After six years of fighting wind development, I‘m looking at the absentee voter numbers and results for the Cape Vincent elections. I wonder if it will ever dawn on the wind proponents and former wind-conflicted town officials who became wind developer pawns and casualties as to what wind actually brought to them. It angered a community so deeply, locals and seasonals, that decades of entrenched town government was overturned.
To wind proponents, here is the gift wind brought you sealed in the belly of the Trojan horse you let through the gates: a longtime supervisor overturned, the Planning Board chairman and three Planning Board members gone, three councilmen removed or resigned, a long-time town justice removed, a local wind-conflicted state senator removed, and worst, a town socially torn apart. All brought to you courtesy of your clean, green wind energy. Make sure you send BP and Acciona a thank-you card.
When Cape wind proponents drank the Kool-Aid, they opened the gates wide for the real monster. They never grasped the frightening reality of who the real enemy was. Wind developers always stay above the fray. And like Teflon, they let all the public dirt and social upheaval that rips apart wind towns slide right off onto their real victims – the leaseholders and conflicted town officials. They engineered the destruction of a long-established town government.
The sad part for pro-wind is it might have been different, if wind money had not blinded them to this reckless, unethical approach encouraged by wind developers. Had the conflicts been handled responsibly and voluntarily by common ethical standards and the pro-wind approach had not been so blindly pro-wind despite legitimate community concerns, some might have listened more sympathetically to their message.
I wonder if they will ever reflect on who the real enemy is and the terribly high cost they paid for letting the monster through the gates? Although there are no real winners here, there is a sliver lining. A crisis brought Cape Vincent local and seasonal residents to a new paradigm for communities with the seasonal/local demographic: to work together for more responsible governance and a brighter future representing all.
However we must be vigilant that the new leaders also act responsibly and ensure they rid us of the wind virus that remains crippling the Cape Vincent community.
Art Pundt
Cape Vincent
URL to article: https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2011/11/18/the-casualties-of-wind-development/