Sharing a letter from an LMPA member

Below, please find a let­ter from Kel­ly Mac­don­ald, a very con­cerned mem­ber of the LMPA. She needs your support .….

ATTENTION!!! ALL Lake Maspenock Res­i­dents and Friends of Hop­kin­ton, Mil­ford, and Upton:
Dear Friends,

It is with heavy heart and deep con­cern that I write to you today, but it must be done. 
I NEED YOUR HELP!

Dur­ing Labor Day week­end, on Sat­ur­day, Sept. 1st, 2018, my twelve year old son and I accom­pa­nied sev­er­al lake neigh­bors in an attempt­ed res­cue of the sev­en­teen year old boy that drowned that day.
What start­ed out as a large par­ty of joy­ous yelling and cheer­ing, end­ed with cry­ing and the shrill screams of pan­ic. Sad­ly, there was a lan­guage bar­ri­er, but lake neigh­bors rushed to the scene to inves­ti­gate, react­ing to the screams and pan­ic, my son and I included.

Words can­not describe the hor­ror in wit­ness­ing this tragedy unfold. Nine months have passed and I am still haunt­ed by the sounds of cry­ing and scream­ing, and the sight of the fam­i­ly run­ning about in pan­ic on the dam. It was obvi­ous they didn’t know how to swim and no one could jump in after the boy.

911 was called. How­ev­er, get­ting to the scene was chaos. The boy was on a neighbor’s pon­toon boat docked at the bot­tom of North Pond Ter­race, that ends at the water, at the Mil­ford end of the dam. Upton EMT’s arrived via Crock­et Road on the Upton end of the dam, and sev­er­al of them ran the whole length of the dam to get to the oth­er side. Mil­ford and Hop­kin­ton EMT’s arrived on the Mil­ford side but they were unable to come down North Pond Ter­race because the road is no longer acces­si­ble. This is unacceptable.

Could those EMT’s have got­ten to that boy any soon­er? We will nev­er know. I do know that this ques­tion should nev­er arise again! We should do every­thing pos­si­ble to know that every­thing was done to ensure the safe­ty of life!

Years ago, when Mil­ford owned the dam, North Pond Ter­race is/was the access road begin­ning at Pine Island Road, extend­ing to the water at the dam. There is also a small por­tion of land at the base of the dam labeled as “Mil­ford Town Park”. This access road served util­i­ty vehi­cles, emer­gency vehi­cles to the dam and lake and also as a boat access to the water. For many years, the town’s peo­ple have come to the dam for out­ings – as it should be.

When you’re stand­ing on the dam and look out into the water, it is shal­low for about 30 feet and then the water shad­ows (and is mis­lead­ing) – and that’s where the bot­tom drops off.

Lake Maspenock is a beau­ti­ful lit­tle lake. It’s clean and great for fish­ing, swim­ming, and boat­ing. Peo­ple will always hang out on the dam. It can’t be policed con­stant­ly, and it shouldn’t be. It’s a great local spot for peo­ple to gather.

Now, just recent­ly, on Sun­day, June 2nd, anoth­er boy lost his life in our lake.

The bot­tom line is, now TWO PEOPLE HAVE DIED!!!

So, what can we do to help pre­vent such a tragedy?

There MUST be Emer­gency Access, RESCUE plans/ pro­ce­dures and RESCUE TEAM put in place from all three towns col­lec­tive­ly! This should be shared respon­si­bil­i­ty from all three towns!

I have spo­ken with oth­er locals and pro­pose a few ideas:
1. POST some type of warn­ing sign(s) that there is a drop-off. This could be writ­ten in Eng­lish and Span­ish, with a sim­ple stick fig­ure stand­ing in the water and the ground drops off. I have drawn an exam­ple.
2. REOPEN/UNBLOCK the access road of North Pond Ter­race begin­ning at Pine Island Road extend­ing to the water, as it was pri­or to Jan­u­ary, 2014. (This road has always been an access road of 10ft wide min­i­mum; now it is mere­ly a path. See pho­tos.)
3. ADD a small dock at the dam on the Upton side AND one near the beach for access in emer­gency sit­u­a­tions.
4. INSTALL Emer­gency Call Box at the dam and at the beach.
5. ADD Emer­gency Life Rings at the dam and at the beach.
6. ADD a “shal­low” swim rope and/or sep­a­rate shal­low area at the beach for younger chil­dren.
7. Emer­gency row boat stored at the beach.
8. AED shed at the beach and at the dam.
9. SHARED water­craft between Hop­kin­ton, Upton, Mil­ford, manned with someone(s) who can assist a res­cue IN THE WATER – as opposed to wait­ing on the beach/land.

Lake res­i­dents dis­cussed Pre­ven­ta­tive action, such as:
Safe Swim pro­gram for all chil­dren
CPR class­es
Store extra gog­gles on board your boat
Life ring on your boat and/or your dock
AED sheds on pri­vate property

PLEASE! I IMPLORE YOU! — Send me your sup­port, encour­age­ment, and/or sug­ges­tions in writ­ing, even just a few lines, so we, with the sup­port of LMPA, may present our con­cerns to our town offi­cials, as a com­mu­ni­ty, to rec­ti­fy the sit­u­a­tion by putting sol­id Emer­gency Access Pro­ce­dures in place!
Any and all con­cerns and sug­ges­tions should be pre­sent­ed to all three towns sur­round­ing the lake. This would include Town Offi­cials such as Select­men, Fire Dept, Police Dept, Attny Gen­er­al, etc. 
Any and all sug­ges­tions should be con­sid­ered to ensure such a tragedy does not hap­pen again.

PLEASE! Send your sup­port in writ­ing to lakesideliving85@gmail.com .

THANK YOU FOR YOUR TIME, ATTENTION, AND CONSIDERATION IN THIS IMPORTANT MATTER!