Orleans Watchdog
Kent's Point:
Still in Denial
Introduction
On September 16, 2025, the Orleans Conservation Commission (OCC) met to discuss the August 27 public hearing, and the state of the proposed changes to the Kent’s Point management plan. The bottom line is that the goalposts have been moved: Instead of considering a year-round sticker requirement, the OCC is now talking about a seasonal requirement, perhaps with a lower price than the $420 currently charged for a nonresident beach sticker. It would be nice if, along with this change, there was more emphasis on established facts and logic, but alas, this modified proposal continues to rest on (not necessarily intentional) denial of important realities.
Denial of the Cause of Inland Erosion
One huge problem is that the OCC continues to deny that runoff is the major preventable cause of erosion at Kent’s, despite the fact that the expert identified it as such on pages 13-14 of his report:
“Inland erosion is associated with surface water runoff, primarily in response to rain events where soil is detached, carried away, and deposited in other locations.”
The expert also recommended, on page 19, measures to slow down the flow of surface runoff and redirect towards stable, vegetated areas and/or low topographic areas:
• Restoring or establishing vegetation to absorb water and reduce erosion.
• Slight reconfiguration of trails to minimize longer straightaways on descending slopes where runoff velocity increases, exacerbating erosion/sedimentation.
• Incorporation of water bars (diagonal channels or bumps, often made of wood or rock) to break up flow paths and divert water off-trail.
• Creation of shallow vegetated swales or basins (i.e., country drainage) for surface runoff collection to promote infiltration.
• Addition of natural mulch/wood chips, shredded bark, pine straw, etc., to trails.
Ever since the report was released in February, 2025, I have been assuming that the reason I wasn’t see such measures being enacted (apart from a little scattering of wood chips) was that they were (unwisely) low priority on the OCC’s list of action items. What the Conservation Department has been doing is, for instance, installing fencing, and putting down gravel in the parking lot. I was amazed, however, when I recently consulted that list, and found that water diversion and absorption measures aren’t included on it at all. That, my friends, is just plain weird. It requires an explanation, and we deserve to get one before the OCC does anything else supposedly in its capacity as steward of the land.
I would note that months after the report was released, I took photographs which conclusively demonstrate that runoff is a very serious problem, and yet the only conversation about erosion of the banks in this meeting related to “storms coming from the South.” That’s not the problem. The problem is that the trails are compacted and we need effective water bars. Instead, we have water bars on the way to the beach, that look like they have been neglected for decades, and no water bars at all at the cliff, where we have actually lost an access trail as a result of the OCC’s decades-long failure to address the problem. For the OCC to call itself stewards of the land and refuse to acknowledge or act upon this very serious problem is unacceptable, in my judgment. We have to get to the bottom of why they are behaving this way, and subjecting the land to a continued risk of catastrophic erosion events. We also need to understand why the Select Board seems equally indifferent to runoff erosion. Seriously – has anyone read the expert's report?
Denial of the Legal Issues
As is documented elsewhere, there are significant legal issues involved in denying or impeding nonresident access to Kent’s Point. Under the First Amendment, the argument that people can visit if they can find a resident to escort them was shot down in Leydon v. Town of Greenwich, so we shouldn’t be hearing about “car pooling” from one of the Commissioners, as we did in the 9/16 meeting. (He also argued that people could still visit in spite of the restrictions, inviting the question, "then why bother?") Moreover, Smith v. City of Westfield explicitly recognizes an easement – held by every citizen of Massachusetts – to enter lands dedicated by municipalities to open space purposes. Imposing a fee, even if only for a few months, is almost certainly an illegal interference with that easement.
So, if the Town of Orleans wants to proceed, it has to explain why Leydon and Smith don’t prohibit their action. Let's see Town Counsel's memo on that. Alternatively, if Town Counsel rests on the utterly inadequate memos he produced in 2015 and 2024, plus the one I was copied in on, let's have an official statement to that effect. Pointing to another town and saying “they have stickers at their park” won't cut it, any more than pointing at other speeding cars will cut it when you get pulled over by a State Trooper. Especially considering the enthusiasm with which some Orleans officials have embraced the idea of police enforcement of leash laws, it’s disturbing to think that those same officials are going to ignore inconvenient obstacles like the First Amendment and state law in order to achieve their goals. I imagine that some of the people eager to do this are horrified at what they see as disregard of the law at the national level. Why is it any different when they want to do something illegal?
– Quick Legal Digression –
By the way, we learn in this hearing that after 10 years of operating under Town Counsel's opinion that we needed to take this decision to Town Meeting, all of a sudden that isn't required any more. Here's Town Counsel's 2015 opinion, which was recently followed up by a whole 6-step plan to get to Town Meeting:​
Now we suddenly don't need Town Meeting approval? Interesting. I'm not saying that we do need to go to Town Meeting, but this sounds very "convenient," particularly in the sense that it avoids highly public discussions of embarrassing matters such as "why isn't the OCC diverting water after being advised to?" and "why doesn't Town government seem to care whether dogs are actually 'jumping on infants' as claimed, or object to the fact that this claim remains published on the Town's website?" Is there a written opinion of Town Counsel on this matter we could consult to see why the process has suddenly been simplified?
Denial of the Responsibility to Educate
At some point in the conversation, one of the Commissioners mentions the “misbehavior” of “low-quality” visitors, such as throwing a ball to a dog in fragile grass. There is no doubt whatsoever that we want to curb this behavior, but I will bet you that virtually whenever this happens, the person involved is not aware that it's an issue, because they have not been so advised. I have been talking about educational signage for years, and there has been room up front at the kiosks for years, and we still have nothing alerting visitors to the fragility of the area and the importance of the marsh grass. The LEC report recommends educational signage on page 19, and expert opinion from the University of Toronto agrees. (see “Evaluating the Effectiveness of Signage in Conservation Areas, Natural Areas and Zoos to Enhance the Education of Eco-tourists”) For some weird reason, though Town government seems to relish the idea of keeping people in the dark, and then judging them and punishing them when they fail to act according to unexpressed expectations. This approach is not emotionally healthy, in my judgment, and it's certainly not functional.
One more point in relation to signage: In my experience, if you engage people in a friendly and informative way, only the most sociopathic, which is a tiny cohort, will continue their negative behavior. There is, however, a larger cohort which is easily activated to respond with oppositional defiance to an authoritarian demand. The challenge, then, is to engage that larger cohort in a positive way, to educate them so they don’t interpret restrictions as arbitrary, and to infuse them with some spirit of camaraderie. This is what I managed over 50 years ago in the back alley of my MIT fraternity, when I originally painted this sign (it needs a refresh; the full text is HEY, NO PARKING, O.K.?!!):
Just recently, I asked about it, and I was told that they have had almost no problems whatsoever with unauthorized parking over the years. Contrast this with the unfriendly, not to mention legally inaccurate, signs at the corner of Monument and Keziah’s. (If these are Town signs, by the way, they need to be removed. It's not okay to use our tax dollars to deceive people.)
I can’t think of a better way to activate defiance, among people – who might be much more cooperative if they were engaged in a more positive and truthful way – than to hit them with this "get off my lawn" energy before they even get to the trails.
Finally, I’ve said this numerous times and it seems always to fall on deaf ears: There are a number of us who want to help educate visitors, be they regular or transient. The fact that we don’t have anything official to point them to on the bulletin boards makes our job vastly more difficult. In a functional community, when people spoke up and said “we would like to help, but we need support,” that would start a conversation. In Orleans, though, we're shouting into a void, because decisions are being made and committed to behind the scenes, and from that point forward, we're not in a problem-solving mode, we're in a "let's push this through" win-lose mode. This was not what our forefathers had in mind, and it doesn't lead to good solutions.
Note: My belief in education is why, before I had researched the law, I was in favor of a sticker requirement tied to an online educational video and test. While I'm not going to advocate breaking the law, I'm still interested in driving visitor traffic to an informational online experience, and will be working on fleshing that out in the not too distant future.
Denial of Alternative Means
At the 9/16 hearing, the alternative of making the parking lot smaller was discussed. This is absolutely a way to reduce visitations, and it has the benefit of clearly being legal. A witness concerned with traffic also mentioned installing an electronically-connected LOT FULL sign to flash on the corner of Keziah's and Monument. That signage option is a significant expense, of course, but just putting up some cheap bollards around the edges of the lot would definitely reduce its capacity. Apparently, this option has been shot down at the Select Board level behind the scenes. However, we as citizens of a town with an Open Meeting Law are entitled to see a public deliberation about this alternative, ideally with an option to comment. For instance, if the reason the Select Board prefers stickers is that it wants the associated income, we all have a right to know that and evaluate it.
Another alternative which is mentioned in passing, and waved off as too "restrictive," is fines. For what? As a person who respects the land and whose dog is inoffensive, I prefer the idea of fining someone for doing something actually problematic to bans or requirements which are applied indiscriminately to all dog owners – or to all nonresidents. So, if someone has an idea for fines, I'd like to hear it discussed in public, rather than have someone explain to me that fines have been taken off the table behind the scenes, as in over lunch at Mahoney's. I'm also on record (see page 139 of the 2024 public comments document, under the heading "Conservation Wardens,") that I'd be willing to be deputized, in order to enforce reasonable regulations. I'm aware of a specific handful of dog owners who are having a little trouble coming to terms with the fact that their dogs' behavior needs to be modified. I would have no problem whatsoever writing them a ticket if efforts to educate and persuade were unsuccessful. We shouldn't underestimate the impact that deputizing members of the dog walking community to police ourselves would have. And if anyone is resistant to this suggestion, I'd ask them to sit quietly for a while and sincerely investigate why.
Denial of the Requirement of a Rationale
The Orleans Town Charter requires Town government to provide “the rationale for its decisions.” I think we ought to be able to agree that “we have a hunch that certain unspecified problems will get better to some unspecified degree by some unspecified chain of cause and effect if we do this” is not a rationale. If it were, then what would be the point of putting the requirement in the Charter? Is the Charter really saying “make sure you say the magic words that you think this will make things better every time you make a decision?” Doesn’t it make a lot more sense that government officials are being required to explain how their decisions represent the application of good values and good logic to an established set of facts, so that citizens of the Town can evaluate those decisions?
Okay, so, assuming we agree on that, what’s the rationale for the seasonal sticker requirement? I ask for the third or fourth time, "what specific environmental problem will restrictions solve, to what extent, and how?" All I heard in this meeting was “fewer visitors equals fewer negative impacts.” Well, no, actually. You could cut the number of visitors in half, and that would have zero effect on runoff erosion because it wouldn’t make the trails any more absorbent than they are now. Moreover, as to any other problem you could name, how about following the expert’s report and trying to educate people – which is literally part of your job – rather than rushing to take away their rights, and risking a lawsuit in the process? Why not educate first, and then evaluate after to see if you still really have a problem? Is it perhaps because you're trying to fulfill a promise to your friends on Keziah's Lane to reduce their traffic flow, under the smokescreen of environmental concerns? When you're not transparent and your statements don't make good sense, these are the questions an attentive person is drawn to ask.
Denial of Hostility to Dogs and Kent’s Point Dog Walkers
After a year and a half of being vilified with profoundly implausible and unsubstantiated narratives of "dogs jumping on infants" and "dogs swarming under fences and causing erosion," we are now told, "benevolently," that stickers are a “sensible compromise between doing nothing and banning dogs.” Town government has been using the erosion canard since 2019 (originally in the Wildflower context), but continuing to publish the screed that "dogs are jumping on infants" on the official town website is a whole other level of inappropriate. Moreover, we have been chastised by an OCC member for "not doing enough" (again, help us educate by posting clear expectations), and both ridiculed and chided by witnesses. I can't help but wonder whether an unconscious purpose of the hearings has been to let people vent stored-up venom at their dehumanized "enemies." A mini-purge, as it were, making amiable compromise and cooperation that much more difficult, to no useful end.
The truth is simple: (1) Some people are uncomfortable walking at Kent's because they prefer dogs to be leashed or absent where they walk; (2) some people make a huge deal out of the fact that there is not much wildlife on the narrow stretch of land where the trails are, as though Kent's Point were deeded as a wildlife refuge rather than open space (and let's not forget that there are habitat areas which are now fenced off from intrusion); and (3) some people take the small amount of ecological damage attributable to dogs (especially when their owners are uneducated) and fixate on it, while turning a blind eye to the vast erosion damage caused by the Town's failure to divert water. Under those circumstances, what looks like attempted manipulation of dog walkers into being grateful that the Town isn't resorting to a cruel and unjustified ban – leaving owners with no year-round place to let our dogs get the exercise and socialization they need – lands as possibly creepy to me. It's uncomfortably close to abuser-speak ("we can hurt you if we want to, so be grateful that we're not"), and I think people should think twice before they repeat this particular talking point.
Note, by the way that "Witness 6," who is the point person for the original petitioners, and who claims that the petitioners devised the sticker "solution" in meetings amongst themselves, verbalized the exact same "we could make this worse for you" point at the 8/27 meeting. You can hear it at 22:54. Am I making too much of this? Decide for yourself how the energy of those comments lands for you.
Conclusion
The proposal is better than it was. However, the only explanation for all the bad logic I see above that makes any sense to me is that none of what we're hearing is actually honest. In other words, the reasons being offered are not the actual reasons for the proposal. Further, since those reasons are being concealed, they must be about something the general public wouldn't support if it were out in the open. All of that, as well as the weird and shocking failure of the OCC to address scouring erosion from runoff, needs to be aired out. Otherwise, the only thing Town Government will learn form its toxic approach is that "in the long run, it worked."
The questions I think the Select Board is ultimately going to have to answer are:
(1) Why is it acceptable for the OCC to ignore the true causes of inland erosion, thus allowing ithat environmental damage to continue, in flagrant disregard of the expert's diagnosis and recommendations?
(2) Why is it acceptable for the OCC to refuse to engage in a real educational signage effort, as recommended by the expert?
(3) Given the Charter's demand for a transparent rationale, why is it acceptable for the OCC to base its recommendation on something as vague and loose as "fewer people = fewer problems," without specifying which problems will be ameliorated and how?
(4) How did the requirement that this decision go to Town Meeting suddenly get taken off the table? Did Town Counsel change his mind, and if so, why? Will you publish the memo in which he did that?
(5) Do you assess that summer stickers are legal under both Leydon and Smith? Why? Will you post the Town Counsel memos on which you rely for those assessments?
(6) Do you care whether summer stickers are legal, or are you in a state of mind where you're willing to skirt the law because you think there's no other way to "do the right thing?" (I ask because if it's the latter, we need to look at whether we've truly considered all of our choices.)