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KENT — One of the mainstays of downtown Kent celebrated an important milestone this summer. Kent Coffee and Chocolate, opened by Sandra Champlain when she was 25 years old, turned 20 on July 4.The idea for the shop came to her on a visit to her mother, Marion, all those years ago. Champlain had graduated from the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, N.Y., and was working in the hospitality industry, sometimes cooking, sometimes in management. She even worked on the Mississippi Queen river boat. But, she said, she had a dream of opening a restaurant.“My mom used to be a flight attendant in the Air Force, back when the Air Force had flight attendants,” she said. “She said one of her favorite things, after the passengers were asleep, was to sit down with a Hershey bar and a cup of coffee.”She and her mother scouted out Main Street in Kent, watching the traffic patterns. The building that now houses her shop used to be a consignment shop. Located just feet from the main intersection in town, it seemed the perfect gathering place.Champlain said her favorite class in school was chocolate and that she considers it her specialty. “I felt the combination of coffee and chocolate would work because all year ’round people buy coffee, and in the slow winter months, there are a lot of chocolate-giving holidays,” she said. “We just went for it, and 20 years later, it still stands.”Champlain has found a successful business formula that has survived a singularly tough economic climate.“What’s worked for the past 20 years is the same good quality coffee from a local roaster, great customer service — people meet up at ‘the coffee shop’; we’ve had the same customers — and chocolate,” she said.And while the combination is a winner, Champlain isn’t just coasting on her success.“It’s tough in this economy,” she admitted. “But I’m committed to keeping it open.”Champlain said she is adding things to make her customers more comfortable — WiFi, new furnishings, a website where customers across the country can order her chocolate. She has also created a CD, “The Law of Chocolate,” that is part folk tale, part history lesson, part guided meditation.“The CD covers the history of chocolate, where chocolate comes from, how it’s made into what we know and love, the health benefits, chocolate’s role in the rain forest and a 15-minute guided meditation,” Champlain said. “You imagine your dream life and at the end you have to bite a piece of chocolate to activate it.”Kent Coffee and Chocolate is at 8 North Main St. Call 860-927-1445 or visit www.kentcoffee.com. “The Law of Chocolate” is available on iTunes and at www.amazon.com.
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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.