In accordance with notice of the Rhode Island Coastal Resources Management Council’s Planning & Procedures subcommittee, a meeting was held on Tuesday, November 12, 2019 at 4:00pm at the offices of the Cervenka Green & Ducharme LLC, 235 Promenade Street, Suite 475, Providence, RI.

MEMBERS PRESENT
Jennifer Cervenka, Chair
Donald Gomez
Angelo Liberti

STAFF PRESENT
Grover Fugate, Executive Director
Jeff Willis, Deputy Director
Anthony DeSisto, Legal Counsel

 

Call to Order. Ms. Cervenka called the subcommittee meeting to order at 4:00 p.m.

Ms. Cervenka called for a motion to approve the minutes of the September 24, 2019 subcommittee meeting.

Mr. Gomez seconded by Mr. Liberti moved to approve the meeting minutes of September 24, 2019. All voted in favor of the motion.

J. Willis stated that Items 4.A, 4.B, and 4.C were incorrectly listed as For Action. Each should have been noticed as For Discussion Only. No action therefore was taken on each of these.

Item 4.A – 650-RICR-20-00-1.1.5(E) Review Categories and Prohibited Activities in Tidal Waters and on Adjacent Shoreline Features. G. Fugate explained that this graphic, for which and detailing the two GLD’s CRMC previously received approval from NOAA, was not needed to be included in the RICRMP as each had received their federal approval under a different process and were currently highlighted in the CRMC’s Federal Consistency package. G. Fugate explained the lengthy and meticulous federal review process.

Item 4.B – 650-RICR-20-00-1.2.2(B)(2)(j) Barrier Islands and Spits. G. Fugate explained how concrete/concrete piling foundations built years ago on barriers are now experiencing a loss of the structure due to erosion, rising sea levels and storm damage, yet because of their installation methods cannot be removed. The revisions currently being studied by staff are meant to address this issue. G. Fugate further explained that he has invited two consulting structural engineers to present to staff some of the issues seen in the field when constructing foundations on barriers as well as headland environments. G. Fugate also explained the programmatic difficulties when needing to factor erosion rates, storm surge and sea level rise relative to the council’s Beach SAMP tools vis-à-vis FEMA tools. Upon meeting with the structural engineers, this item will come back to the subcommittee for further discussion and possible action for a rule change.

Item 4.D – 650-RICR-20-00-1.3.1(G) Construction of Shoreline Protection Facilities. G. Fugate explained that staff has been working on a total rewrite of this section to look into not only updating some of the policies, adopted when the program was first developed in the 1970s, but also to incorporate a hybrid approach to non-structural methods that include a small percentage of structural methods. G. Fugate explained the hybrid approaches. He then explained some of the issues associated with post-storm reconstruction. For instance when stone that had been washed off existing rip rap revetments due PTS SANDY were allowed under the Council’s Emergency Permitting program at that time to be recovered from the beaches immediately in front of the revetments and restacked. These structures may not have suffered as much damage and could have benefitted from a hybrid approach rather than a total structural application. Ms. Cervenka asked how the Council’s Experimental Regulations for Matunuck and Misquamicut fit into these revisions. G. Fugate stated that they are separate and will remain as such given the recent extension to their applicability by the Council. Upon additional staff revisions, this item will come back to the subcommittee for further discussion and possible action for a rule change.

Item 4.C – 650-RICR-20-00-1.3.1(D)(b) Recreational Boating Facilities. Due to time constraints this discussion item was tabled to a future meeting.

ADJOURNMENT. Mr. Gomez, seconded by Mr. Liberti, moved to adjourn. All voted in favor of the motion and the meeting was adjourned at 5:11 p.m.

 

Respectfully submitted by

Jeffrey M Willis, Deputy Director

 

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