December 15, 2011
Massachusetts

Fairhaven selectman denies shuttering camera during meeting

By BETH PERDUE, www.southcoasttoday.com 14 December 2011

FAIRHAVEN – Fairhaven selectman Brian Bowcock has denied that he turned off the camera during a contentious meeting with wind turbine opponents this week.

Bowcock said today that, after making a motion to recess the meeting, he left the meeting room briefly to confirm that the camera was still on.

“I got up and left the room and I made sure that the television was still on,” he said. “I yelled up to the camera operator, ‘Are we still on TV and he said yes.’”

Bowcock said the vote to recess did not come until after he returned to the meeting room. Only after that point, he said, was the camera turned off by the cameraman.

“When we did have a motion to recess and we had a second and Mike Silvia announced we were in recess, that’s when the camera operator shut the camera off.”

“It’s standard procedure when we go into executive session,” he added.

When asked by those present if he had turned off the camera, Bowcock said he responded to the question, but couldn’t answer definitively because selectmen have experienced technical difficulties with the camera in the past.

“I think somebody yelled at me is the camera still on and I said I believe so, I don’t have a television in front of me,” he said.

Confronted by wind turbine opponents at the emotional meeting, selectmen agreed to host a forum with developers and wind experts to respond to questions and concerns. The project to build two 400-foot turbines (from base to blade-tip) has been contested by a small group of residents concerned about health and other impacts from the massive commercial turbines.

No date for the forum has yet been set.

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2011/12/15/fairhaven-selectman-denies-shuttering-camera-during-meeting/