Please do your homework
Rumford Falls Times, www.rumforfallstimes.com 10 June 2011
Recently, Rumford voters received a mailing from a potential developer to support the wind ordinance that is on the June 14th ballot.
I urge all of you to investigate what you are being told before you vote. It was mentioned that it would bring $4,000 per turbine per year to the town. What was left out was the fact that it is averaged over a 20-year period, meaning that if they choose they don’t have to pay the community a dime for 20 years. It should have been written in the ordinance that Rumford is to be paid per year but it wasn’t.
Don’t just take my word for it, I encourage you to do yourself a favor and look up Maine State law Title 35A Ss 3454. Also, it mentioned that there are provisions that if the state comes out with stricter guidelines in the future then those shall apply. This is true with any ordinance not just this one, a town can’t be more lenient then the state. What they neglect to tell you is that if they have a pending permit then they are grandfathered to the less stringent standards.
It was said in the mailing that the increased valuation can be sheltered to ensure that we do not lose state aid for our schools. What you are not told is by doing that you will see a next to nothing decrease in your property taxes from a project like this. I guess they feel it is acceptable to “bend the truth” when trying to get you to vote the way they want.
During the public hearing for this ordinance it was very apparent things were forgot and questions couldn’t be answered. How could the majority of the board expect the taxpayers to support their ordinance when they couldn’t explain it to those in attendance? I encourage you to vote “no” on June 14th on the Rumford wind ordinance. Tell the new board that you want a fair ordinance for both the developer and the town and to close up all the loopholes!
Peter Buotte, Jr.,
Rumford
URL to article: https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2011/06/10/please-do-your-homework/