Remarks for the Selectboard meeting July 8 2004

Thank you for the opportunity to address you today.  My name is Charles Greenhalgh and I’m representing Focus: Tamworth.

First, I want to clarify the mission of Focus: Tamworth. We are a group of citizens who are acting to protect the quality of life in Tamworth.  We are PRO TAMWORTH, not anti CMI.  All of us in this room, including the members of the Selectboard, share the same goal: preserving and improving the quality of life in this town.

In her presentation at your last meeting, CMI’s lawyer Susan Duprey attempted to paint our citizen’s group as one that opposes the building of CMI’s racetrack.

It is clear that CMI will take whatever action is necessary to move forward with its racetrack, including labeling citizens who want to insure compliance with the law as “opposition.” But our goal is simply to insure that CMI complies with all legally required standards in constructing and operating its facility. We would rather focus on the current situation and the things that concern us:

Wetlands impact is one big issue. Focus: Tamworth has reviewed CMI’s application for a Special Use Permit under Tamworth’s Wetlands Ordinance.  The application raises several questions, not the least of which is the scheduling of a public Planning Board hearing to accommodate Ms Duprey’s vacation, over the objection of the Conservation Commission and in violation of the law regarding the notice period for the hearing.  Certainly CMI has enough lawyers so that the hearing could be scheduled in accordance with the law. Additionally, the Special Use Permit application appears to us to be incomplete, because it does not address several key points of the Tamworth Wetlands Ordinance and has a number of technical problems.

Noise is an even bigger concern. CMI recently released the results of its own noise study. Focus: Tamworth  believes that CMI’s study is an exercise in “expert shopping” and should be viewed with a jaundiced eye by the Selectboard and the citizens. Of course its conclusions support CMI’s contention that this race track will not affect quality of life in Tamworth. Given that CMI will ignore and try to discredit any evidence that does not support its goal of constructing this race track, we as citizens believe that this sound study should be ignored.

The town needs a way to regulate the operation of this racetrack to minimize its negative impact. At your last meeting, Ms Duprey said that CMI is willing to discuss some voluntary operating restrictions with the Selectboard. We feel that negotiating a “new RTO” is unacceptable. The town’s voters overwhelmingly approved the original RTO, and we feel that is the right way to regulate this racetrack.

And can CMI’s representatives be trusted? Their past behavior indicates that they can’t.

• CMI offered to pay up to $10,000 for a noise study in concert with the Tamworth Foundation. The study cost $35,000. That study used data from a race at Loudon that they identified as representative of events they would hold in Tamworth. When they didn’t like the results, they tried to discredit the noise consultant.  Is this the action of someone who honors their commitments?
• On four separate occasions, CMI, whose lawyers created the first draft of the Racetrack Ordinance, said publicly that it was either good for the town or something they could live with. Then, in a covert manner, they shepherded SB 458 through the legislature and exempted themselves from the ordinance they helped write. Do you trust them to stick with an agreement that doesn’t have the force of law?

Focus: Tamworth is intensely concerned about preserving local control for the citizens of Tamworth.  The citizens of this town have shown that they want their elected and appointed officials to regulate the construction and operation of CMI’s racetrack in a fair and open process.  The citizen volunteers of the RTO committee worked hard to draft the RTO, which was approved by 84% of voters at Town Meeting.  Citizen volunteers on the Conservation Committee provided lengthy and critical review of CMI’s defective wetlands application permit to insure that CMI did not go forward with construction that we now know would have resulted in substantial damage to wetlands and serious impact on the Ossipee Drift Acquifer.  Citizens of this town turn out in record numbers to listen and speak at public meetings and votes on these issues.

Meanwhile, CMI and its lawyers and lobbyists work behind the scenes in Concord and in the press to eviscerate local control and frustrate any effort to assert it.  Rather than simply admit that CMI is doing what any big corporation would, go to any length to make money for its shareholders, CMI Lawyer Susan Duprey has blamed Focus: Tamworth, a small volunteer citizens group, for not matching its lobbying efforts in Concord. But Focus: Tamworth did not even have a lobbyist until early May, long after SB 458 was passed and signed.

CMI lawyer Susan Duprey has said that SB 458 was created to avoid “having to sue the town.” CMI Lawyer Ed Hahn threatened litigation several times during the meetings of the RTO Committee. Susan Duprey threatened litigation if the sound limits of the RTO were too low for CMI’s liking. When Focus: Tamworth recently proposed a noise ordinance, based on levels developed in an independent study, that would insure preservation of quality of life in Tamworth for all citizens, while allowing CMI to operate its race track, CMI Lawyer Susan Duprey again threatened to sue the town.

It seems to us that CMI and its lawyers and lobbyists are attempting to create a litigation hysteria, to intimidate the citizens into accepting this race track on CMI’s terms.  Focus: Tamworth remains committed to insuring that the citizens of this town not be threatened into accepting anything less than a fair, legal and transparent process of permitting and regulation of the construction and operation of this race track, under local control.

At your May 13^th meeting, we asked what the Selectboard plans to do to restore the local control that Tamworth lost with the passage of SB 458. We would like to hear your answer to that question.

Repealing SB 458 would restore the regulations and controls of the RTO. We are asking you to work with the New Hampshire Municipal Association to repeal SB 458.

A noise ordinance that applies to “instructional driving facilities” as defined in SB 458 would restore at least the town’s ability to regulate noise. We would like to know the town attorney’s opinion of the legality and constitutionality of the Noise Ordinance that we proposed last month.

Focus: Tamworth will continue to do what our name suggests, focus on the quality of life in Tamworth.  We know that is your focus as well, and look forward to working with you on these issues.