The Friends of the Blue Hills testified last week in support of Rep Walter Timilty’s bills to protect a well-loved part of the Blue Hills.
All wetlands help prevent flooding and purify storm water. Not all wetlands, however, have as devoted a following as the Fowl Meadow wetlands in the Blue Hills. When a 276-unit development was proposed right next to Fowl Meadow on Brush Hill Road in Milton, the leadership and members of the Friends of the Blue Hills understood this threatened what the state calls an Area of Critical Environmental Concern. This ‘critical’ forested land where the development is proposed surrounds Fowl Meadow and provides food and habitat to the Blue Hills rare and endangered animals.
To protect Fowl Meadow, last Thursday Friends of the Blue Hills Board member, Denny Swenson, testified before the Milton Board of Selectmen and a separate hearing before the Committee on the Enviornment, Natural Resources and Agriculture. Her message at both the Selectmen meeting and the State House Hearing were the same: we need to protect the integrity of this critical habitat and the endangered species it contains by protecting it from development.
“We’re grateful to Rep Walter Timilty,” Swenson said, “for responding to this threat to such a beloved part of the Blue Hills. We also greatly appreciate the Milton Board of Selectman for requesting an extension in the review period for the development proposal.”
