Eightmile River Watershed

The Eightmile River Watershed Project began in 1995 as the second joint effort between the University of Connecticut Cooperative Extension System and the Nature Conservancy Connecticut Chapter. This Project, as with the Chester Creek Project, is aimed at assisting the communities within the watershed to protect their natural resources as they develop their towns. Support for the project has come from two additional partners the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Region 1 and the Silvio O. Conte National Fish and Wildlife Service.

The Eightmile River is a regional sub-basin draining to the lower Connecticut River. About 63 square miles in size and encompassing land from 5 towns, the Eightmile basin has remained largely forested—a fact which, combined with its geology and water systems, have made the area home to a remarkable diversity of plants, and animals, including many rare and endangered species.

The Project is a nonregulatory, education driven effort that makes use of geographic information system (GIS) technology to help provide a watershed perspective to local interests. The philosophy of the Project is that local land use decisions, by both municipal officials and individual land owners, hold the key to the ultimate fate of the watershed's natural resources; and, that the health of these resources is closely linked with both the long-term economic vitality of the region and the rural character of its communities.

To balance conservation and growth in the Eightmile river watershed by identifying, protecting and enhancing its priority natural resources and encouraging land use patterns protective of those resources. - The Eightmile River Watershed Program Goals were developed by the locally led Watershed Advisory committee and voted on by the Committee. In addition to the overall goal, the Project's three work groups have each drafted subsidiary goals for their areas of focus - Land and Forest Resources, Water Resources and Cultural Resources.

1. Land and Forest Resources Goal

Protect and enhance rural landscapes throughout the watershed.

• Provide habitat for a full range of native wildlife and plant communities.
• Protect the quality and quantity of water resources.
• Ensure a sustainable supply of wood and other forest products and benefits for future generations.

2. Water Resources Goal

Protect and enhance the water resources of the watershed.

• Protect drinking water.
• Provide riverine and wetlands habitat for fish and wildlife.
• Maintain natural drainage patterns and the integrity of riparian (streamside) corridors to prevent flooding and water pollution.

3. Cultural Resources Goal

Encourage land use practices that protect significant natural resources and direct future growth to areas that are capable of supporting it.

• Provide a high quality of life for residents based on a rational balance of resource protection and economic growth.
• Protect cultural resources.
• Preserve the rural character of the watershed.

The Eightmile River Watershed Project is built on the philosophy that "watershed management" is mostly about good land use planning by municipalities, and informed land use decisions by individual property owners. Accordingly, project "management" takes the approach of a small planning effort, where UConn and other natural resource professionals work together with a relatively small group of representatives from the towns. The composition of the Committee and the Resource Team are allowed to evolve, according to the direction that this planning effort takes. The goal is to avoid 60-person committees and 50-item lists of issues, and thus keep the group workable and the project moving forward.

Eightmile River Town Committee - Members include representatives from:

• East Haddam Board of Selectmen
• East Haddam Planning Office
• East Haddam Land Trust
• Lyme Land Trust
• Lyme Board of Selectmen
• Lyme Wetlands Commission
• Salem Land Trust
• Salem Planning and Zoning Commission
• Salem Economic Development Commission
• Salem Inland Wetlands Commission

Eightmile River Resource Team

• UConn Cooperative Extension System: NEMO team
• UConn Cooperative Extension System: Forestry Team
• Connecticut Sea Grant College Program
• The Nature Conservancy, Connecticut Chapter
• Silvio O. Conte National Wildlife Refuge, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
• Environmental Protection Agency: Office of Ecosystem Protection
• Connecticut Office of the State Archaeologist
• Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection: Fisheries Division
• Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection: Natural Resources Center
• New England Environmental Services
  

Other Officials Kept informed of the Project

• Salem Board of Selectmen
• East Lyme Board of Selectmen
• Colchester Board of Selectmen
• East Haddam Conservation Commission
• East Haddam Economic Development Commission

The Eightmile River Watershed Conservation Compact was conceived as a voluntary, watershed wide, cooperative effort. The Compact states that member Towns recognize the Eightmile River and its Watershed as an important natural resource and pledge to work together to ensure its long-term social, economic and environmental health.

View the Compact (PDF 150 KB)

The Eightmile River Watershed Conservation Compact was developed, based on historical precedent, with the intent of presenting the least threatening, most time honored approach to voluntary community involvement on an important issue. The Compact is also based on the belief that local officials know best how and when to address local issues. Any decisions regarding watershed activities, public expenditures, and local programs or policies will be determined at the local level, by local officials, by using existing procedures.

The idea of a compact goes back to the first agreement signed by the English settlers in our country. The Puritans, while still aboard the Mayflower, pledged to work together to form a new settlement in the new world. That settlement was named Plymouth, and the agreement became known as the Mayflower Compact. In that same cooperative spirit, Salem, East Haddam and Lyme will decide the best ways to address balancing conservation and development within the Watershed. How that balance is ultimately achieved will be determined by local decisions and procedures as other issues are presently handled. While the Compact speaks of voluntary regional cooperation, it is founded on the principles of local autonomy and home rule stressing education and planning rather than regulation.

After presentations in each town this past summer, and Selectmen's meetings approving the Conservation Compact throughout the fall, the towns of Lyme, Salem, and East Haddam signed the Eightmile River Conservation Compacts December 23, 1997 at Chapman Falls in the Devil's Hopyard State Park.