Editor:
[The following is a copy of a letter sent to the Board of Trustees of the Kennebunk Kennebunkport and Wells Water District concerning the sale of Branch Brook water to Poland Springs for bottling]
Today [June 25] I am asking you to reconsider the proposed deal with Poland Springs. I am a concerned consumer and live in Kennebunk. As a teacher of environmental science I selected bottled water as a topic for my class.
After much discussion and using “Living in the Environment” by G. Tyler Miller as our college text, our class came to the conclusion that the process of extracting water from a stream, hauling it miles away, bottling it in plastic and selling it back to consumers who’s own water supply is fine creates undo waste.
The bottled water industry is, for the most part, a luxury we cannot afford. I think the board of trustees will deeply regret, in years to come, a decision to go forward and sell some of Branch Brook.
I hope you will reconsider and understand the long-term implications of such an agreement. Water is our natural resource in Maine and we are fortunate. Thirty years into the future? By current standards of environmental thinking, this would be a huge mistake.
Eileen Willard
Kennebunk