Latest News
Auto Repair
Blinds
Building/Remodeling
Floor Refinishing
Insulation
Landscaping
Landscaping
Lightning Rods
Moving
Overhead Doors
There are so many opportunities for miscommunication and mutual misunderstanding during the isolation COVID-19 distancing and sheltering has produced. On social media, especially when it comes to politics, the impersonal approach to exchanging ideas and positions can lead to harsh divisions. There is no gray area in such discourse any more.
This could also well be part of what has led to more polarized discussion locally, with town meetings of all kinds now happening online and with much less, if any, in-person contact. While more people may be able to attend such meetings no matter their ability to travel, it can be tougher than ever to find common ground on the more contentious topics up for decisions at the meetings.
Those topics include, but are not limited to, affordable housing, planning and zoning and land trust management. The discussions in Falls Village and Salisbury around these issues have taken turns that seem more personal and confrontational than those that would happen face-to-face, with all parties in one room.
On the topic of affordable housing, for instance, those opposing the current proposals in both Salisbury and Falls Village say they support the concept of affordable housing and understand the acute need for more in the area. But the specific projects on the table have flaws, they argue, that just cannot be overcome.
Now is the time for all sides to come together and figure out a compromise, in both towns, so that opportunities to create this essential housing aren’t lost, as others have been. With the influx of many who can well afford individual residences to the Northwest Corner and the surrounding area, it is more essential than ever that the people who cannot afford the rate of local housing be supported in their wish to live here: teachers, medical workers, restaurant staff, local journalists, town and school staff, contractors, landscapers and more. They, and all our communities, would benefit from more housing options in an area that only seems to escalate in cost of living.
These are the critical people who help our society function. One example is those who made a big difference to quality of life following the snowstorm Dec. 17. A lot of snow fell overnight and into the next morning, but the area residential plowers and town crews got out in the middle of the storm and, along with state plow drivers on the state roads, made the roads and driveways drivable and safer as the days went on and the temperatures stayed cold. Thanks to all who moved a lot of snow around in the dark and cold, then had to dig their own homes out after they were done. Where would the area be if there isn’t housing available for these folks, and others who are so willing to serve their communities doing fire, ambulance, town and other volunteering? This is a moment when a changing of the guard is happening, and many of those who have served for decades are aging out of their roles. There needs to be space for others to step up, and to find reasonable and good lives here while they’re at it.
Let’s hope that communication improves and compromise becomes a real part of the discussion going into 2021, for the good of all our communities.
Related Stories
Get Local News Delivered To Your Inbox
Subscribe to receive stories reported for, by, and about our neighbors, on the issues affecting you.
By signing up you agree to our
privacy policy
.
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.