“Get mad. Stay mad. Make history” (Fairhaven, MA)
Dec 13, 2011
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Editor’s note: Watch this 20-minute video of an outrageous town meeting in Fairhaven, Mass. What’s outrageous is the conduct of the Board of Selectmen.
What is fabulous is the refusal of townspeople to put up with the board’s behavior.
Listen carefully, folks: You are going to have to be just as vociferous as these people—and just as angry and adamant about not “shutting up”—if you are going to stop wind turbines from coming to your town.
Three cheers for the citizens of Fairhaven! Visit their website, Fairhaven Wind Project.
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Comment by Frank Haggerty on 12/13/2011 at 7:28 pm
This past week, the Town of Fairhaven released a twelve pound box of e-mails sent and received by commercial wind turbine contractors/investors over the past year. The town plans to install two 400 foot turbines.
The emails were made public this week through the Massachusetts Public Record Law (MPRL). The documents were handed to representatives from windwise .org, a local group at a cost of six hundred dollars. The plan is to make the documents public.
The Fairhaven wind turbine group against the poor siting of commercial wind turbines has turned into a consortium of citizens from Falmouth to Mattapoisett. The main goal is to inform the public about the science and the truth of commercial wind turbines.
Wind energy is too costly for the taxpayer; too inefficient to keep its promises to generate electricity at the level claimed; and too destructive in its impact on the people and the environment in the vicinity of the turbine installations.
Comment by sue Hobart on 12/13/2011 at 7:42 pm
HAMMER THEM INTO THE GROUND FAIRHAVEN!!!! You MAKE this stop! I am so heartened by your outrage. It can only get greater and greater!!!!
Those selectmen MUST be held accountable for their negligence. No “industry experts” can be believed! Get educated and STAY MAD! Your kids’ and everyone’s lives are more important than any of this BS.
Go friends go!!!
Comment by Sherri Lange on 12/13/2011 at 7:48 pm
Brave persistent people of Fairhaven. You are right. This is what it takes. How many meetings do not even have the open camera? I have been to many community meetings, and even this basic human right was not afforded. So many violations.
It continues to be wrong, as the lead protester says. Wrong.
Keep screaming until they HAVE TO LISTEN.
Comment by Barbara Durkin on 12/13/2011 at 8:50 pm
We will defend democracy! Just ask the Selectmen of Fairhaven! Way to go, Fairhaven Patriots!
Cheers!
Barbara Durkin
Comment by Andreas Marciniak on 12/13/2011 at 9:33 pm
Good on you people of Fairhaven! If that is what it takes to make them listen, then go for it! Someone might want to tell these bureaucrats that it’s us they all work for, not the other way around—something a lot have forgotten in the last 30 years.
We, here in Waterloo, South Australia, have 37 turbines, and it has wrecked the community and the town.
My brother and I went to a town meeting in Burra (Australia) to tell the people not to go ahead with these turbines. We were received by Council the same as you people of Fairhaven—only we where threatened that the police would be called in to remove us from a public meeting. So I told the Speaker to do so, and told the meeting that the outburst they witnessed from my brother will be happening to them, because that’s what the wind turbines do to people.
We where escorted out of the meeting, but made the front page of the local newspaper. Our point was made! So, do what you knead to do!
GOOD LUCK!
Comment by Marsh Rosenthal on 12/13/2011 at 11:44 pm
After watching the video of the Selectman’s meeting in Fairhaven I am reminded of the recent public hearing meeting of the Savoy Conservation Commission where my First Amendment Right to Free Speech was abridged by the appointed stooges on the commission. The wind plant developer was there in phalanx with their fancy Boston lawyer to get their consevation permit. The bully boy on the commission wanted the committee to vote for it there and then. Sensing that the blood was up in the room, the other two demurred. Since then they have issued a fourteen page Order of Conditions, which was obviously prepared by the developer. This is being appealed.
After having filed a written complaint to my board of selectmen demanding the removal of the chief bully on the inept commission, I received a phone call from the Chairman of the Selectboard that no action was to be taken, as there were “insufficient grounds” in my complaint. I subsequently sent a copy of my complaint to Ms. Kelly Gunagan, Associate Attorney General, descibing the travesty of just procedure and the committee rigging in my town. The letter was sent Certified, Return Receipt Requested. It was received and signed for 12/1/2011. I have yet to receive any communication from Ms Gunagan’s office in Springfield, MA
Government is broken. It does not seem to care.
Dear people of Fairhaven, asking the developer if the wind turbines are safe for children is like asking a used car salesman if the cream puff on the lot is OK. Of course he’ll tell you whatever you want to hear to sell you his jallopy! You are entitled to get YOUR CHOICE of public health and engineerig expertise, AT THE TOWN’S EXPENSE BEFORE ANY CONSTRUCTION BEGINS, PERIOD!
My heart bursts with your anger. Your anger is my anger.
Comment by Andreas Marciniak on 12/14/2011 at 12:43 am
Sorry about the couple of spelling errors in my earlier Comment; I just got so hot under the collar when I saw the video clip. I’m one of the people that had to leave his home in Waterloo, Australia, and stay in the city in my mother’s shed!
If these turbines can make us so very sick, just think what they will do to our kids? I know what effect it had on my 17-year-old daughter, my brother & brother-in-law, my sister and her husband, and my friends—and the community.
Comment by Tom Whitesell on 12/14/2011 at 12:56 am
If the selectmen of Fairhaven had any guts, any integrity, any comprehension of, or respect for democratic process, they would be standing up and saying YES!—not sleazing away back in their chairs and refusing to interact with the citizens of the town for whom they are the elected representatives. You can tell them I said so.
Tom Whitesell
Potsdam, NY and
12th generation American citizen, my ancestors having begun to arrive in what has long been styled Eastham Massachusetts in 1610.
Comment by gail on 12/14/2011 at 2:07 am
If only I had known all this when I went to see the Mayor of Scansano (Italy) 5 years ago. The video really shook me up and brought back all the humiliation.
Great to see the tables turned and a panel of humiliated councillors!
I was told that my health problerms were my sacrifice for Italy!!!!!!!!!! We’re still fighting for compensation, outcome in the stars.
YES, tell them what they should be doing and what they are being paid for. Then hound them out of office and put someone there who cares about the people. (The Mayor of Scansano resigned over corruption charges.)
Comment by Lachlan on 12/14/2011 at 6:51 am
I believe the way to treat these arrogant committeemen is to point out their duty of care responsibilities to the community that they serve. Also it should be pointed out to them that if they fail in their duty of due diligence that they may well be liable for their failures.
The deliberate interference with recording equipment to cover their shortcomings should also be treated as an act of treachery for which they also need to be held accountable by the people they are meant to protect, and a vote of “no confidence” in them would go a long way towards making this point.
I was a sceptic for a long time and became seriously ill when I had to stay at Waterloo (Australia) for 48 hours to help a family member, so I do understand the consequences of wind farms too close to residential areas.
From what I have seen personally and from speaking to family members and others, the minimum setback needs to be around 10 km, minimum.
Good luck with your case……..Lachlan
Comment by Bill Heller on 12/14/2011 at 4:20 pm
Are Selectmen selected or elected? Vote them out next time if you can. Does Mass. law allow for a recall petition? If so, it’s worth a shot.
These guys don’t belong in office! And as we all know, every developer has their cadre of credentialed experts. Don’t even think they’ll side with residents on any aspect of the issue.
There is no law that says you can’t be rude as long as foul language isn’t used. From my own experience, I would urge Fairhaven folks to consider hiring an attorney. We’d be living with a turbine here in Union Beach a year ago if we hadn’t…though we’re in appeals and the outcome is 50/50.
In Fairhaven and here in Union Beach, there will be no political solution. Sue baby sue! Way to go Fairhaven on standing up to these stupid crony bureaucrats!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Comment by Sheila K. bowen on 01/14/2012 at 10:14 am
You are all heroes!!
Continue to push them for a public hearing at a location that will accommodate a large crowd! They must comply with your wishes.