The Buttonwood Brook and Apponagansett Bay watershed was once a healthy thriving ecosystem that supported stream and wetland habitat, a productive shellfishery, and a healthy salt marsh system. Over the last century, increased development and urbanization have profoundly altered how water flows across our landscape. Instead of soaking into the ground and being filtered through soils and slowly flowing towards the Brook and Bay, untreated runoff from roads, parking lots, and roofs is now collected by stormwater pipes and quickly flows into Buttonwood Brook and its tributaries. During rainstorms a surge of polluted runoff overwhelms the Brook, degrading water quality, habitat, and ecological function. Together with groundwater pollution from septic systems, these factors contribute to and expedite the transport of pollutants to receiving waters like Apponagansett Bay, where water quality consistently ranks in the bottom 10% of all 30 major harbors and coves in Buzzards Bay.

Led by the Buzzards Bay Coalition, Buttonwood-to-Bay is a five-year EPA funded project designed to bring together local communities, non-profits, and municipalities to tackle longstanding issues that impact local water quality and community resilience. Now in its third year, Buttonwood-to-Bay represents a once in a generation opportunity to holistically assess the watershed, identify underlying issues, and mobilize the resources required to implement solutions. Buttonwood Brook is the region’s most negatively impacted urban stream flowing through one of the Bay’s most disadvantaged communities. An important goal of this project is to address environmental justice and equity issues through investments in Green Infrastructure and Ecological Restoration that directly benefit underserved communities in New Bedford and Dartmouth.

Working to Restore Habitat and Water Quality

To accomplish this task, Coalition staff have worked with project partners, stakeholders, and contracted engineers to integrate water quality data with community needs and develop a list of potential restoration sites within the watershed. Project partners used multiple criteria to identify project sites that bring the greatest benefit to the community by addressing surface and ground water pollution, climate resilience, habitat restoration, and environmental justice issues. Project partners and local stakeholders teamed up with an experienced engineering firm to prioritize the top sites for implementation over the next few years.

Right now, the Coalition is actively partnering with local municipalities, state and federal agencies, and other non-profits to advance the restoration of Buttonwood Brook and Apponagansett Bay through several grant funded projects that take a variety of approaches to improve water quality, habitat, and community resilience.

Green Infrastructure (GI) projects to reduce stormwater pollution along the Kempton Street Corridor, in Buttonwood Park, and in the Buttonwood Park Zoo. The Coalition, the City of New Bedford, and the Friends of Buttonwood Park have partnered on a project to implement GI and Nature-Based Solutions that will filter runoff and reduce harmful pollutants in local waterways, lower the potential for beach and shellfish closures, and produce important co-benefits like reduced heat-island effect, improved air-quality, and greater resilience to climate change.

Ecological restoration projects on the lowest segment of Buttonwood Brook. The Coalition is working with the Town of Dartmouth and the Dartmouth Natural Resources Trust to modify several aging dams and culverts, reconnect floodplains, and restore riparian habitat. These efforts will improve water quality and restore habitat, increase community resilience to extreme weather events, and re-establish migratory fish passage into Buttonwood Brook for the first time in over 150 years.

Connecting homes to sewer to reduce nitrogen pollution from septic systems. The Coalition and the Town of Dartmouth are working together to make it easier for residents in areas served by municipal sewer systems to connect their homes and abandon aging septic systems that leach harmful levels of nitrogen into our groundwater and negatively impact sensitive coastal ecosystems like Apponagansett Bay. This project will reduce the potential for the closure of swimming beaches or shellfishing areas caused by harmful algae blooms.

EPA SNEP has been critical to funding this project, but support from our membership and the local community is vital to the project’s success and its long-term sustainability. Join, donate, or get involved today to support our work going forward. If you have questions about the Buttonwood-to-Bay Project please contact the Project Manager, Dan Goulart at goulart@savebuzzardsbay.org or 508-999-6363 ext. 230.