Exemplary

Tom Gray's brief post (copied below) deserves comment.  His last sentence, I believe, embraces an essential wisdom of democracy all too often overlooked and under appreciated.

"The more reactions and ideas we have from others, the better job we can do in arriving at recommendations . . .".

This is easy to say, but no easy thing to sustain. 

A committee or board made up of volunteers spends hours and hours of what for the rest of us might be leisure time in meetings and document review trying to find solutions that makes sense to them.  They open their efforts to public comment from a bunch of neighbors who may not even bother to read the committee or consultant report.  Some public comments are informed and thoughtful -- meaning the committee probably has more work to do -- but more often these committees receive criticism for not thinking my way, or worse, no response at all. 

Consider school boards which labor countless hours to accommodate irreconcilable interests as part of their annual budget process -- with only a handful of citizens in attendance -- then must endure complaints about rising costs or why Jimmy's extracurricular got the axe from voters who never bother to attend these budget meetings.

After a few years of earnest effort serving the public, it's no wonder the most thoughtful give way to the cynics and the demagogues who tend to rise to the top in our political system. 

So it's worth tipping the hat to Tom's modest, wise invitation that embraces the conflict and complaints that come with public comment.  At its core lies the old adage "two heads are better than one;" a fundamental insight into democracy and relationships of all kinds. 

We are all profoundly provincial individuals aware only of what we have lived through ourselves.  Wise democratic leadership requires us to reach beyond our own ideas to understand how others see these issues, if only for fear we may ourselves be missing the bigger picture.  Hearing out a variety of views and helping forge compromise among them, in recognition that a better, more enduring solution usually results from that compromise. 

The alternative is a winner-takes-all partisan drumbeat, one side claiming a mandate because   they received more votes in the latest election, spurning compromise and pressing through their policies by strict majority until their opponents gain the votes to turn the tables.  Plagued by partisanship at every level of government, we could all learn from Tom's example of humble leadership. 







- 8 ---------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Sat, 10 Dec 2011 11:47:43 -0500
From: Tom Gray
Subject: [Norwich] Public Forum on Communications

All,

Speaking for myself only and not for the rest of the Capital Finance
Planning & Budgeting Committee (because I haven't discussed it with
the other members), thanks for the feedback on the communications
report!  Keep it coming!  The more reactions and ideas we have from
others, the
better job we can do in arriving at recommendations that are likely to
attract public support and acceptance.

Regards,
Tom

Uh-oh (Norwich ListServ)

This Monday night the Capital Facilities Planning Committee is hosting a public forum on a proposal to build a 180-foot communications tower, apparently on the hill above the town garage on New Boston Road.  Before questioning the proposal, I want to express thanks to the Committee for offering this public forum and providing a copy of the town consultant's report recommending the 180' tower.   For those of us not able to attend the public forum, a chance to hash things out on the listserv is a fair second.

First, I think it's important to understand the scale of the proposed tower.

The DRB reviewed and approved a Verizon cell tower back in 2004-2005.  The review process for a cell tower is different from that of a town government sponsored project, but the DRB review was instructive. 

Verizon proposed a 110' tower disguised as a tree.  Both the Act 250 District Commission and the Norwich DRB determined that they could achieve their specific coverage goals with a tower/tree of only 90' and that's what they built.  The disguise worked because I never hear anybody other than immediate neighbors ever mention the cell tower in town. 

Under state law, a cell tower can be up to 20' above the tree line without any special authorization from the DRB.  We found the tree line surrounding the proposed cell tower averaged about 60' in height which is fairly typical in this area.  In other words, the proposed 180' tower would be about three times higher than the surrounding trees.  Take a look out your window and imagine that height. 

As the consultant's report explains, a very tall tower is needed to reach more terrain in such a hilly town.  Verizon was primarily interested in establishing cell coverage on I-91 so could live with a tower half that height.  Signal propagation maps they provided us showed that to significantly increase cell signal throughout Norwich, they would need a tower in the 160-180' range. 

So here are my questions:

1. Putting aside aesthetics, if we want the best signal coverage, shouldn't we be looking at the highest points in town rather than restricting ourselves to town-owned property?  The police, fire and town garage are all relatively low-lying properties compared to the heights to the north and west of town.  Image the view from a 180' Gile Mountain tower. 

2. Has there been any serious discussion of co-locating cell transmitters on the proposed 180' tower?  That could provide some revenue to offset the cost of acquiring a hilltop and building the tower way up high.  It would also significantly improve cell coverage in many parts of town, allowing more people to drop their landlines and text in the woods.  

3. If a 180' tower is a good idea for Norwich, isn't it also a good idea for all our neighboring towns as well?  Any chance we could share towers sited to cover several communities?  The consultant's report makes reference to the120' tower on Hurricane Hill in Hartford and the Hayes Hill tower in Etna.  This seems to me to be a perfect example of the need for a regional planning approach.  Could we coordinate communications (and co-located cell coverage) for Sharon, Strafford, Thetford and Norwich in a single site, sharing the cost and limiting the impact of these towers?  Otherwise, are we about to see a bunch of 180' hilltop towers popping up around the Upper Valley?

4. If we build a 180' tower, will it have to have one of those red flashing lights that have sprouted up in Etna and Lebanon? 

Again, thanks for the forum opportunity and access to the consultants report. 

-     -     -     -     -

Details from Public Forum Notice:

The Norwich Capital Facilities Planning and Budgeting Committee will hold a public forum Monday, Dec, 12, at 7 p.m. in Tracy Hall on the topic of radio communications equipment used for fire, police and public works and dispatching equipment and apparatus for the Town's public safety (Police and Fire) Departments.

The Town hired a consulting firm last year to examine the departments' communications equipment and identify needed changes, both to comply with a new Federal Communications Commission (FCC) standards that will take effect Jan. 1, 2013, and to provide better and more dependable coverage in Norwich's hilly terrain, which hampers line-of-sight communications.  The cost of implementing the consulting firm's recommendations, which include installation of a new 180-foot communications tower, is estimated at $765,000.  The purpose of the public forum will be to explain the need for and impact of the proposed changes and potential approaches to reduce the consequent burden to Norwich taxpayers, as well as to answer questions and receive comments.

Both Sides Now

I've received a lot of emails asking for copies of Stuart Richards' November 19th Valley News Forum letter, so I've scanned it. You should be able to access a PDF version of it HERE.

I've also submitted a letter to the Valley News Forum myself in response to Stuart's letter which I preview (unedited) below:


To the Editor:

Stuart Richards' November 19th Forum letter exemplifies the intractability of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Like so many on both sides of the conflict, Richards engages in broad brush bigotry cloaked within a litany of selective facts. He draws upon the most extreme examples of Palestinian belligerence to conclude the Palestinian people, as a whole, are unworthy interlocutors for peaceful settlement, surmising "[t]hey'd rather celebrate and dance in the streets, as they did after 9/11, or (sic) celebrate the murder of innocent Israeli women, children and men, while idolizing their own suicide bombers."

Of course, similar screeds pop up among the Op-Eds in the Arab press, extrapolating proof of Jewish sub-humanity from similarly extreme examples of Israeli belligerence. For every Hamas adherent vowing to wipe out the Occupier there is a settler movement true believer advocating Greater Israel. Back and forth these verbal salvos fly, enraging one another while enlightening no one.

Certainly one lesson of these past sixty-five years must be the fact neither extreme has the means to wipe out the other; however much they may wish otherwise. Instead, as is more typical of stalemated conflicts, these extremes will continue to provoke and outrage one another until the wider population grows exhausted by the carnage and destruction. Eventual peace emerges from compromises which are only possible once the toll and pointlessness of continued conflict have become unbearable -- once war has transitioned from appearing to offer a solution to being recognized as the problem itself.

In the meantime, the anguish and despair elicited by this conflict prompts rants such as Richards has indulged in here. Yet, however much one may share the anguish and despair for lives torn apart by the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it seems to me an intolerable indulgence to paint one's enemy as less than human. This indifference towards their anguish gives license to the awful bombings of civilian targets in Israel; the massacres in Qana, Sabra and Shatila; the Christmas bombings of Hanoi; the London Blitz; and too many other civilian bloodlettings to comprehend.

Despite a widespread, adolescent, desire to believe otherwise, neither Arab nor Jew holds a monopoly on righteousness in this conflict. Good people, Jew and Arab alike, are being destroyed by the day. Many are traumatized, maimed, or killed in the violence. Others are rotted out by hatred; at best blinded to the shared humanity of their adversaries. At worst, they perpetrate retaliatory violence hoping to inflict such suffering that their enemies will yield or their own anguish will abate. Barring a thorough genocide by one people or the other, Israelis and Palestinians will continue to live in close proximity for generations to come. No one can say when they will finally be convinced of the futility in continued conflict. For now, it seems to me our duty to challenge the bigotry that fuels this war and to resist the temptation to dehumanize either party to what is, after all, a thorough-going disaster which will appear an incomprehensible footnote in the history books.

Watt Alexander
Norwich, VT

sleeping with tyrants

I recently listened to an interview with Aung San Suu Kyi from the BBC where she said:

It is not power that corrupts, but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it.

In Egypt today, we are witnessing a people uniting to free themselves from a crippling fear of Mubarak's scourge.

We are also witnessing the Obama Administration paralyzed by a fear of losing power. Losing power over a group of Arab dictators who have convinced us they are the necessary bulwark against a hostile Arab street.

The Administration fears losing a status quo which; however intolerable to millions of Arabs living under it's crushing heel, is a devil we know.

I believe Barack Obama is a smart, well-intentioned man who has surrounded himself with smart, well-intentioned staff. Their minds are focused upon the potential downsides to trusting the Egyptian people to forge their own course. The Administration's fear of losing influence prevents them honoring a people struggling to free themselves from their fear of the iron rod.

And the rest is just words.