Planning Board Tightens Peer Review Contract for Cooling Tower Decommissioning Site

SOMERSET — June 9, 2026 — Somerset Planning Board tightens peer review contract for former cooling tower site near shellfish area. The board voted unanimously Tuesday to execute a third-party stormwater review contract with consulting firm Rue for the Breaking Point LLC application at 1 Breaking Point Road — the site of a former power plant's cooling towers adjacent to a critical shellfish growing area on the Taunton River — but only after negotiating three changes to Rue's proposed scope of work. Member Tim Turner successfully argued that Rue's draft reports should go directly to all five board members, not solely to Town Planner Messier, saying "we are the stormwater permit granting authority — it's not the town planner." The board also required Rue to submit materials one full week before each meeting rather than 48 hours in advance, and changed permissive language in the contract so that Rue "shall maintain" a publicly accessible digital document repository rather than merely being "prepared to maintain" one. The board also voted unanimously to support a Chapter 91 Waterways license for Sabatia Holdings, LLC at 34 Anchor Drive, covering an existing pier, floats, and seawall repair, and continued the Breaking Point LLC stormwater permit hearing to June 23, 2026.