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Politics & Government

Officials Eye Tougher Action On Wetland Violations

Conservation Commission focusing on two Route 1 restaurants, one family.

The Conservation Commission voted this week to fine a resident $25,000 for alleged illegal dumping, and to impose restrictions on one restaurant that has ignored requests and enforcement orders and another in arrears in payments owed the commission.

The town will fine the Pizzutti family of Chestnut Street for allegedly illegally dumping landscape debris in wetlands adjacent to their property.

When the commission asked town counsel, attorney Thomas Mullen, of Wakefield, what recourse remained in this ongoing attempt to get the family to comply with the commissions orders to clean up the area and remove the debris, he simply said, "sue them."

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Mr. Mullen suggested that, "this is the best remedy to the problem."

The owners of the Chestnut Street property have apparently ignored past requests by the commission to meet with them at their scheduled meetings to resolve the problem.

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"We have had them served by the police, who have gone there and handed papers to someone who answers the door, and they still ignore us and our orders to clean up the debris dumped there," said Conservation Commissioner Betty Adelson.

Matter Of Credibility For The Commission, Town

Concerned that the commission could lose credibility if they do not act on this problem, commission chairperson Denise Young, said, "We should make good on our efforts to resolve this problem."

Ms. Young has said in the past and remained adamant about the idea that if the commission allows the property owner to ignore the requests and laws protecting the wetlands around Lynnfield, it will set a precedent for neglect.

Restaurant Draws Ire From Commission

The commission, with attorney Mullen’s help, will withhold the license to operate from the Bostonville Grille after it, too has ignored repeated requests by the commission to meet and resolve the restaurant’s payments in arrears for land they rent from the commission for added parking spaces at the restaurant.

The restaurant had cut into some uplands behind their property to add parking spaces, "that land belongs to us," said Betty Adelson of the conservation commission.

The commission signed a licensing agreement with the restaurant that will allow them to rent the added parking spaces from the commission. "They often go several months without paying us and are always in arrears," Ms. Adelson explained.

Asked what recourse they have to collect the back payments due them, attorney Mullen explained that the commission can hold the restaurant’s license to operate and collect the payments in arrears from the restaurant or its guarantors.

The commission’s Ms. Adelson said that the Bostonville Grille "goes for three months without paying. We call and ask them for payment, and hear nothing, then at the end of the three months, they pay what they owe and the whole thing starts over again."

Fat Cactus Also Mentioned For Wetland Violation

The commission wants to meet with the nearby Fat Cactus, on 215 Broadway, because it has expanded its parking area with dumped gravel that has covered a bordering vegetated wetland, (BVW), an area that buffers wetlands from adjacent property.

"That area is protected. Eventually chemicals that leak from parked cars work their way into the water system, so we can’t allow parking there," Ms. Adelson said.

The commission will issue an enforcement order to stop using that area and will eventually put up some kind of barriers to prevent further use of that area.

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