When Mark Dell’Orfano bought his house on Fairlane Drive in fall 2005, he didn’t know it abutted a wetland the town was studying with the intent to increase regulations.

“While there was a piece of wet property behind my property, I didn’t see anything that showed a delineation of a wetland on this particular property behind mine,” he said.

Then, after he moved in, a neighbor came by to tell him of the ordinance proposed for the March 2006 and that it would affect Dell’Orfano’s property.

“He said, ‘You know they’re going to try to pass an ordinance that will basically put a line through my house and through the middle of your backyard.’ The usable part of my backyard,” Dell’Orfano said.

The ordinance was the March 2006 proposed zoning amendment meant to increase setbacks to 100 feet around 21 significant town wetlands.

Voters overwhelmingly rejected the amendment 3,732- 944, so the wetland abutting Dell’Orfano’s property isn’t regulated differently than others in town.

Now, Dell’Orfano is a member of a resident group looking to make sure future regulations don’t affect their properties.

The subcommittee
The Bedford Conservation Commission is creating a subcommittee to look further into the wetland issue in town, said Mervyn Taub, commission chairman, who will not serve on the subcommittee. It will be led by commission member Kermit Zerr, who said the subcommittee is not looking to subvert what voters already said they didn’t want. Instead, the subcommittee will take a more involved look at the issues and include residents in the conversation.

The commission has not ruled out increasing setbacks, but does not explicitly aim to do so, he said.

Also on the subcommittee is commission member Karen Simmons, planning board council liaison Paul Roy and members from the community. The town council is set to interview residents for the positions Wednesday, Feb. 28, Zerr said.

George Drewett, a member of the resident group opposing increased wetland setbacks, and Dell’Orfano applied for seats on the subcommittee.

Dell’Orfano said the distances the town used for the March 2006 proposed ordinance are ambiguous.

“A study they consistently point at, talking about good science, setting out the criteria for why these particular 21 wetlands were chosen, doesn’t say anything about why a 100-foot setback is better than a 50-foot setback,” Dell’Orfano said.

Taub said driveways and landscaped lawns are the biggest cause of wastewater entering wetlands and a 100-foot setback would have been preventative.

“When something goes wrong with the water supply in this town and it turns out to be polluted or it turns out to be to oxygenated due to runoff, the homeowners are going to be the first to complain,” he said.

The residents
The resident group is led unofficially by Bill Dermody of Birchwood Circle, who helped put together a citizen-petitioned article for the upcoming 2007 zoning amendments.

Zoning Amendment 7, which the group urges voters to vote ‘yes’ on, aims to exclude existing development from any future regulation. The 50-foot setback would still apply to these homes, Dermody said. Also, the amendment says the town would have to make reasonable effort to notify owners of properties affected by future ordinances.

At a Jan. 8 meeting, the Bedford Planning Board voted not to recommend this amendment.

On Feb. 25, some members of the resident group met with the press and town council candidate Mike Izbicki, who is also a planning board member.

Sharon Stirling of 33 Birchwood Circle, said this is is a townwide issue, not just a problem for wetland property owners.

“The larger issue for me is not about wetlands, but about overreaching government in this town. It’s the government not listening to the people,” she said.

Regulation history
Since 1997, the setback for all Bedford wetland owners has been 50 feet, Dermody said.

In 2005, the town hired a wetland engineering firm to study the wetlands and find out which were the most important for the town, Zerr said.

This study found 21 wetlands were “of significant value” – a term that has sparked feedback from residents who are unsure just what it means.

Zerr said the term “significant” wetlands comes from wanting to keep regulations local, which is better for the community.

“We used ‘wetlands of significant value’ because when you define them as ‘prime wetlands’ they come under state regulations,” he said.

The study was completed by local environmental engineers Vanasse Hangen Brustlin Inc., and was published December 2005.

“They surveyed every wetland in town according to the 14 criteria as laid out by the state of New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services,” the 2005 Annual Town Report states. The 14 criteria came directly from the DES’s 1991 “Method for Comparative Evaluation of Nontidal Wetlands in New Hampshire.”

The criteria include ecological integrity, education potential, ground water use potential, historical site potential and flood control potential.

After the study, the commission, lead by Taub, created the proposed ordinance for March 2006. The amendment would have affected about 650 homes in Bedford, Dermody said.

As a result, all wetlands are regulated the same and the term “of significant value” doesn’t apply to any wetlands, said Karen White, town planner.

In Amherst
About seven years ago, the Amherst Conservation Commission brought in a soil scientist to study that town’s wetlands.

They found about 40 wetlands should be noted as “public water protection wetlands,” said Richard Hart, who has served on the commission since 1987.

“Amherst did a survey and picked out some wetlands that they identified as the most significant for the town’s public water supply,” he said.

The town then increased the setbacks for those wetlands to 100 feet, leaving the other wetlands with 50-foot setbacks, said Hart, who didn’t know the exact number of property owners affected. “They’ll certainly come up before the town board, the planning board, from time to time,” he said.

The future
Both the town and residents agree the wetlands are important. Peter Sokolosky and Mike Bousquet both live on Hancock Drive in a development near a wetland.

“Not more than five years after Mike and I bought (our homes), we pick up the paper and find the town has totally redefined the wetlands, and, in doing so, we thought, dramatically reduced the values of our properties,” Sokolosky said.

Bousquet said the people living in the community care about the wetland, so there’s no need to regulate against them.

“I maintain that we don’t need to be told by the conservation commission that we need to be educated. I took great offense to the chairman of the conservation commission saying, ‘Well, these people don’t understand,’” Bousquet said.

Taub and Zerr agreed wetlands are important, and said the subcommittee will also focus on education. The subcommittee will help facilitate this understanding of wetlands in Bedford and will also help educate residents.