HADLEY — An effort to protect around 700 acres of undeveloped and mostly wooded land near the Mount Holyoke Range will depend on action by Hadley voters and the state Legislature this fall.
While Kestrel Land Trust and the state’s Department of Conservation and Recreation in March received a $764,500 Massachusetts Landscape Partnership Grant for the River to Range project, which aims to protect land between Skinner State Park and the Connecticut River, Kestrel Executive Director Kristin DeBoer told the Select Board last month that two additional steps are necessary to move the project forward.
First, voters at a special Town Meeting, scheduled for October, will be asked to modify and enhance the existing protections on about 320 acres of town-owned land. The actual vote will serve to amend the protections under Article 97 of the state Constitution.
Second, special legislation must be filed in the state Legislature to amend the protections. The board voted 4-1 to send a letter of support for this legislation to Sen. Jo Comerford, D-Northampton.
The lone dissenter to the project was board member John Waskiewicz, who remains worried about placing additional restrictions on what is largely municipal watershed land, even though forestry, hunting, snowmobiling and other active uses on the land are supposed to continue.
The town is putting together a group that will also offer oversight and input for the process, which will be led by Select Board member David J. Fill II.
DeBoer said it is vital to complete Hadley’s work by the end of 2019, as the land in Hadley is being used to leverage the rest of the land acquisitions, with property in both South Hadley and Amherst to be protected.
One aspect already complete, DeBoer said, was using a portion of the state grant to purchase two properties on Chmura Road in June.
Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.
