Wayland Needs Moratorium On Crumb Rubber Fields: Letter

This letter to the editor does not necessarily reflect the views of Wayland Patch.

Last April, the recreation director’s explanation of the "virgin crumb rubber" planned for use in the proposed Loker artificial turf field led to a laboratory analysis showing that its rubber infill contains several dangerous chemicals: phthalates likely to cause cancer and birth defects. The small particles of this infill created by field use and maintenance would be blown by storm winds into our water supply, compounding the PFAS contamination we’re already combatting and creating a significant risk to public health in Wayland.

At our Annual Town Meeting last May, this revelation combined with the adverse ecological impact of installing ~200,000 pounds of rubber and plastic into our environment helped defeat Article 25, which sought town funding for the Loker artificial turf field. When the Recreation Commission continued its pursuit of a permit from the Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA), a petition with more than 400 signatures was presented to the Board of Selectmen asking that the Town Administrator be directed to retract the permit request until the Board of Health could assess the public health risk. The Selectmen did not intervene, and the ZBA permit was granted.

With the permit granted, if the Recreation Commission were to raise the necessary funds through gifts from individual and corporate donors, and if the Board of Selectmen were to accept those gifts and then grant permission to use the land, an artificial turf field could be constructed at Loker — with no public health assessment, and no further approval from Town Meeting.

This is unacceptable.

Nearby towns like Concord and Sharon have addressed this issue by passing Articles at their Town Meetings that prevent the construction of artificial turf fields for specified time intervals; they enacted moratoriums on artificial turf field construction. Wayland needs just such a moratorium to allow time for the public health risk to be assessed. This time can also be used to comprehensively assess Wayland’s immediate and projected needs for athletic fields, and to review its athletic field maintenance and construction practices; organically maintained natural grass fields can provide significantly more playing time than what we’ve been getting.

Waiting until Wayland’s Annual Town Meeting next May to consider an artificial turf field moratorium Article would give the Recreation Commission more than 8 months to privately fund an artificial turf field at Loker. Thus we have no choice but to immediately call for a Special Town Meeting to promptly consider an artificial turf field moratorium Article. The required number of signatures have been obtained and submitted to our Town Clerk; by law, the Board of Selectmen must now schedule a Special Town Meeting within 45 days.

This was avoidable, but we now have no choice.

—Dave Bernstein, Wayland