Help Campobello Island fight Welshpool Wind Turbine Inflicting Local Council

The long suffering residents of the bucolic Campobello Island, New Brunswick would make a perfect case for why ratepayers can’t trust municipal governments. Life on Campobello was going along as usual when the Campobello Rural Council decided in their wisdom to add a wind turbine project to the lowing cows in the Village of Welshpool, Campobello Island.

Why is it that Ned, the friendly farmer, or Mike, the laid-back fisher person, are only average citizens right up to the first day they get themselves elected to local government, but become lemmings goose-stepping their unwitting citizenry to United Nations Agenda 21 slavery after they add the status of ‘Councillor’ to their names? “Welshpool residents with some supporters from other areas have been protesting the erection of a wind turbine to be sited in a dangerously too narrow setback to their homes, tourism outlets, church/church hall, and library etc.,” resident Victoria Cunningham writes Canada Free Press (CFP) this morning. According to the Mayor, the wind turbine proposal was initially presented to the Rural Council of Campobello sometime in the late fall of 2011. The residents discovered the project in March, 2012!

---

“The residents were not informed or consulted by their Welshpool elected representative, even when a letter of support (voted for unanimously) was sent from the Council to the land developer proposing the project,” writes Cunningham. Objections from property owners are being steadfastly ignored by Council members. Says Cunningham: “Council has opted for the authoritarian style of leadership. They have displayed a flagrant lack of leadership and caring for their constituents.” Make that councillors who gain power courtesy of three vote wins. Councillor Janice Watters won the Ward 3 (Welshpool) 2010 municipal race 77 to 74 over Bradley Mitchell after a recount. “The races for the two other ward positions were straightforward.” (The Quoddy Tides, Vol. 42 No. 24). “In Ward 1 (Head Harbour), Kevin Sawtelle (79 votes) beat Brittany Lank (44) and Austin Estabrooks (3). In Ward 2 (Wilson’s Beach), Terrance Preston was the only one to file nomination papers, so he gained his position by acclamation.” It might be amusing for some to remember the words of Campobello Mayor Stephen Smart, who ran unopposed and was therefore ‘acclaimed’ on Nov. 15, 2010: “We’re just trying to get a fair shake (in the province), trying to promote both senior and youth issues, improve the basic standard of living. It’s a real simple thing. We are not going to change the world, because we can’t.” To the residents of Welshpool, Your Worship, inflicting them, out of the blue with a Wind Turbine Project, is changing their world the wrong way. Before Campobello council can start shouting “NIMBY (Not in My Backyard) at their constituents, there is ample proof world wide that wind turbines are being fought off by the rural residents of many lands. Other than their not always being available when needed for power, wind turbines are a danger to birds; they are noisy to live by and an eyesore for miles around. In short, worldwide 8 million birds and 16 million bats are killed by wind turbines annually. Campobello lies in the mighty Atlantic migratory fly path. Sad to say “Green” politics pokes its nose in even the most rural of areas. No village, no matter how remote or peaceful, is safe from the Politics of Green. With the apathy that comes with Municipal elections in North America, Snoopy could get elected. Voter turnout in some areas has been recorded at less than 20% . Because municipal governments have the full time convenience of being able to blame the senior levels of government for their own shortcomings, they are often what one politician called the “whine” cellar of government. Many ambitious politicians who start out at town and city hall elections use municipal government as a stepping stone to the bigger paying jobs at senior government levels. When they arrive there, they bring their hoity-toity I’m-the-boss attitude with them. Roland Haché, (LEG) who started out as Mayor of Petit Rocher, N.B. and who now sits in the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick, recently sent this email to CFP: “Please take me off your “send list”...you are bigots, facists (sic), racists! If hell exists, you people will sit in the first row.” Meanwhile: This message all the way from Campobello Island, N.B. to Toronto, Ontario and back again: Campobello Council, your taxpayers do not want the Wind Turbine Project at Welshpool Village.

Email:

From: Haché, Roland (LEG) roland.hache@gnb.ca Subject: Re: Obama: “We’ve Begun to See What Change Looks Like”—America: “No Thanks, Barack!” Date: 6 May, 2012 11:26:49 AM EDT To: CFP Business business@canadafreepress.com Please take me off your "send list"...you are bigots,facists,racists! If hell exists, you people will sit in the first row.