Whose decision is it, anyway?
Windham leaders shouldn’t capitulate to Nash Road area neighbors by giving up their right to legislate concerning the proposed quarry.
Instead of passing the buck and okaying a moratorium or referendum, as neighbors demand, the town should stand up and make a decision regarding local builder Peter Busque’s proposal to build a quarry at the corner of Nash Road and Route 302.
No one is to blame in this matter. Busque is trying to make a living and following town ordinances in figuring out where best to mine for building materials. Conversely, the neighbors, many of whom have lived in the Nash Road area for generations, are right to feel betrayed by their town leadership, which would allow such development near their homes.
The harsh truth is that ordinances are ordinances. Busque’s operation is allowed under current zoning ordinances and the Planning Board has to allow whatever use is permitted. And Busque is putting his faith, and financial investment, in Windham’s zoning laws not changing in the middle of his project.
And talk of a referendum should be only that, talk. We can’t hold a referendum every time a difficult matter comes up. That’s why we have ordinances and planning boards and town councils. They shouldn’t afraid to make a decision. And they shouldn’t be intimidated, either.
But ordinances are not set in stone; they are set at the will of the people. Windham’s set of ordinances is notoriously out of date and do not conform with Windham’s changed demographics. Ordinances can be changed, and perhaps the land use ordinance allowing quarries in the Nash Road area should have been changed once the road morphed from a quiet country byway to a populated residential neighborhood. But none of that matters now. What matters is that ordinances be adhered to, and not the interests of neighbors. It simply isn’t right to make Busque suffer when he was only following the existing local ordinances.
As much as it may pain the neighbors on Nash Road and the businesses along Route 302 in that area, the town really has no choice other than approving Busque’s proposed plans. The rule of law must be followed at all costs.
Sure, no one wants to see or hear a quarry operation on Route 302, but America is built on fairness to individuals and businesses, not pleasing a majority. The neighbors are victims in this case, but the alternative isn’t bright either. We have to be a law-abiding nation and we can’t change the law because Not-In-My-Back-Yard folks are crying foul.
The people to blame here, if you really want to find someone to blame, are the ordinance writers and reviewers. Specifically, why wasn’t this matter resolved by the Comprehensive Master Plan Update Committee? And, come to think of it, why weren’t Busque’s detractors a part of that committee?
Take it offline
For safety’s sake, Maine’s Sex Offender Registry should be taken offline.
Does anyone believe that the premeditated murders on Easter Sunday were committed for any other reason than because the deceased were listed on Maine’s Sex Offender Registry?
Imagine these two unfortunate men were your fathers, sons or brothers. Would you hesitate to take some sort of action against the “killer” of your loved ones? If the murders can be linked to the Web site, wouldn’t it make sense to take the “killer” Web site offline before it happened again? While the Canadian man pulled the trigger, the Web site was his link to finding the victims.
Most people probably never thought anything like this could happen. A man from tranquil Cape Breton, of all places, comes down and shoots to death two men he found on the registry. Impossible, but it happened. People who believe that it was a fluke and won’t happen again are probably the same people who believe America will never again be attacked by terrorists. Both will happen again; it’s only a matter of time.
So, are we just going to let this registry linger on the Web, doing nothing about it, even though we’ve witnessed the tragedy it can cause? Hopefully not. Hopefully, Sen. Bill Diamond, D-Windham, and fellow lawmakers will do something before more people are harmed at the hands of other Stephen Marshalls.
Taking down the site doesn’t have to mean parents and neighbors can’t find out where these sex offenders live. Once the site is taken down, police can continue to make the lists available to anyone who calls or walks into the station. The names and addresses need to be made public, for the safety of the community, but the Web is not the appropriate venue for such personal information, not in this day and age of vigilantism.
This is a war between the public’s right to know and personal privacy. Sometimes, especially in America where we have freedom from oppression and government intrusion, personal privacy has to trump the public’s right to easy access. This is one of those times.
-John Balentine, editor
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