Hubbardston Board of Health Denies Beaver Permit, Invites Owner to January Meeting

HUBBARDSTON — December 16, 2025 — Hubbardston Board of Health denies beaver removal permit and flags 30 years of landfill monitoring costs for Select Board review. The three-member board voted unanimously at its December 16 meeting to deny a 10-day emergency beaver permit for 23 Williamsville Road, citing the absence of any threat to the property's well or septic system and concerns about disturbing the animals during winter denning and mating season; the homeowner will be invited to a January meeting to present additional information. Chair Gael Moncoeur also moved to escalate the town's landfill monitoring program — which has cost an estimated $10,000 to $11,000 annually for roughly 30 years — to the Select Board after one monitoring well missed two consecutive tests, complicating an application to reduce testing frequency. "Ten thousand times 30 years — this town has spent — that's worth putting on the agenda," Moncoeur said. The board also agreed to follow up on a Hubbardston resident's elevated lead exposure referral and to draft a public awareness post on childhood lead testing requirements, and it flagged missing permit paperwork for a septic installer and a trash hauler, blocking approval of warrant number 12.