BY STEPHEN BEALE

Some Town Council members wondered if Bedford could be involved in land deals as far away as Berlin, after the Town Council approved an ordinance on Feb. 11 allowing the Conservation Commission to buy property outside of Bedford borders.

Town councilors Mike Izbicki and Bill Dermody dissented, saying there should be explicit restrictions on what the commission could do outside of town.

In a separate vote, councilors unanimously said the commission can donate money to state or national conservation organizations, such as the Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests and the Sierra Club.

The council was able to craft the new ordinance thanks to enabling legislation passed at the state level in 2008. Many communities will have to wait until their Town Meetings if they want to adopt the ordinance, but city and town councils do not, according to Mervyn Taub, chairman of the Bedford Conservation Commission. Taub did not know how many other towns, if any, have already instituted the new rule.

Taub and other supporters said purchasing land outside of the town would enable the commission to protect some of the wetlands and water resources inside it.

“Say we have a beautiful wetland that we’re talking about, that Ash Bog, and say 3 miles upstream, there’s a farmer who has the stream running through his farm and he’s polluted the stream,” Taub said. “We might want to protect our wetland and one of the ways of protecting it is to purchase the piece of land and close down the farm.”

Plus, he said the ability to give money to conservation organizations meant several towns could bundle their funds together to preserve larger areas that cut across municipal lines.

Several residents spoke in support of the new policies as well. Susan Tufts-Moore said what one person does in one town could affect other towns downstream. Jeanene Procopis said the local viewpoint was not effective.

Councilors Izbicki and Dermody wanted the intent explicitly stated in the new ordinance. “The way I read it is you could buy swampland in Florida,” Izbicki said.

Taub said the lands would be on the watershed that flows into Bedford. Dermody asked him to define where that watershed was. Dermody said he had not been able to find any mention of a “Bedford watershed” on the state Web site.

He asked if Taub was referring to the Merrimack River watershed, which stretches from Lake Winnipesaukee to the Atlantic Ocean.

“If that’s the watershed we’re talking about, that this legislation allows the conservation commission to spend its money in, I object to that,” Dermody said. “This money is generated in Bedford.”

But other councilors noted they have to approve proposals for specific land purchases and also have the right to rescind the ordinance later on. Councilors Michael Scanlon and Chris Bandazian said they trusted future councils to make decisions in the best interests of the town.

“Unless we all lose our minds, we’re not going to buy swamp land in Berlin,” Bandazian said. The funds for those purchases would not come from tax dollars. Instead, the commission would be spending revenue the town receives from change-ofuse fees from developers, according to Taub.