Special Town Meeting: Wind bylaw front and center
That's the question that will take center stage at next Thursday's citizen petition-called Special Town Meeting.
On the heels of a highly controversial wind turbine project application-the first under the wind energy conversion facility bylaw-a group of residents feel the bylaw needs revision. In order to revise the bylaw properly, the proponents are proposing a "moratorium" be placed on the bylaw and all its provisions to prevent new applications from being grandfathered in under the current bylaw.
"I equate it to a time out in a basketball game," said Jeff Patterson of 10 Sanctuary Pond who spoke on behalf of the proponents. "I think it is fair to say (the town) learned a lot of the issues that come up with this type of development during the first application process...we want to include that knowledge to improve the bylaw."
Special Town Meeting, which includes two warrant articles, will begin Thursday, June 25 at 7 p.m. in the high school gymnasium. It is the first Special Town Meeting called by a citizen's petition since 1996 when voters met to approve funding for a new school.
At this point, it seems like anyone's guess at how many voters will show up at Town Meeting.
"There are number of people who want to be heard and should be heard on both sides of the issue. One of the purposes of Town Meeting is to get all the views on the table," said Selectmen Chairman Paul Carlson.
While Carlson recognized many citizens will have already decided how to cast their votes before arriving at Special Town Meeting, he encourages those who may not know all the nuances and issues involved to attend and listen to the discussion.
The article has a higher threshold to meet than most Town Meeting articles as a two-thrids majority vote is required to enact all zoning bylaw amendments.
Selectmen, the advisory committee and the planning board have yet to make their recommendations on this article.
The wind energy conversion facility bylaw, which passed unanimously at the 2008 Annual Town Meeting, made wind turbines a permitted use by special permit and establishes criteria in which projects are evaluated. The current zoning bylaw, which is about three-and-a-half pages long, establishes definitions specific to wind turbines and criteria on various aspects and impacts of the structure-height, setback, color, noise generation, visual impact, lighting and shadow flicker, to name a few.
The article will face opposition at Town Meeting. In letters to the editor this week, the Alternative Energy Committee, the primary force behind the drafting of the wind turbine bylaw, opposes the article. Members of the local environmental group Sustainable Cohasset have come out against the moratorium proposal.
When asked what he expected in terms of discussion and attendance, Planning Board Chairman Al Moore found himself at a bit of a loss.
"In my experience there hasn't been one of the these," Moore said, noting he has served on the board for about 20 years. "We could have trouble getting a quorum or it could be packed. It's pretty hard to tell."
With the anticipated uncertainty of the crowd, he said the planning board has erred on the side of caution in booking auditorium for their public hearing to be held on Wednesday, June 24, the night before Town Meeting. By state statute, the planning board must hold a public hearing before any proposed zoning bylaw changes are voted on by Town Meeting. Each of the public hearings on the Cohasset Heights wind turbine project proposal, which was denied by the planning board in early May, were attended by close to or more than 100 residents.
Members of the planning board have made no secret in previous meetings of their opposition to this process preferring a more deliberative process completed over a period of time.
"Zoning shouldn't be done on the fly," Moore said. Moore added a 45-day time period, the amount of time the state allows from the time citizen call a special Town Meeting to the time it takes place, is not the way to change zoning. He noted the state laws take that into account by given planning boards 65 days to hold a public hearing on zoning bylaw amendments.
He said the process could set a bad precedent for future zoning bylaw changes - when neighbors or residents are unhappy with some piece of zoning, they can try to "ram something through quickly" by means of calling a special Town Meeting.
Jeff Patterson, a citizen proponent for the article, said the article is not requesting zoning bylaw changes be made, but asking voters to give the town breathing room to assess the current bylaw without the threat of future applications being grandfathered in under the current bylaw.
Although the warrant article does not contain any set period of time where the bylaw would need to be revised, according to Patterson, it has always been the intention of the citizen's group to amend and improve the bylaw as soon as possible.
As an answer to some who have said the intent of the article is to get rid of the bylaw, an amendment is being drafted to reinstate the current bylaw as of Annual Town Meeting held in the spring 2010 if no amendments are proposed. The amendment will be made on the floor of Town Meeting, Patterson said.
Patterson, who was among those who vocally opposed the Cohasset Heights wind turbine project application during the Planning Board's public hearings and is one of the leaders in the citizen group Cohasset Wind Advisory Committee that started in opposition to the turbine project, added there are several general areas he and other proponents would like to see changed in the bylaw including: confirming the planning board's authority to place conditions and monitor those conditions over a period of time, confirming the planning board's authority to take into account the economic benefits and detriments to the town, adding in specific objective requirements to various aspects specific to wind turbines (shadow flicker, visual) and alignment with the state's Green Communities Act.
A lawyer himself, Patterson said the article as written or any article, for that matter, could be airtight as to not allow a wind turbines application in Cohasset.
"I can't guarantee this will stop all projects, but I think it makes sense to have a deliberative process to make the bylaw better," he said.
The applicant for the Cohasset Heights wind turbine project put forth by CCI-Energy, which was denied by the planning board in May, has already gotten approval for a "Form A" (approval not required, or ANR). Effectively that means the property will be immune to the moratorium and the current wind turbine bylaw will hold for that property for a period of three years.
Aside from the wind turbine issue, voters will be asked to revise a decision they made at the November 2008 Town Meeting.
For more than a year, the Cohasset Sports Partnership has been working to raise money for a turf field to replace the current natural grass Alumni Field at the high school. In that time, they have raised over $475,000 in private donations.
When the article passed at Town Meeting cost estimates were $1,050,000. Town Meeting voted to bond $500,000 to construct the field, if cash donations totaling $550,000 were raised.
Earlier this month the project went out to bid. The low bid came in at $950,000.
George McGoldrick, president of the Sports Partnership, said there is $25,000 contingency and, if not used, he expects both the town and the private donations to be equal contributors at $475,000.
The article requests Special Town Meeting to adjust the numbers to reflect the new estimate. If the article passes muster at Town Meeting McGoldrick said the turf field construction could begin in July and be ready for fall sports.
The Selectmen placed the article on the warrant, but have yet to vote on whether to recommend the article. They will discuss the article at their meeting Monday, June 22 meeting.