Massachusetts has 3,000 dams, many of which no longer serve their original intended purpose and now pose a risk to nearby infrastructure and public safety during storm events. Many dams are in disrepair and are subject to increasing stress as storms increase in magnitude and frequency. These dams impede natural riverine processes and limit access to critical spawning habitat for migratory and resident fish. The Massachusetts Division Ecological Restoration (DER) works with public and private land owners to restore and protect the Commonwealth's rivers, wetlands, and watersheds for the benefit of the people and the environment, and has recently begun a proactive, systematic approach for achieving this goal.

Using the Massachusetts Office of Dam Safety's database and DER's (Ecological) Restoration Potential Model, DER has identified the dams in the Commonwealth that pose the highest risk to people and the built environment and whose removal will provide the greatest aquatic ecosystem benefit. This analysis has yielded a prioritization of potential dam removals in Massachusetts that optimizes community climate change resiliency with ecological restoration. This presentation will highlight the methodology used to identify the highest ranking dams in the Commonwealth, discuss the challenges encountered in developing a successful proactive outreach process, and outline the steps DER is taking to prioritize these dam for future removal.

Kris serves as an ecological restoration specialist for the Massachusetts Division of Ecological Restoration (DER). Kris has nine years of practical experience leading and designing watershed and aquatic habitat restoration projects and currently manages dam removals projects throughout the Commonwealth. He is a registered professional engineer and holds M.S. and B.S. degrees in civil engineering. Kris joined SER in 2014 and currently serves on the SER-NE Chapter Executive Committee.