FOR MORE INFORMATION:
Focus: Tamworth spokesperson:
Charles Greenhalgh
603 356-5439 x 516
If unavailable:
Kate Vachon, press coordinator
603 323 8224
focus@focustamworth.org

Noise Ordinance passes at Tamworth Town Meeting

Re-establishes local control of noise from proposed racetrack development

(TAMWORTH, NH, March 16, 2005)

At Tamworth Town Meeting on March 9th, voters passed an ordinance limiting the permissible level of noise from private driving instruction and exhibition facilities. The ordinance passed by a solid majority, 261 to 142. Attendance at Town Meeting set a 20-year record.

The Noise Ordinance was petitioned by 250 Tamworth voters after RSA 287-G, passed in 2004, exempted private driving instruction and exhibition facilities from regulation by towns. Many in Tamworth were upset by the passage of RSA 287-G and its attack on the power of towns to exercise local control of activities within their boundaries.

In March, 2004, under the authorization of RSA 31:41-a, Tamworth Town Meeting voters passed a Race Track Ordinance by an 84% margin. The provisions of the new Noise Ordinance mirror the noise restrictions of the Race Track Ordinance, but apply them specifically to private driving instruction and exhibition facilities.

Club Motorsports, Inc wants to build a private race course for high-performance cars and motorcycles on the north slope of Mt. Whittier in Tamworth. Representatives of Club Motorsports worked closely with the committee that wrote the Tamworth Race Track Ordinance.

The RTO was approved by the Tamworth Selectmen and became law on October 1, 2003. Club Motorsports representatives have since confirmed that they proposed the passage of RSA 287-G and employed a lobbyist to help move it quickly through the legislative process.

During negotiations over noise levels in the RTO, a letter to the selectmen from Club Motorsports lawyer Susan Duprey threatened to “use the judicial system, and any all other means available to us, to test the validity of the ordinance,” if noise restrictions were not eased. At hearings in February for HB 90, a bill before the New Hampshire House that would repeal RSA 287-G, Club Motorsports representatives stated that they had engineered the passage of RSA 287-G in order to avoid having to sue the town over the Race Track Ordinance.

A Race Track Ordinance passed in the nearby town of Effingham, with more stringent noise limits, has recently been upheld by the New Hampshire Supreme Court.

Charles Greenhalgh, a lawyer, Tamworth resident, and Focus: Tamworth spokesperson, points out that local regulations to control businesses are routinely challenged in court. “Towns that pass ordinances aimed at regulating business always take the risk that the business will sue to overturn the regulation,” he said. “But when the citizens of a town demonstrate by voting for an ordinance that the ordinance is necessary to protect their health and safety, they are also demonstrating that they expect their town officials to enforce and defend the regulation.

“We’re very pleased that Tamworth voters have re-affirmed the need for local regulations and local control of noise from this kind of facility,” Greenhalgh added. “We believe the Club Motorsports development is a race track, but even as a ‘private driving instruction and exhibition facility,’ it is now subject to at least this much local control.”

The new ordinance sets a limit of 69 dB at the property boundary of any private driving instruction and exhibition facility in the town of Tamworth. Most facilities that attract high-performance automobiles and motorcycles accomplish noise control by limiting the noise produced by individual vehicles, measured at a specific distance from the tailpipe. Such limits are significantly higher than 69 dB, because they are measured near the vehicle rather than at the property boundary. The two measurement methods accomplish similar noise reductions for the surrounding community.

The Tamworth Noise Ordinance sets quieter limits of 61 dB  between 6 PM and 8 AM and on Sunday before 12 noon. St. Andrews-in-the-Valley Episcopal Church is less than one-half mile from the proposed Club Motorsports facility.

Focus: Tamworth is a coalition of local residents who support careful and fair regulations that protect Tamworth’s economic and natural resources. More information on Focus: Tamworth is available at www.focustamworth.org.

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