Work at Marshfield airport rankles neighbors

Neighbors of George D. Harlow Field are wondering why tree and land clearing at the town-owned airport has been allowed to continue after state officials issued a noncompliance notice for the ongoing $15.34 million runway improvement project.

State Department of Environmental Protection spokesman Joseph Ferson said the noncompliance notice was issued Nov. 19 after local officials failed to adhere to a 2012 variance for the project, which will widen the runway to 100 feet, extend it by 300 feet, shift it 190 feet west of the current surface and add 300-foot paved safety buffers at each end.

The notice states that officials failed to submit required information prior to the start of construction and failed to seek approval of changes made to plans and documents.

It does not require they cease work, Ferson said. It requires that they respond and address those specific violations within 30 days, and we go from there.

But resident Joseph Pecevich said its troubling that the work has been allowed to go on even though conditions that officials agreed upon are not being met.

People are outraged and disgusted and saddened to see what happened, he said.

Resident Peter Howard also said he cant believe state environmental officials would allow such wide-scale clearing to continue.

What theyve done to the environment is outrageous, he said. If you put a shovel in the wetlands down at Wollaston Beach, you could get arrested for tampering with wetlands, yet theyre bringing in machinery thats incredibility huge.

Town airport commission Chairman Robert Reilly said Tuesday that officials have responded to the noncompliance notice, explaining that the violation is the result of miscommunication between two Department of Environmental Protection offices the Boston office and the Southeast office

Because so many permits were required, officials in the Boston office agreed to allow airport officials to respond to the conditions only when all appeals and negotiations had ended, but that was not communicated to the Southeast office the office that issued the noncompliance notice, Reilly said.

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Work at Marshfield airport rankles neighbors