Conservation Commission sets eight-week deadline for high school turf field cleanup

WAYLAND — August 28, 2024 — Wayland Conservation Commission sets eight-week deadline for high school turf field crumb rubber cleanup. After nearly four years and three notices of violation, the commission ordered the town to bid out and complete roughly $35,000 in swale excavation and replanting within eight weeks and to have a wetlands consultant under contract by the same date to map crumb rubber migration toward the Sudbury River, with fieldwork to follow the first frost. Chair Sean P. Fair said he was "out of ideas how to motivate" the town; member Shannon Fischer called the field "effectively an environmental disaster." Project engineer David Kelly of Meridian Associates said finer mesh screens in six perimeter-drain baskets had made a previously discussed grit chamber "beyond overkill," a conclusion member Barbara Howell and resident Dave Bernstein challenged. School Committee member Erin Gibbons said the field "was built and is filtering correctly" and asked for the commission's demands in writing. A written status report is due by the Sept. 18 meeting.