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10/6/08
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2 comments
Oversight of uses for Sears Island focus of meeting
SEARSPORT, Maine — Environmentalist Ron Huber of Rockland said he believes the proposed industrial part of Sears Island should be given the same oversight as the conservation side receives. For the past 15 months the Joint Use Planning Committee, an initiative established by Gov. John Baldacci, has been reviewing the conservation portion of the 931-acre, uninhabited island. During the public comment period of Friday’s JUPC meeting at the First Congregational Church on Church Street, Huber of Penobscot Bay Watch proposed establishing a new council to study the effect of a cargo port on the part of the island designated for industrial and transportation use. “We’ve spent all this time looking at the conservation side, but no time on the transportation side,” he said. “This is supposed to be a committee for joint use.” The new advisory council would “assist the Maine Department of Transportation in the decision process concerning environmental management activities within the Transportation area,” Huber read from a concept paper he circulated at the meeting. The new council further could look at policies related to environmental and conservation measures added to the transportation area, and at proposals and plans submitted by would-be developers for that area. The new entity also could carry out oversight of the discharge permits, licenses for buildings and rail yard operations and look at lease agreements that might ensue, Huber said. He recommended membership on the council to be from groups and organizations, such as the Conservation Law Foundation, which understands how port development can have a serious environmental impact. The council wouldn’t have the authority to approve or disapprove, he said. JUPC facilitator Dianne Smith and committee member Bruce Probert reassured Huber that environmental information gathered already would be available to any board or committee asked to approve industrial permits. No action was taken on Huber’s proposal. Sears Island, in upper Penobscot Bay, is owned by the state of Maine and managed under the jurisdiction of the DOT. If approved by the Joint Legislative Committee on Transportation, the island will be divided into two areas: a 330-acre potential transportation area and a 601-acre conservation area. The conservation portion will be placed under a perpetual conservation easement and managed for outdoor recreation, education and protection of ecological resources, according to JUPC member Scott Dickerson, who read a concept paper for a conservation area advisory council similar to the one proposed by Huber for the industrial area. Huber’s proposal comes at a time when the JUPC is winding down 15 months of review. The committee plans to present its final report to the Legislature’s Transportation Committee on Oct. 15 and hold a public hearing at 7 p.m. Oct. 29 in Union Hall in Searsport. For the past two or three decades, a succession of groups has been tasked with determining the future land use of Sears Island. In 2007, the Sears Island Initiative Steering Committee’s Consensus Agreement established that the “appropriate uses for [nearby] Mack Point and Sears Island are compatibly managed marine transportation, recreation, education and conservation.” Duane Scott of the DOT, presenting an outline of the final report to the committee Friday, called the Consensus Agreement a “guiding light” for everyone involved. Scott’s outline includes seven recommendations for putting a plan in place: a conservation easement, land use plans with a boundary map, Maine Coast Heritage Trust as the easement holder, appropriate access issues, municipal revenue for the town of Searsport, identification of wetland mitigation options for a potential port, and land management and advisory entities.
Comments
At the risk of seeming to legitimize a Baldacci administration-sponsored planning process that has been patently dishonest from day one, Huber is trying to throw a monkey wrench into plans by an unholy coalition of boosters for corporate welfare assistance and a group of alleged "environmentalists" to pursue their respective development schemes for Sears Island. AND MORE POWER TO HIM!!! One group that essentially represents the interests of a failing railroad is working to destroy with an absurdly unnecessary cargo port about 40 percent of what is at present the largest publicly owned island along the U.S. East Coast that remains totally wild. Holding their collective fingers crossed, the other group with the rapidly fading prestige of the Maine Sierra Club so pathetically out in front simply hopes this won't happen. Meanwhile, by their action in agreeing a port is, in fact, an "appropriate" use for the island, these environmental Quislings are increasing the likelihood such an obscenity will be built. ("Look, Ma, the same Sierra Club that spent a fortune on lawyers in the 1980s and 1990s successfully fighting an island cargo port, now they're saying out of both sides of their mouth how they're not 'endorsing in advance' any port scheme but they think it’s APPROPRIATE that some 341 acres of wild island forest and fern meadow be clear-cut, graded and paved over for such a purpose. Check it out at their website if you don't believe me.") Their reward for cooperating with the port boosters in such an unhappy endeavour? Why, these private interests will be deeded 601 acres of the public's property, supposedly to be conserved. Their definition of conservation includes EcoWorld, a private multimillion-dollar environmental education complex to be built on the island with up to 10,000 square feet of roofed structures housing classrooms and office rental space, an amphitheater seating perhaps 400, all manner of paved and unpaved roads and parking lots, and a demonstration wind turbine tower of unrestricted height. As one of my sons, his future clouded by the folly of his elders, so drily observed to me recently, "Oh boy, I can hardly wait to visit EvoWorld so we can sit in a classroom on Sears Island and watch a PowerPoint presentation of what the island used to look like." The Joint Use Planning Committee’s Consensus agreement a “guiding light”?!! Oh come on now… for who? The Department of Transportation? Maybe – But certainly NOT for everyone involved as Mr. Scott states. This consensus agreement is, in and of itself nonsense. The process is and has been flawed from its conception. First of all, there should not be a “joint-use” plan. There should be NO DEVELOPMENT ON THE ISLAND. There should be no hypothetical plan for a hypothetical port. Everyone keeps saying, “oh, there’ll be no port….” And at the same time, fear mongers like to keep everyone on edge by saying partial conservation of the island is better that having it developed by real estate interests. Why not FIGHT to conserve the whole island???? Why is a container port worth sacrificing any part of the island for? Why in the world have interests that supposedly care about the environment sold out to partial conservation???? If in fact there is a “slim-to-no” chance that DOT will build a container port – then why is so much time being spent preparing the island for development of a port? The conservation side of the island is in place solely to enable the destruction of the land that DOT needs to build the port.(READ: MITIGATION) The conservation groups have wasted their time with this whole process. Their time should have been spent working to conserve the entire island. Honestly, how do you folks with all the conservation groups, FOSI and the Maine sierra club sleep at night? This is a classic case of what’s going on all over in this state and country. The people speak out, and the government and quasi-governmental interests pat the opponents of development on the head, thank them for their input and proceed with business as usual. The people have spoken time and time again: NO DEVELOPMENT on Sears Island. This is a non-negotiable concept. No Container Port, and No Eco-world. Try telling the plant, bird, mammal, insect, amphibian and other life forms on the island how eco-friendly these supposed lovers of the earth are when they destroy land on the conserved side of the island to put up a parking lot to go with the 10,000 foot education building they are proposing. Come on folks, get your heads out of the sand. If you care about the largest remaining wild island on the eastern seaboard, fight for its total conservation. Do something Bold. Pull out. Stop the consensus process. Its not too late. |
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