Concord – July 8, 2008 – Governor John Lynch has signed a new law passed by the legislature that creates a citizen-driven petition process for bringing new bodies of water under the control of the State’s boat mooring law.

Upon receipt of a petition containing 25 individual signatures from each municipality bordering a public water body, the Department of Safety will be required to hold a public hearing to determing the necessity of establishing a moorings permit process for the lake or pond. At present, only the State’s six lagest lakes, including Ossipee Lake, are governened by the moorings law, which controls the number and placement of moorings.

The new law was initiated by the N.H. Lakes Association and was sponsored by Senator Robert Letourneau of Derry. It take effect on August 31st.

Lynch also recently signed Senate Bill 384 which requires that the N.H. Department of Environmental Services (DES) and local authorities be notified when a septic system is found to be failing during a site assessment of developed waterfront property. This law will take effect on January 1, 2009.

Under current law, site assessments are already required to be performed by permitted septic system designers prior to the sale of developed lakefront property, but the law does not require that the DES and local authorities be notified when a system is actually failing.

SB 384 was initiated through the joint efforts of the N.H. Lakes Association and the N.H. Rivers Council and was sponsored by Senator Kathleen Sgambati of Tilton.