Conway Daily Sun
2006-04-27

Focus won't budge on noise

Track opponents says Army Corps ignored own sound study

Nate Giarnese

TAMWORTH — Focus:Tamworth, the citizens group whose staunch opposition has tossed a monkey wrench into plans for a multi-million dollar driving park, announced this week it will challenge a federal permit granted to the developer, Club Motorsports Inc., arguing that U.S. Army Corps of Engineers ignored its own sound study.

Focus, which has sued Club Motorsports over its refusal to abide by a town wetlands ordinance, said the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers disregarded a four-page report by a sound expert in granting an environmental building permit. The report concluded that without a stricter noise standard, Tamworth would suffer a significant blow to its cherished quietude.

“The frequency content and the duration of noise events that could be caused by this facility will sound like no other sound sources in the area. Without appropriate limits, this will change the environment of the Tamworth area,” the report says.

Noise at the envisioned Mount Whittier country club for high performance cars is emerging as a flash-point in the battle over the development. Neighbor has turned against neighbor, some say, as residents clamoring for the economic boost Club Motorsports promises in new jobs and tax revenue have railed against Focus, and the group's apparently considerable financial backing. Both Focus, which has fought to retain local control of the project, and Club Motorsports have been in deadlock, while lobbyists and lawyers hired by the two jostled in the courts and in the Statehouse for legal and political advantage.

Focus has also ridden a groundswell of citizen support. Area residents have petitioned state and local leaders, and turned out for public hearings in droves, attempting to ensure Tamworth , and other towns in the state, did not lose the power to set the rules inside their borders.

Public debate has stirred emotions which at times have erupted into squabbling between Tamworth officials. Selectmen last year ordered all town boards to stay out of the private lawsuit. But this year, with two newly-elected members, the board signed a memo to the Local Government Center , which has joined the Focus suit in an amicus brief. Formerly called N.H. Municipal Association, the organization unsuccessfully lobbied state senators to return some measure of local control to town authorities it said was stolen from Tamworth and other towns by highly contentious legislation backed several years ago by Club Motorsports.

Focus won the wetlands suit in superior court. Since, Club Motorsports has appealed to the state supreme court where the case could be heard in coming months. About 27 New Hampshire towns signed on to the center's brief, including several of Tamworth 's neighbors.

But Club Motorsports supporters here scoff at the town's effort to regulate sound. They are quick to point out that Tamworth , a town without zoning, is home to a crusher, a log yard and a series of highways. Each of which, they say, is loud, and none is regulated by the sound ordinance. "If the sound ordinance didn't apply just to us, but to every business in town, we wouldn't have a problem with it,” Club Motorsports Vice President Jim Hoenscheid said.

The ordinance applies only to non-spectator, instructional driving tracks. It was drafted, however, in response to the company's quietly convincing the legislature to pass a state law which exempted it from a town racetrack ordinance. Some lawmakers complained the law was passed secretly.

Meanwhile, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers put Club Motorsports' application for a major and wide-ranging environmental impact permit through a rigorous 18 month review. The agency hosted a rare satellite public hearing in Tamworth that jammed the school gym with opponents of the driving facility. Likewise, at following hearings at the statehouse, Focus members and citizens decried the company's tactics, and feared the town was losing its ability to regulate its most massive new neighbor. A handful praised Club Motorsports, including the two ousted selectmen and one resident who said he had hundreds of signatures from the town's "silent majority."

Part of that unusual review process included the Army Corps hiring its own sound engineers to prepare a report that could resolve a conflict between two earlier studies.

The report, part of the permit approval package, Focus says, clearly discredits an earlier sound study commissioned by Club Motorsports and used as the basis of the company's permit application. Focus stands by another, far stricter sound study commissioned by a group called the Tamworth Foundation , which the Army Corps said was supported by Focus and is the basis for the sound ordinance passed by town meeting.

Focus media coordinator Kate Vachon said other racetracks have lived within similar limits as placed by the ordinance. But the company says the 69 decibel ceiling at the property line won't allow them to fire up an engine, never mind run a fast car over the humps and sharp twists of a European-style loop.

But the Army Corps said the company's study did not “adequately address the potential impact of the proposed facility on the community. It's modeling is inappropriate and its criteria are deficient for a proposed facility of this type to peacefully coexist with a nearby residential community.”

Despite the fact that the Army Corps saw serious flaws in the company's numbers, and warned of trouble, the permit was granted, marking a third and last major state or federal permit needed.

“When we saw the report we said we will have to challenge the permit,” Vachon said.

She said the permit seems to let Club Motorsports run far louder than the town allows, since town meeting passed its ordinance last year. "They have to conform to the town ordinance," which is backed up by overwhelming scientific evidence, Vachon said. “Without that limit there is going to be a significant impact on the town.”

With court suits pending, and the company's operating plan based on sound levels that seem to violate the town law, which Club Motorsports has said was unfairly crafted to target only them, the company says it must hold off on any major construction.