June 11, 2015
Maine

Dixfield voters adopt original wind ordinance

MATTHEW DAIGLE, Staff Writer | Sun Journal | June 10, 2015 | www.sunjournal.com

DIXFIELD – After three years of meetings and votes, residents narrowly voted to repeal the Wind Energy Facility Ordinance and replace it with the Planning Board’s original draft.

Ballot Warden Theresa Hemingway said Wednesday evening the vote was 377-372.

It was the third vote in three years on the ordinance.

In November 2012, voters approved a wind ordinance drafted by Norine Clarke and Stephen Donahue, who served on the Board of Selectmen at the time.

In early 2013, selectmen voted to send the draft to the Planning Board and tasked them with amending some of the language.

The Planning Board brought its recommendations to selectmen, who made revisions and put it on the November 2014 ballot. Voters rejected it, 553-567.

The draft approved Tuesday contained the original recommendations that the Planning Board made, without the selectmen’s recommendations.

Discussions between some residents and the Board of Selectmen were contentious in the days leading up to Tuesday’s vote after Tom Carroll, project coordinator for Patriot Renewables LLC of Quincy, Mass., said that the ordinance’s 35 decibel nighttime limit would likely prohibit a wind farm in Dixfield.

Patriot Renewables approached Dixfield officials three years ago about constructing wind turbines on a Colonel Holman Mountain ridge.

[Click here to download the ordinance (setbacks 2,000 ft to property line, 4,000 feet to occupied building or special resource; sound limits at property line of 35 dBA at night (7–7), 45 dBA at day, 50 dBC at any time)]

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2015/06/11/dixfield-voters-adopt-original-wind-ordinance/