Letters to the Editor

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Would you help The Family Pantry obtain part of $1 million?

For the 10th year, the Alan Feinstein Foundation will distribute $1 million to anti-hunger agencies and The Family Pantry will be one of those agencies this year.

The way it works is we keep track of all new donations (cash, checks and food) during March and April and report it to the foundation in early May. The Alan Feinstein Foundation then makes proportional grants to the agencies that participated.

It will be a nice revenue source and a great way to increase awareness about hunger. So I ask anyone who can to make a donation to us and it will help us to get part of that $1 million. Please note that your donation is in response to the Feinstein challenge.

For further details, you may visit its website at www.feinsteinfoundation.org and as always you may contact me at the pantry, by e-mail to manderson @thefamilypantry.com or by phone at 508-432-6519.

Mary Anderson

Family Pantry

Harwich

 

OK troops, brace yourselves. Time again for my pet spring rant.

After a long winter of shut in, stale indoor air, I look forward to mild spring days when I can open up my house for some fresh breezes. But I have a neighbor who burns his brush during this same season and all I get is a house full of smoke.

Can someone tell me why we allow people to pollute the air when the concern is about global warming and putting more carbon into the atmosphere? Where is the logic in this exercise? I can’t believe that the bit of soil conditioning from the ashes is worth the amount of COs going into the atmosphere. Isn’t it more eco-friendly to take the stuff to the dump and have it made into mulch?

Francis S. Capsan

Brewster

Jon Gilmore has pontificated his objection to those who did not consider the photo of Sarah Peake kissing her wife as appropriate for this newspaper (Letters, Feb. 16).

Jon, please identify when we saw a photo of Shirley Gomes kissing her husband. Please try not to hurt yourself.

Bob Ledoux

Chatham

 

Compared to the Lower Cape, the town of Hull is a dump. As David Beck points out in his guest commentary (Feb. 16), Hull is in the landing path of Logan Airport. He didn't mention the lovely view his town has of the Boston sewage treatment plant. They may as well put wind turbines there.

Cape Cod is a national seashore – a national park – a national treasure. It is one of the last bastions of beauty that we have. Industry is encroaching upon us, but we have tried to fight it back. We don't need tourists coming here to see how we ruined the place.

Should wind towers go up here, you will not see your taxes go down. You will not see your electric or water bills go down. You will not be making Cape Cod greener. All you will see, as the blades turn, is someone else making money at your expense.

Mr. Beck, my friend who lives in the town next to you and doesn't get any benefit from your wind turbines doesn't appreciate their noise at all. But that is just his opinion. Keep your man-made swish, swish. We want to preserve the roar of the ocean.

Orleans residents take note: Your town has plans for six wind turbines.

David Brinning

Orleans

The Eastham Energy Committee respects the right of people to express opposition to the proposed wind turbines. However, two letters in the Feb. 16 issue of The Cape Codder provide misleading information. The committee wishes to point out the facts in those cases.

Lauren-Preston Wells stated, "Energy generated by the turbines would be sold back into the grid and any resulting profits would accrue to the private developer who owned the turbines." The committee has stated that the financial benefit to the town will be based on two negotiated items: a payment to the town for the lease of the land and a negotiated share of the revenue from the electricity to be sold to the grid. Those negotiations will happen at the time developers respond to the Request for Proposals. The revenue from "energy generated by the turbines" will be shared with the town through agreements negotiated by the board of selectmen.

Francie Williamson refers to "storage of thousands of gallons of oil and lubricants in the nacelles, generators, and substation." The committee has stated that lubricants will be primarily in the nacelle (the motor at the top of the tower); that the RFP will require that lubricants be environmentally friendly, and that there be a containment system built into the turbine base. The committee plans to include in the RFP a requirement for extra oil or lubricant to be stored off site.

The committee believes wind energy can help meet our growing energy needs and that we should do our share locally. We need to weigh the risks and the potential benefits of these turbines. Studies that the committee has requested will help us weigh those risks and allow the voters at town meeting the opportunity to make a decision. 

Brian Eastman, chairman

Eastham Energy Committee

I am a part-time resident of Eastham. I am without a vote but I do pay full taxes to Eastham and abide by the restrictions imposed on my home in the National Seashore. When we purchased our home we were well aware of the restrictions governing the improvement or changing of our property and understood that the town of Eastham as well as the Seashore wanted to keep the beauty and natural environment as it has always been. I bought into the theory that I would have the natural beauty and environment to enjoy as would everyone else. I do not understand why we have to be threatened by the wind turbines that will absolutely change/alter/damage the natural beauty of the town and the Seashore.

I ask why and at what cost do we need to have the turbines?

The energy commission has clearly stated they are not able to determine the monetary benefit to the town until the developers bid on the project. The energy commission is doing its job and testing and testing and I wonder what the cost is to do all these tests? What is the bottom line here? What will four turbines do for anyone? The contribution to the grid is so small and the contribution to the town is not even existing. I feel that maybe the federal government has all towns looking for alternative energy sources and that is good but does that mean a Band-Aid approach?

Why do we make such a huge deal over a cell tower but yet we do not question a turbine twice the size of the Pilgrim Tower in Provincetown?

What is the driving force of these turbines and who benefits?

At least I can use my cellphone with the cell tower. I have to ask why the energy commission was originally commissioned to study one turbine in Eastham and now it is four. Why is there new construction and more and more houses being built in Eastham when there is such a high inventory of existing homes for sale?

We generate the need for more energy and stress on our water and waste instead of finding ways to conserve. If the town keeps going in the direction it is going, we will all see property values drop (but taxes will not go down – insurance cost will rise) and there will be plenty of low-income housing available. 

Denise Kopasz

Eastham

 

This paper's Feb. 23 headline, "Truro Frustrated by State Bureaucracy," could have read "Truro Selectmen Continue to Disdain Environmental Protection." In their own words:

1. Clearcutting the Community Center property (lawsuit pending) creates an ideal habitat for the threatened broom crowberry, triggering a MESA (Mass. Engangered Species Act) review. Chairman Gaechter characterizes portions of a letter from the Natural Heritage and Endangered Species Program as "bull----.”  Selectman Palmer says, "…they’re making this up as they go along."

2. After selectmen ignore then downplay the dumping of contaminated fill at Pamet Park (Gaechter believed "the debris was limited to a small section of the park"), Mass. DEP orders the town to remove and replace the bogus fill polluting the entire area.

3. When DEP informs selectmen that the town hall bells violate state noise pollution regulations, "Ring the hell out of ’em," Gaechter replies, "I’m not comfortable with some of the processes they use." Asked why the town must pollute the nighttime sky with bright lights and clanging bells at 3 a.m., Gaechter insists, "I want ’em shining on the bells while the bells are ringing."

4. Residents of North Truro Village Center and the North Union Field Road area manage to repel unwanted intrusion into their neighborhoods by selectmen who initially disregard angry protests.

So far they have gotten away with trashing my neighborhood.

What will you do when they set their sights on yours?

Michael Snell

Truro

I admire Deb Camuso's courage and applaud her observation that "... some people (in Truro) are uncomfortable expressing their opinions fearing reprisal in the future." I know how she feels, and I know many residents who feel the same way.

On Feb. 9, I attended a board of health meeting to ask them to fulfill their responsibility to enforce state noise pollution regulations. I sat patiently as they finished agenda items then, last person there, I introduced myself and stated my request.

The board as a whole said nothing because the board of selectmen had instructed them to "table the matter." But BOH member Mark Peters could not resist the urge and launched into a lengthy and arrogant rant – filled with pseudo-science mumbo-jumbo (“A decibel meter is a decibel meter the way a spoon is a spoon"), excoriating me for challenging the authority of the selectmen.

Since then I know very well what it feels like to live with the fear of reprisal by a government body. Selectman Hartman has even admitted that waking me up at 3 a.m. and 4 a.m. with loud bells that violate state noise pollution regulations “has become a personal matter by a couple of members of the board against you.”

Governance by vendetta is the assassin ofdemocracy. The time is long overdue to dismant1e this state of fear and dispatch all bully tactics and the bullies who practice them from public office, from top to bottom. As the saying goes, "The fish rots from the head down."

Patricia Smith-Snell

Truro