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Board grants variance to keep inadvertently installed well at Lawrence Landing with testing conditions
Summary
The board approved a variance reducing the required well–septic setback from 150 to 125 feet at a covenant lot in Lawrence Landing, on condition of deed restriction to two bedrooms, required PFAS sampling and standard water testing for three years.
The Nantucket Board of Health approved a variance request allowing a well that was installed in the wrong location to remain on a newly created covenant lot at Lawrence Landing, with monitoring and deed restrictions attached.
Don Bracken of Bracken Engineering told the board the lot in question was subdivided from a main parcel that already contained two dwellings served by the same septic system. The applicant redesigned a separate septic system sized for a two‑bedroom covenant lot, and planned a relocated well. During field layout before installation, Bracken said the well had already been drilled in the original location (an existing, closer location) and not in the new, intended location shown on submitted plans.
Under Madaket well setbacks, the regulation requires a 150‑foot separation between a septic soil absorption system and a well; Bracken asked the board to allow 125 feet instead. He said the proposed design reduces the septic footprint and increases separation modestly from the existing condition, and that the lot will be deed‑restricted to two bedrooms and will use an installed IA (innovative/alternative) septic system.
Staff and board members discussed testing and monitoring as a condition of approval. John (Health Department staff) proposed and the board adopted special conditions: the well driller must submit the required post‑installation test results (including PFAS sampling required at well installation) and the property will submit standard water-quality tests for three years. Board members suggested annual sampling as an appropriate condition given the setback reduction and local groundwater conditions; the motion adopted required the owner to provide standard drinking‑water testing annually for three years and to submit the initial PFAS test results that are required at well installation.
Board members also confirmed the lot will be deed‑restricted to two bedrooms and that an IA septic system will be installed. The board approved the motion to grant the variance with those conditions; the chair recorded the vote as “aye.”
Bracken thanked the board; staff said the variance will be documented with the deed restriction and monitoring requirement before issuing a certificate of compliance.
No Title 5 variance was required for septic design; the variance is to local Madaket regulations governing well setbacks.
