under a separate permit for discharge to surface water. And when our inspections of early last summer found excessive nitrogen levels, we required immediate action to fix the problem,” she said. “An inspection later in the summer determined that the plant had returned to compliance. MDE continues to investigate the cause of this failure and to determine what additional action or corrections may be needed. Continued inspection and oversight will ensure that the plant is capable of managing the existing waste stream and any additional load allocation from growth approved by the local authorities.
Dorsey also noted that the permit “review process is rooted in science, engineering and state regulation and law” and MDE has no authority over land use decisions.
“We do require a permit applicant to demonstrate that a proposed facility has received county and town approvals, such as zoning and land use. Once a local government approves the land use for the facility, MDE evaluates a permit application,” Dorsey said. “And we evaluate it to ensure that the proposed facility’s engineering capacities will lead to results that meet the standards of state and federal law, including limits in the water discharge itself and limits on pollution to any affected groundwater and waterways.
“If MDE’s science-based review finds that all such requirements are met, then the draft permit is open and available for public comment. That’s why you’re here tonight,” she said.
Written comments on the draft permit (19-DP-3460) must be emailed by 5 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6, to [email protected] or mailed, with a postmark no later than Dec. 6, to: Maryland Department of the Environment, Water and Science Administration, Attn: Mary Dela Onyemaechi, Chief, Groundwater Discharge Permits Division, 1800 Washington Blvd., Suite 455, Baltimore, MD 21230-1708.
Permit documents are available online at https://mde.maryland.gov/programs/Water/wwp/Pages/19DP3460.aspx.
The MDE permit is one of two ongoing processes related to Trappe East, a mixed-use project of up to 2,501 homes and commercial uses on about 800 acres on the northeast side of Trappe.
While the MDE is reviewing the discharge permit, one Talbot County Council member has introduced a resolution to rescind changes to the county’s water and sewer plan related to the Trappe East project.
A public hearing on Resolution 308 was held Oct. 12 and will be continued at a future meeting of the county council.
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The county council will hold a public hearing tonight on a resolution that would rescind sewer plan changes for the Lakeside/Trappe East project.
Council Vice President Pete Lesher introduced Resolution 308, which would rescind Resolution 281.
Resolution 281 was approved 4-1 by the Talbot County Council in August 2020; Lesher voted against approval. Resolution 281 included several amendments to the county’s comprehensive water and sewer plan, most notably in connection with the proposed 2,500-unit residential and mixed commercial development proposed for the northeast side of Trappe.
Those changes included a new wastewater treatment plant for the Trappe East project. The plant would treat wastewater at an enhanced nutrient removal (ENR) standard and discharge up to 540,000 gallons of wastewater per day as spray irrigation on adjacent fields.
Opponents are concerned about the environmental impact on nearby Miles Creek, which feeds into the Choptank River, and note the abysmal water quality of La Trappe Creek, another Choptank River tributary into which the existing Trappe sewer plant discharges its treated wastewater.
Environmental concerns were heightened earlier this year after problems at the town’s existing plant. Those concerns led the county planning commission this summer to seek additional information from the Maryland Department of the Environment, the town of Trappe, and the developer.
The Talbot County Planning Commission heard public comment Wednesday morning on those concerns and voted 3-2 Thursday night against a motion recommending that the county council rescind Resolution 281.
All five members had concerns about the town’s existing plant and the current condition of La Trappe Creek, but three agreed that the panel had been correct in voting last year to certify that Resolution 281 was consistent with the county’s comprehensive plan.
Those three members — Chairman Phil “Chip” Councell, Paul Spies, and Michael Strannahan — had voted to certify that Resolution 281 was consistent with the comprehensive plan. Commissioners William Boicourt and Lisa Ghezzi voted last year against certification and voted Thursday night to recommend rescission of Resolution 281.
Councell said he was trying to reach a middle ground that would result in the most timely upgrade to the existing Trappe plant and an improvement in its discharge.
Councell noted the commission had not been formally asked to review its decision on Resolution 281, but “felt we had to do something” when new information came to light.
“And that something in my opinion, was what can we do to protect La Trappe Creek?” Councell said. “(I)f we vote to rescind, it probably goes to court… (I)f this gets tied up in litigation, it goes on and on and on. The existing Trappe wastewater treatment plan continues to pump the water.
“So I’m struggling here right now, trying to figure out what is the fastest way to get that plant upgraded,” he said. “And no matter what happens today, tonight, no matter what happens next Tuesday, every citizen in this county needs to be committed to getting that plant where it needs to be, whatever it takes.
“And I think … it makes no sense to compound the problems that we know is a problem,” Councell said. “So we’re going to add one-third of the capacity to the existing plant…. But if we hold the process up for one year or two years, more than that, it’s going to go into La Trappe Creek anyway.
“I think I’m willing at this point to do everything in our power … short of rescission, because I honestly think that would be the worst thing for the Trappe wastewater treatment plant,” he said.
Attorneys for the Town of Trappe and the project’s developer noted they are looking at the possibility of using the Trappe East plant to treat the town’s existing wastewater to ENR standards and then sending the treated discharge back to the town’s discharge point. That option may be the fastest and cheapest way to upgrade the town’s wastewater treatment to ENR standards, which would significantly improve the town’s discharge into La Trappe Creek.
Ryan Showalter, an attorney for the developer, said Wednesday, “that’s an option that’s being studied, and one reason why it’s being studied as it may be the fastest way to replace or upgrade the town’s treatment process.
“The Lakeside plant is modular, so adding two additional modules could create 200,000 gallons of capacity in the existing Lakeside plant,” he said. “Nobody’s proposing changes in the discharge at this point.
“So the concept would be whatever comes from the the existing town’s collection system would be treated at Lakeside and would be discharged at ENR levels to La Trappe Creek,” Showalter said. “If one day there’s 150,000 gallons coming from the town collection system, that 150,000 gallons would be discharged under the town’s existing point discharge at ENR levels.”
Showalter also noted that nearly all of the Lakeside property has been designated as a future growth area for Trappe since 1973. The entire property has been in the town’s planned growth area since at least 2002 and in the county’s growth area plan for Trappe since at least 2005.
Bruce Armistead, an attorney for a neighboring property owner, said his clients — Dr. and Mrs. Steve Harris — were primarily concerned about the location of the spray irrigation fields.
“The Harrises are an adjacent landowner to the proposed Lakeside project and potentially the most affected by the entire project,” he said Wednesday. “That doesn’t mean that they’re unconcerned about the information you’re receiving about the existing Trappe plant, but their principal concern is the location of the spray fields that are proposed for the Lakeside project.”
Armistead said it appeared the planning commission may have received incomplete or inadequate information during its 2020 review of Resolution 281.
“And it really doesn’t matter whether that was inadvertent, intentional, sloppy, or whatever,” he said. “The fact is, if you agree that there was incomplete or incorrect information that was used to make your decision previously on 281, then you have an obligation to the county to support taking another look.
“Real people and property rights are going to be seriously affected by this proposal,” Armistead said. “We’ve only got one chance to get this right. And frankly, Dr. Harris does not want to be the canary in the mineshaft.”
The Talbot County Council meeting begins at 6 p.m., with public hearings scheduled to begin at 6:30 p.m. The council meets in the Bradley Meeting Room in the south wing of the courthouse, but seating is limited and is available on a first-come basis.
The meeting may be viewed online by going to the county’s website at https://talbotcountymd.gov, then scrolling down and clicking on the photo of the county council under the heading “Meeting Videos.” On the meeting videos page, click on video or live/in progress next to the listing for the council’s Oct. 12 meeting.
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The county planning commission heard public comments Wednesday morning on Resolution 281 and will discuss Thursday night what actions, if any, it will take on the matter.
Resolution 281 amended Talbot County’s water and sewer plan to:
• reclassify and remap certain areas of the Lakeside/Trappe East property from W-2 to W-1 and from S-2 to S-1. (W-1 is immediate priority status for water; S-1 is immediate priority status for sewer.)
• add the Trappe East water and sewer systems to the list of capital improvement projects.
The commission’s agenda for Wednesday described the issue as “Discussion of Planning Commission’s previous certification of consistency with the Talbot County Comprehensive Plan with respect to Resolution 281 and possible recommendations and/or other actions, including undo, consider, reconsider, rescind or amend the previous certification.”
After hearing Wednesday morning from environmental groups and attorneys for a neighboring property owner, the developer, and the Town of Trappe, among others, Talbot County Planning Commission Chairman Phil “Chip” Councell asked for another meeting to be scheduled for the planning commission to consider the comments and discuss its course of action.
Councell asked for that meeting to be held before Tuesday, when the county council will hold a public hearing on Resolution 308, which would rescind adoption of Resolution 281. Resolution 308 was introduced by Council Vice President Pete Lesher, the sole council member to vote last year against Resolution 281.
Resolution 281 had been introduced Dec. 17, 2019, by Talbot County Councilmen Chuck Callahan, Frank Divilio, and Corey Pack, with public hearings held Feb. 11, 2020, and July 21, 2020.
The Talbot County Planning Commission considered the resolution in January, May, and June 2020, and voted 3-2 that an amended resolution was consistent with the comprehensive plan.
The county council voted 4-1 on Aug. 11, 2020, to approve the resolution as amended, sending the matter to the Maryland Department of the Environment for its approval, which the state agency subsequently granted. Councilwoman Laura Price joined Callahan, Divilio, and Pack in voting in favor of Resolution 281.
Earlier this year, petitioners asked the county council to rescind Resolution 281, claiming the county council and the planning commission were not provided with full information last year and noting that the discharge permit for the wastewater treatment plant that will serve Lakeside has been sent back to the state environment department for additional public comment and a public hearing.
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Over the pleas of his colleagues, Talbot County Council Vice President Pete Lesher introduced a resolution Tuesday night to rescind Resolution 281, in which the county supported the request of Trappe and a developer to amend the county’s comprehensive water and sewer plan for the Trappe East project.
The other four members of the Talbot County Council cited legal advice that the resolution, if approved, would accomplish nothing.
“My goal in this process is to give the issue a fresh public hearing for the benefit of both proponents and the skeptics,” Lesher said. “Resolution 281 came to the council at a time of a series of higher profile issues. And we’ve heard from a growing number of constituents who are concerned that their issues with this were not heard.
“And among those concerns is a provision of Resolution 281 that will allow the first 120 homes to be connected to Trappe’s existing secondary wastewater treatment plant, an outdated plant that discharges nutrients into an impaired waterway,” he said. “Trappe does eventually plan to upgrade this plant to modern ENR discharge standards, but that upgrade is still years away.”
County Attorney Patrick Thomas said the council’s approval of Resolution 281 essentially was the preliminary approval to change the water and sewer plan.
“(U)nder state law, once the council approves these comprehensive water and sewer plan amendments, they then have to go to MDE for final approval,” Thomas said. “MDE can then can deny it, they can approve it, they can amend it in part, they have … the final authority on that.”
After the council approved Resolution 281, the proposed amendment was sent to MDE, which approved it in November 2020.
“And then those amendments became part of the comprehensive water and sewer plan,” Thomas said. “So at this point, there’s nothing … for the council to rescind. (Y)ou gave your preliminary approval, it went on to MDE, they issued the final approval.”
The only way to undo Resolution 281 would be for the council to approve another amendment to the comprehensive water and sewer plan to revert it to its pre-281 status and for MDE to then approve that amendment, he said.
Councilman Frank Divilio said he had concerns about the Trappe East project, but rescinding Resolution 281 would be “a waste of time.”
Councilman Corey Pack agreed.
“I think that the county attorney has already laid out, succinctly, that 281 has already been incorporated to the comprehensive water and sewer plan and I don’t know how many times he can say that,” Pack said. “There is nothing here to rescind. This is a bridge to nowhere…. (I)t doesn’t accomplish anything.
“There is a way by which if you wanted to remove the changes of 281 from the comprehensive water and sewer plan, you would need to amend the comprehensive water and sewer plan,” he said. “This just doesn’t do it. Mr. Lesher, I’m sorry, it’s really putting the council in a bad position to put something on the agenda for a public hearing, which you very well know is not going to accomplish anything.”
Pack also noted that Resolution 281 contained some beneficial compromises between the county, town, and developer.
“There are those things built into 281 that were good. Going from a 2-foot freeboard to a three foot freeboard was a good thing. Going from 60 days of holding time to 75 days of holding time was a good thing,” he said. “So not everything in 281 to my point of view was bad.
Council President Chuck Callahan and Councilwoman Laura Price agreed that rescinding Resolution 281 would have no effect.
“I think there are some valid concerns and questions that need to be answered,” Price said. “But like my other colleagues, this is not the vehicle to do that.”
Price said the council would be able to make a more informed decision “on whether or not we … need to amend the comprehensive water and sewer plan” to address Resolution 281 after the Maryland Department of the Environment’s public hearing on the discharge permit for the Trappe East wastewater treatment plant.
That hearing had been set as a virtual hearing in early September but has been changed to an in-person hearing in late October at the Talbot County Community Center.
Asked what would happen if the council approved Lesher’s resolution, Thomas, the county attorney, said, “I don’t think it would have any effect. It’s not amending the comprehensive (water and sewer) plan.”
After additional discussion, a majority of the county council voted to schedule a public hearing for the rescission resolution at 6:30 p.m. Oct. 12.
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Maryland regulators are taking public comment again on plans to handle wastewater from a massive new development on the state’s Eastern Shore by spraying it on farm fields.
The Maryland Department of the Environment had issued a wastewater permit in December 2020 for Lakeside, a proposed community of 2,501 homes and apartments plus a shopping center in the small Talbot County town of Trappe. But a judge ordered the department to give the public another opportunity to comment on the permit because of changes made in it before being issued.
The proposed permit allows the developer to eventually spray an average of 540,000 gallons of wastewater daily on grassy fields. It must be treated using enhanced nutrient removal to lower the levels of nitrogen and phosphorus. A lagoon is also required to store wastewater for up to 75 days during winter and when it’s raining or too windy to spray.
Neighboring residents and environmental groups questioned the MDE’s assurances that the nutrients and other contaminants in the wastewater would be soaked up by the grass in the fields. They fear it could seep or run off into nearby Miles Creek, a tributary of the Choptank River.
The MDE is taking comments until July 26. It also plans to hold a public hearing, but a date had not been set.
Written comments should be mailed to the Maryland Department of the Environment, Water and Science Administration, 1800 Washington Blvd., Baltimore, MD 21230-1708, Attn.: Mary Dela Onyemaechi, Chief, Groundwater Discharge Permits Division.
For more information and to check on the hearing, visit mde.maryland.gov/programs/Water/wwp/Pages/19DP3460.aspx.
By Timothy B. Wheeler
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As supporters and opponents of the Lakeside development in Trappe await a new state hearing on the project’s wastewater discharge permit, Talbot County is being asked to revoke its approval of changes to the county sewer plan related to the project.
Petition 21-01 would rescind Resolution 281, which primarily amended the county water and sewer plan to:
• reclassify and remap certain areas of the Lakeside property from W-2 to W-1 and from S-2 to S-1. W-1 is immediate priority status for water; S-1 is immediate priority status for sewer and
• add the Trappe East water and sewer systems to the list of capital improvement projects.
The petition notes that the discharge permit for the wastewater treatment plant that will serve Lakeside has been sent back to the state environment department for additional public comment and a public hearing.
The proposed resolution included with the petition would not allow the county to consider any changes to its water and sewer plan related to the Lakeside project until after the state issues a final discharge permit, the final permit’s terms and conditions have been reviewed by the county planning commission and public works advisory board, and ShoreRivers’ case regarding the permit has been “fully resolved.”
ShoreRivers Inc. had sought judicial review of the final discharge permit issued by the Maryland Department of the Environment for the Lakeside project. The environmental group asked the court to send the permit back to MDE for additional public comment and hearing. (The Chesapeake Bay Foundation had filed a separate case also seeking judicial review of the permit.)
In seeking a remand to MDE, ShoreRivers said the final permit issued by the state differed substantially from the draft permit that had been the subject of public comment and a public hearing. The group also said the nutrient management plan for the project also had not been available for review and comment.
Lawyers for the property owner and the town had agreed with the request to send the issue back to MDE and Talbot’s circuit court judge entered an order April 27 remanding the permit to MDE for “… a public comment period of not less than 30 days and a public hearing to hear comments on, and any objections to, the nutrient management plan and the final terms and conditions of the (p)ermit….”
An MDE spokesman said Friday that the department has not yet finalized the opening date for the public comment period and has not scheduled the public hearing.
The petition notes the arguments in the ShoreRivers case, suggesting that the council’s approval of Resolution 281 relied on recommendations from the county planning commission and the public works advisory board that were based on a review of the draft permit.
A lawyer for Lakeside’s owner, Trappe East Holdings Business Trust, said it “strongly disagrees” with the premise of Petition 21-01.
“The County Public Works Advisory Board, Planning Commission and County Council reviewed complete information regarding the pending resolution and further considered the resolution after the County Council introduced Amendment No. 1,” attorney Ryan Showalter said in a statement. “One of the principal reasons the applicants initiated the Resolution 281 amendment was to update the provisions of the County Comprehensive Water and Sewerage Plan to provide for current, state-of-the-art ENR wastewater treatment technology, rather than the BNR specification that has been in the County Plan since 2002.
“Contrary to TEHBT’s intention, the draft MDE discharge permit was written for BNR-level treatment, not the ENR treatment the developer intends to utilize,” he said. “If there was any inconsistency between MDE’s discharge permit actions and Resolution 281, it was the draft discharge permit, not the final permit, that was inconsistent.”
“The wastewater plans for Lakeside remain entirely consistent with Resolution 281, as adopted,” Showalter said.
The Talbot County Council discussed the petition during its May 11 meeting, with Vice President Pete Lesher seeking clarification on the process. Lesher was the only council member to vote against Resolution 281, which was approved 4-1 on Aug. 20, 2020.
Acting County Attorney Patrick Thomas said the council’s rules of procedure, Section VI, B, say that “once a petition has been presented to the secretary, it shall be certified, presented to the Council and numbered, and the secretary shall maintain a file on the petition.
“Pursuant to section nine of the rules, the secretary shall read the petition by name and title, as she has. And then at that point, the Council may, but is not required, to consider the petition and take any appropriate action,” he said.
Thomas said the petition was asking the council “to adopt a resolution rescinding Resolution Number 281 without prejudice. And under the Council’s rules of procedures, in order to initiate legislation, a member of the council would need to direct the county attorney to prepare” the legislation.
Councilman Corey Pack expressed concern about rescinding Resolution 281, suggesting that doing so could open the entire Lakeside property to immediate development.
“I think we worked very diligently with both the Trappe Planning Commission and the developer to come to a consensus on how the parcel will be built out. And 281 did that,” he said. “It split it up so that one-half will be developed in S-1 and the back half in S-2.
“Removing 281 and opening up that entire parcel up to S-1 development zoning is something that I dread,” Pack said. “I do not think that is advantageous to do that.”
During the process of reviewing Resolution 281 in 2020, the planning commission was told by County Engineer Ray Clarke that the Maryland Department of the Environment considered the entire Lakeside parcel suitable for S-1 designation. The parcel was given the W-2, S-2 designation in 2002, meaning it was suitable for development in three to five years.
Clarke also said during the 2020 review that while MDE put water and sewer plans in the county’s hands, the state agency has final approval. Even if the county had rejected Resolution 281, the town of Trappe could have gone directly to MDE and asked for its approval of the W-1, S-1 designations.
Thomas, in response to a question from Lesher, said a council member could tell him to prepare a resolution based on the petition or the council could gather additional information first.
Councilwoman Laura Price said additional information was needed.
“I think it makes sense for us to gather our own information and make sure that everything is fact based,” she said. “And I think we also understand that this is remanded back to MDE to look at this permit again. So I think it would make sense to wait and see what happens with that and meanwhile gather our own information and we’ll go from there.”
In public comments, Dan Watson, who initiated the petition, said it had been signed by more than 60 people, along with the Talbot Preservation Alliance, as of mid-afternoon May 11.
Watson said he had asked to present the petition to the council, in addition to the secretary’s reading of the short title, but that request was ignored.
While the petition involves the Lakeside project, Watson said “I’m not here to try to stop it, but to see things go right. This petition is about protecting the integrity of Talbot County and its review processes.
“So the purpose is to introduce the resolution so that, in Ms. Price’s words, we can get the information and look into it,” he said. “It isn’t the case that one gets information and looks into it and analyzes it and talks with the planning commission and hears from the public and the public works advisory board in order to determine whether or not to introduce a resolution. It is a resolution is introduced and sets in motion that process.”
In a subsequent letter, Watson said the county council had mishandled the petition by not allowing him to present it.
The council’s rules of procedure (at Section XIII, C) say “When petitions are made to the Council, the persons or parties presenting same shall have the opportunity to state their case by presenting witnesses, exhibits, and other evidence.”
“I am sure the Council will not argue that accepting an unannounced, time-limited phone call from me an hour later, during the public comment period of the meeting, fulfills that requirement,” Watson said in his May 21 letter.
He also suggested that “proper submission of a Petition in and of itself initiates a regular legislative action, and does not require the more familiar step of a Council Member introducing the proposal ….”
But the council’s rules of procedure do not seem to suggest that. Even if the rules did, the state constitution does not allow citizens to initiate legislation.
Section 216 of the Talbot County Charter would have allowed voters to put proposed legislation on the ballot via direct initiative, but the state’s highest court ruled that section unconstitutional in a 1988 case. The Maryland Court of Appeals has repeatedly ruled that voters may not initiate local legislation, including legislation disguised as charter amendments.
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Those worried about the potential for water pollution from a massive residential and commercial development planned in Trappe will get another chance to voice their concerns.
A Talbot County Circuit Court judge has ordered the Maryland Department of the Environment to hold another hearing and give the public another opportunity to comment on sewage discharge plans for Lakeside, a proposed community of 2,501 homes and apartments plus a shopping center, in the small town of Trappe.
The April 27 ruling by Judge Stephen Kehoe came in a case filed by ShoreRivers, which had appealed the groundwater discharge permit the MDE had issued to Lakeside’s developer, Trappe East Holdings Business Trust. Development plans called for discharging treated wastewater by spraying it on fields of orchard grass in a corner of the 860-acre tract near the headwaters of Miles Creek, a tributary of the Choptank River.
Lawyers for the developer and the town of Trappe had filed a joint consent to ShoreRivers request that the permit be sent back to the MDE for further review.
State regulators originally granted the project a wastewater discharge permit in 2005, around the time Trappe voters approved annexing the undeveloped land into town limits. Development plans stalled after that, but the MDE tentatively approved a new permit in 2019 and finalized it in December 2020.
ShoreRivers contended that the final permit was different in key respects from the version MDE asked the public to comment on in 2019. The final permit was based on a nutrient management plan that spells out the terms and limitations of the treated wastewater spraying — but that plan was submitted after the public comment period had ended, and the MDE refused ShoreRivers’ requests to reopen the case.
“The nutrient management plan is a core component of the permit,” said Matt Pluta, the Choptank Riverkeeper. “Whether or not the details in [the plan] are adequate in protecting water quality warranted a review from the public.”
The final permit required the developer’s proposed sewage treatment plant to use enhanced nutrient removal, significantly lowering the levels of nitrogen and phosphorus in the wastewater before spraying it on up to 88 acres of grassy fields. The developer also was directed to build a lagoon to store wastewater for up to 75 days during winter and other times of the year when it’s raining or too windy to spray.
Pluta conceded that those changes could reduce chances of degrading nearby waterways. But he and others still question whether the system would prevent pollution from getting into the creek or the Choptank, both of which are already impaired by nutrients.
MDE spokesman Jay Apperson said the state regulatory agency will comply with the court order. But he added that the MDE “has not yet determined when the public comment period will open, and we have not yet scheduled a public hearing.”
The ruling put on hold a separate lawsuit filed by the Chesapeake Bay Foundation challenging the MDE’s approval of the Lakeside discharge permit. CBF spokesman AJ Metcalf said the environmental group would pause its litigation while new comments are taken on the permit.
“We welcome this additional opportunity for the public to weigh in on the nutrient management plan associated with this project’s discharge permit, as well as another chance to comment on the terms and conditions of the permit,” said Alan Girard, CBF’s Eastern Shore director.
Lawyers for the developer of Lakeside and for the town of Trappe did not respond to emails seeking comment.
By Timothy B. Wheeler
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The Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF) filed a lawsuit against the Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE) contesting the legality of the wastewater discharge permit it issued for Lakeside at Trappe. ShoreRivers also is challenging the discharge permit.
The permit, which MDE approved in December, allows the proposed 2,500 home and commercial development in Talbot County to use spray irrigation over farm fields to dispose of treated wastewater, CBF said in a press release.
Under the permit the development can spray up to 540,000 gallons of treated wastewater per day over the fields. The treated wastewater must contain no more than 3 mg/L of nitrogen and 0.3 mg/L of phosphorus on average before being applied to the fields.
While this is the standard for wastewater plants disposing of treated wastewater, the current assumption for wastewater disposed onto fields — as is proposed in this project — is no net pollutants once it leaves the field, according to CBF. Nitrogen and phosphorus from treated wastewater can fuel harmful algal blooms in local rivers, streams, and the Chesapeake Bay that create oxygen-deprived dead zones inhospitable to marine life.
In a press release, CBF outlined two primary concerns related to this method of wastewater disposal.
The first is that the department did not fully account for the connection between groundwater and surface water. Multiple studies have shown that even under the best conditions, nutrient pollutants applied to agricultural land can reach nearby streams through shallow aquifers under farm fields.
However, MDE asserted, without sufficient evidence, that the nitrogen and phosphorus in the wastewater will be taken up by crops in the spray field, according to CBF. MDE contends that this will effectively result in “zero net discharge” of pollutants to local waterways, which may enable the development and MDE to bypass requirements to reduce pollutants under the Chesapeake Clean Water Blueprint, also known as the Chesapeake Bay Total Maximum Daily Load.
Neither the department, nor the developer has effectively proven that this plan to dispose wastewater won’t increase pollutants entering the Bay.
The second issue is that MDE did not publish the nutrient management plan for the project during the public comment period. The plan is intended to demonstrate how the proposed development would use specific crops to take up nutrients in the wastewater being sprayed on the field to prevent them from entering nearby waterways.
Instead, MDE accepted the plan after the public comment period was closed and deemed it “satisfactory” without providing the public with an opportunity to weigh in on it, CBF said in a press release.
The development is being built near Miles Creek and the Choptank River. The Lower Choptank River is already impaired by sediments, nutrient pollutants, and fecal coliform in its tidal portions.
“The department’s approval of this wastewater permit sets a risky new precedent enabling large developments to use spray irrigation to bypass Bay pollution reduction requirements,” Alan Girard, CBF’s Maryland Eastern Shore director, said. “We already know legacy pollutants such as fertilizer, manure, and chemicals can seep from the ground via groundwater and flow into nearby streams and creeks. However, by claiming the Bay TMDL that obligates Maryland to reduce pollution is not applicable to wastewater treatment plants that use spray irrigation, the department has basically ignored that fact.
“This appears to circumvent established state policy to manage water quality. The state must account for pollution from septic systems that discharge to groundwater, but by obtaining a state groundwater discharge permit to spray irrigate instead, developers will be able to ignore these limits,” Girard said. “We are deeply disturbed that the department will not close this loophole that allows the state to disregard Bay restoration requirements.
“MDE must also follow its own public notice regulations, which it did not do in this case. While the department did eventually make the nutrient management plan for this project available, it did not do so when the formal public comment period was open as required by law,” he said. “This is unfair to those who could be affected by the pollution that this project could generate, and we are asking the court to recognize this fact. There are substantive issues with the plan and its application here which could have been addressed through the public notice and comment process.”
Petition for Judicial Review 2-1-21The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.
