So uh it is 6 30 p.m.

on the 29th of July 2026.

Welcome to the Board of Representatives, 72nd Board of Representatives appointments committee.

Uh just quickly call the role.

We have I'm co-chair Felix Garner, we have Co-Chair Stephen Shaw, Representative Weinberg, Representative Hill, Representative Caparelli in the room, and then we have Representative Hyatt, Representative Weathers, and Representative Bradford on the call.

So that is a quorum.

So let's get started.

So we can do our first interview, which is Alpha 32.045 for the Environmental Protection Board.

It's Laura Tessia, who we joined by right now.

It's a reappointment with expiring December 1st, 2028.

Welcome, Laura.

Thank you for being here.

Thank you for your service and board so far.

What was the biggest challenge you faced with the environmental protection board in the last run?

Tell us about because enlighten us.

I think the biggest challenge is trying to strike a balance between protecting the resource and accommodating the needs of the community, the property owners.

I think that's definitely a recurring theme we've heard of other applicants.

And what do you think about the um the like the load on the environmental protection board, which the in the wetlands permits or the variances which I know you have we've heard about that?

It can be quite fun.

Yeah, it's um it varies from month to month, but yeah, it seems to me that um be interested to hear what Thomas and Todd have to say, but in my time on board, I think it's gotten heavier, the load, and um there are certain months where there are just a lot of development proposals with very sensitive issues, and they can carry over from meeting to meeting, and depending on the attendance of the meetings, sometimes we have to worry about consistency.

So um that can be rejoiced.

Um yeah, it's it's it's challenging.

It really is.

It takes a lot of time to review the packets that come to us the Friday before the meeting on that there's following Thursday, and those packets can be heavy duty.

Yeah, okay.

Any other questions?

Of course, go ahead.

Thank you for your service.

I you have the most unbelievable resume on how you have to be here.

And I'm so grateful that you donated your services for as long as you have.

Um, how do you balance economic development and protecting the environment?

It's challenging.

I mean, for me personally, and you know, certainly within the rubric and the requirements of the law and what we're charged with and the guidance that the state provides, but acknowledging all of that, cutting that aside for a moment.

You know, the existing property owner who just wants to make reasonable use of its land and is already there in proximity to the resource.

Those are a little bit easier to deal with.

I do find that um it's important to we we don't currently have a way of analysing development.

So when you have a wetland system, we see developments that are one off.

So someone will come in to us, let's just say it's poor housework, and that system, and we see one development here, one development here, and they may be years apart.

There's no way for us to assess the cumulative impact on that system from all of the developments over the course of the years that have been brought forward and approved.

And so for due diligence, that's a real challenge.

Um for new developments, I find those difficult because the particularly in North Stamford, the topography is such that the region's oil topography makes it very difficult to sufficiently protect wetlands from not just the direct impacts, it's not just direct encroachment, but there are indirect impacts as well.

And with the septics issues and the public and not having public water supply, it gets to be very complicated, and on some of these sites, it just doesn't leave a lot of room for reasonable development.

So that can be very challenging as well.

Keeping keeping septic systems far enough away from water supply, that kind of thing.

Keeping septic systems, in other words, the full complement of the development proposal, ensuring that it is sufficiently removed from the wetland itself, right?

Given the topography, the geology, the soils, and the other factors, that um it's not over time to degrade that system.

And that can be very challenging to assess.

Is most of your work in the North Stamper area versus the rest of the city?

The new developments are predominantly in the North Stamper.

Yeah.

Um I wanted to ask you a question regarding there.

There is there is politically a new wave of I don't know how to put this, but sort of against boards like yourself and the zoning board, particularly the EPP, um, that you are you know slowing down, stopping development uh in order to protect the wetlands.

And so I wanted to talk a little bit about why are we protecting the wetlands?

Can you can you speak to why it's so important?

The types of things that it affects in people's everyday life in in protecting in protecting wetlands.

Well, which is the majority of what you're doing, I think, right?

There are the you know, there are the things you normally hear about wildlife and habitat and the importance of diversity, biological diversity and protecting those systems.

But I think if you want to get down to the practical impact on humans, um your water supply is in those watersheds, and those wetlands are critical to not only conserving water supply and ensuring quality, uh um just acting as a buffer and a reservoir for storage for those in some cases for those systems without the wetlands and uncontrolled development, you would end up with considerably degraded drinking water.

Now in North Stanford, we don't draw from that public supply, but South Stanford does.

And so everything south of the border is drawing from the reservoirs.