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NORTH CANAAN — Organizers of the CSTA Fall Festival fundraiser (set for Saturday, Oct. 3) hope that this will be the first of many annual events.
CSTA stands for Claudia and Stephen Together Again.
After Claudia Segalla passed away in April 2002, following a battle with cancer, her husband and daughter (now Stacey Oates) set up a scholarship fund in her name at Housatonic Valley Regional High School.
“Through the years, Dad and I tried to change the way it was set up so we could tap into the fund to help others in the community on an emergency basis, such as Ford’s Farm when their barns burned,� Oates said. “We weren’t able to make the legal changes. Then my dad got sick with cancer and passed away.�
That was Christmas night 2008. Oates began thinking about how much he’d done for everyone, pitching in to make others’ lives better.
“He did so much for everyone. He’d go off and paint someone’s house for them.�
She became determined to follow through on his wish for a fund inspired by that giving attitude.
Oates, who started CSTA Inc. with her sister, Tess, said she was amazed at the immediate and generous response from businesses all over the area, donating services and raffle prizes.
The Fall Festival will benefit the Memorial Sloane-Kettering Cancer Center, the Center for Cancer Care Fund at Connecticut Oncology and Hematology, the American Cancer Society Relay for Life team “What Would Stevie Do?,� Pet Partners and local food pantries and the Claudia and Stephen Segalla Memorial Scholarship Fund. An emergency fund will also be established to help local families in need.
There is a lot going on during the day, with special events prior to the festival and a pig roast (which begins at 2 p.m.). Most, but not all, will be held at the Great Barrington VFW.
The day begins with a yard sale at 10 a.m. A horseshoe tournament and Poker Run start at 10:30 a.m. The tournament is $25 per person, which includes festival admission. Call in advance to join. The winner will take half of the pot.
The Poker Run takes participants, traveling by motorcycle, car or truck, to five area bars and restaurants. They receive a playing card at each. Back at the VFW, the best poker hand wins a 50/50 jackpot. Tickets are $30 per driver and $10 per passenger, and include festival admission.
Festival-goers will enjoy an all-you-can-eat menu, including roast pork, hot dogs, hamburgers, roast beef and southern fried chicken breast, as well as sides and desserts.
Admission for those 10 years and older is $15 in advance or $20 at the door. Children under 10 will be admitted for $5 or a bag of non-perishable food for either a local pantry or the pet food bank.
Events include a tie-dyed T-shirt station, a bounce house, face-painting, a golf-chipping contest and crafts tables for the kids. Lucky Nails salon will offer $15 manicures, with a ticket for a drawing for a free manicure; $5 from each will be donated to CSTA.
Music will be provided by DJ Mary Fresh and Justin Victory’s band, Undercover. There will also be a chance to register teams for next June’s Relay for Life.
A silent auction will include prizes such as a sports summer camp, power equipment and a day spa package.
Two additional raffles will offer a total of 46 prizes, from private yoga sessions, makeup consultation and acupuncture to wine and spirits, gift certificates for pizza and chocolates and merchandise at all sorts of businesses.
A 50-cent raffle for children will offer more food and ice cream, as well as fishing and bird-watching equipment and more.
To buy tickets now, call 413-329-1471 or 413-229-2887.
Anyone who cannot attend the festival but would like to make a contribution may send a check, made payable to CSTA Inc./Stacey Oates and mail it to CSTA Inc., c/o Stacey Oates, 32 Leffingwell Road, Southfield MA 01259.
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Telecom Reg’s Best Kept On the Books
When Connecticut land-use commissions update their regulations, it seems like a no-brainer to jettison old telecommunications regulations adopted decades ago during a short-lived period when municipalities had authority to regulate second generation (2G) transmissions prior to the Connecticut Siting Council (CSC) being ordered by a state court in 2000 to regulate all cell tower infrastructure as “functionally equivalent” services.
It is far better to update those regs instead, especially for macro-towers given new technologies like small cells. Even though only ‘advisory’ to the CSC, the preferences of towns by law must be taken into consideration in CSC decision making. Detailed telecom regs – not just a general wish list -- are evidence that a town has put considerable thought into where they prefer such infrastructure be sited without prohibiting service that many – though not all – citizens want and that first responders rely on for public safety.
Such regs come in handy when egregious tower sites are proposed in sensitive areas, typically on private land. The regs are a town’s first line of defense, especially when cross referenced to plans of conservation and development, P&Z regulations, and wetlands setbacks. They identify how/where the town plans to intersect with the CSC process. They are also a roadmap for service providers regarding preferred sites and sometimes less neighborhood contention. In fact, to have no telecom regs can weaken a town’s rights to protect environmental, scenic, and historic assets, and serve up whole neighborhoods to unnecessary overlapping coverage and corporate overreach. Such regs are unique to every town and should not follow anyone else’s boiler plate, especially industry’s.
Connecticut is the only state that has a centralized siting entity for cell towers. The good news is that applicants must prove need for new tower sites in an evidentiary proceeding and any decisions have the weight of the state behind them. The bad news is that the CSC used to be far less industry-friendly and rote in their reviews, which now resemble a check list. There is an operative assumption at CSC that if an applicant wants a tower, they must need it, otherwise why spend significant money to run the approval gauntlet? This reflects a subtle shift over the years at CSC from sincere willingness to protect the environment toward minimal tweaking of bad applications with minor changes. The bottom line is that towns really cannot rely on the CSC to do all the work for them.
What CSC issues telecom providers is a “certificate of environmental compatibility” after an evidentiary proceeding (not unlike a court case) with intervenors, parties, expert witnesses, and the service provider’s technical pro’s sworn in and subject to cross examination. Service providers get to do the same with any opposition from intervenor/party participants – like towns and citizens -- and their experts. It’s an impressive process whose ultimate goal is the fine balancing between allowing adequate/reliable public services and protecting state ecology with minimal damage to scenic, historic, and recreational values. They unfortunately often fall short of their mandate – like approving cell towers with diesel generators over town aquifers -- evidenced by CSC only rejecting about five cell towers in the past 15-20 years.
The CSC was founded in 1972 and clarified its mission in the 1980’s to prevent the state from being carved up willy-nilly by gas pipelines, high tension corridors, and broadcast towers. With the sudden proliferation of cell towers beginning in late 1990’s, it became the most sued agency in Connecticut by both an arrogant upstart industry if applications were denied and by towns/citizens when bad sites were forced on them. CSC gradually formed a defensive posture that drives their decisions toward industry with deeper pockets and attorneys on retainer.
For citizens, nothing can wreck one’s day like the CSC. It behooves towns to protect what little toolkit they have, and understand the legal parameters of the CSC’s playing field. The CSC is not a “normal” government agency where municipal/citizen redress is based on logic and local support. Their process is largely immune to everything but specific kinds of evidence – like town regs with setbacks/fall zones, radio frequency transmission signal strengths, sensitive areas identified, and detailed wildlife inventory, among others.
There is a current cell tower fight involving two intervening towns -- Washington and Warren; both with good cell tower regs – over a tower site within 1200’ of a Montessori School, near Steep Rock’s nature preserves with comprehensive geology/wildlife databases that include endangered, threatened and special concern flora and fauna, on established federal/state migratory bird flyways, within throwing distance to a historic site capable of being listed on the Underground Railroad, and with an access road on a blind curve entering a state highway that will permanently damage wetlands, vernal pools, and core forests. There are well credentialed environmental experts, including Dr. Michael Klemens, former chair of Salisbury’s P&Z, as well as the former director of migratory bird management at the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and an RF engineer testifying to alternative approaches, plus three attorneys representing intervenors. It is the most professional challenge I have seen at CSC since Falls Village successfully mounted one that protected Robbins Swamps several years ago.
The hearing is ongoing, with uncertain results. To see what it takes today to stop an inappropriate tower siting, see Docket #543 under “Pending Matters” at https://portal.ct.gov/csc before removing local cell tower regs – the lowest hanging fruit that any town can possess in case it’s needed.
B, Blake Levitt is the Communications Director at The Berkshire-Litchfield Environmental Council. She writes about how technology affects biology.