Byron unanimously rejects mountain district ordinance  

Credit:  By Eileen M. Adams, Staff Writer, Sun Journal, www.sunjournal.com 2 September 2010 ~~

BYRON — Fourteen voters at a special town meeting Monday night unanimously turned down a proposed mountain district ordinance.

Selectman Anne Simmons-Edmunds said those who spoke said the ordinance was unconstitutional because it would affect only about 25 or so property owners and not the entire town.

She said the four-page ordinance was written by residents Sarah Nadeau, Robert Bourassa, and Melissa and James Ramey. She said none of the writers attended the special town meeting.

The ordinance is believed to have been written to prevent the development of commercial wind turbines. However, at a public hearing on the matter last week, those attending said it would also restrict traditional mining and logging activities.

Simmons-Edmunds said the ordinance can be reworked and presented again to the Board of Selectmen for action. She said the town’s Planning Board has no plans to write an ordinance that would address wind turbine development.

“I believe the building code is strong enough,” she said.

That code prohibits building structures taller than 30 feet.

“But I also believe someone could sue the town and (the issue) would be decided in the courts,” Simmons-Edmunds said.

Townspeople overwhelmingly refused to extend the acceptable structure height about a year ago when potential wind farm developers Angus King and Rob Gardiner presented tentative plans to build such a project in Byron.

Also at Monday’s meeting, a second article that had asked residents to grant an easement on town land so a new leach field could be built by Rita Dunton, was struck from the warrant.

Simmons-Edmunds said Dunton, who lives on Dingle Hill Road, had the leach field redesigned so that town land was not needed.