Climate action plan for whom? 'Sustainability' shouldn't be just a convenient shingle on MDI
Greenwashing is a form of marketing spin deceptively used to persuade the public that an organization's products, aims and policies are environmentally friendly - Wikipedia
SOMESVILLE, Sept. 11, 2021 - For all its dysfunction, Bar Harbor is the only town on MDI taking serious steps to combat climate change.
It is the only town currently recycling and doing it at a substantial scale and cost. It is the only MDI town which is an “intervenor” in the battle against salmon farming in Frenchman Bay. Bar Harbor is the only town to publicly challenge the incompetent agency managing the shuttered waste plant in Hampden. And Bar Harbor is seriously discussing capping visits by cruise ships, one of the foulest polluters on the planet.
Two years ago its town council declared a “climate emergency” which was mostly a sound bite. It already had constructed solar arrays much like all MDI towns. But solar panels sprinkled around the island do not constitute a climate strategy of serious scale. You can’t pull a fire alarm and then battle the blaze with only a garden hose.
MDI towns must acknowledge the elephant in the room, Acadia National Park, for any action plan to be taken seriously. Three years ago, a study stated that climate change is destroying the national parks at an alarming rate.
Then there is the soon-to-be record this year of 4.5 million visits to Acadia, and the concomitant air, land, water pollution, the dirty diesel fuel burned by cruise ships, recreational vessels, lobster boats and the mountains of trash generated. No one collects the data but it’s a safe assumption MDI’s carbon footprint is at its peak. None of that is apparent from the comfort of a waterfront porch on Northeast Harbor.
The other towns are mostly taking baby steps, or municipal “greenwashing” if you will, akin to the crew of the Titanic bailing water with spoons.
This week’s Mount Desert select board meeting was an example. The board heard from A Climate to Thrive, which proposed to develop a “climate action plan” as mandated by voters at the May 4 town meeting which declared yet another municipal “climate emergency.” (See video starting at minute 34:30)
ACTT is a fine organization and QSJ is among its supporters. It has done exceptional work with renewable energy on MDI. But the proposal for the $9,630 project lacked detail. It only catalogued a process, probably taken from some template, to “attend sustainability committee meetings, schedule and develop agendas and lead listening sessions, public presentations” and “provide a framework.” It was typical consultant speak.
Member Martha Dudman, the conscience of this board, noted that one member of the sustainability committee worked for ACTT, and another has a connection to the organization. That would be Johannah Blackman, Chair of ACTT, who sits on both boards, and Gordon Beck, who said he was paid for a project for ACTT.
“This makes me uncomfortable,” Dudman said. “We haven’t talked to any other professionals who might be able to provide these services.
“I think the work needs to be done; I’m not convinced this is the best way for us to do it,” she said at great risk to her personal relationship with members of the “sustainability committee.”
Beck said he would have no financial interest in the climate action plan.
“I think it would be pretty shortsighted to delay and reject this pretty expedient way of getting going on a climate action plan,” Beck said. “It seems that this is the time to spend a reasonable amount of money on getting a plan together.
The conversation led to other questions for ACTT.
Have you done this kind of work before?
Why are we talking about paying for the project out of the budgets of town departments?
Do the departments even know about this?
At which time police chief Jim Willis suggested the matter be postponed.
On a matter as important as climate change, an attempt to self deal such a project to essentially the same insiders is, well, an “uncomfortable” situation.
Plus, why is it a priority that this project be a cost-expedient exercise as suggested by Beck? QSJ was alarmed by the price tag - not in how much ACTT was seeking but in how unambitious it was, casting doubt whether this was anything more than a cat-herding exercise with the same “sustainability” cohort.
At the meeting Tuesday the board spent only a few minutes discussing a real climate calamity - the 16th straight month during which the select board has been staring into an abyss like deer in headlights, uncertain on how to deal with the closed regional waste plant in Hampden. Has the town sustainability committee uttered one public word on this fiasco with our garbage being mostly landfilled the last 16 month?
The task is made more difficult because Public Works director Tony Smith, who is a board member of the governing agency, the Municipal Review Committee, is conflicted - with fiduciary obligations to the MRC which may not be in the interest of Mount Desert residents.
He has been a relentless defender of the MRC as seen in the video of the May select meeting where he was coached by George Aronson, MRC consultant, throughout. Smith made a strong pitch to support the MRC’s designation of Delta Thermo Energy, despite reports by QSJ and other media about how DTE misrepresented its capabilities. Martha Dudman made a move to disapprove of the DTE designation. She was joined only by member Geoff Wood. (see video below starting at 1:01:52)
One month later, DTE failed to meet its financing obligations. No surprise to QSJ. The MRC has since launched a new search. There is no telling if the plant will ever re-open.
Caroline Pryor, co-founder of a materials research firm, has a clearer view as a climate concerned citizen. See her in the above video challenging Tony Smith. Caroline Pryor would make some noise on the MRC board. She would not be conflicted as to her role.
The select board this week finally asked Tony Smith to develop an interim plan for recycling. He reached out to Ellsworth Thursday to inquire into piggy-backing on its recycling efforts. If successful, we will head back to the future to sort our our cans, plastics, glass, paper and cardboard at the transfer station on Sargeant Drive. It only took 16 months to come to this point.
The war against climate change cannot be won without making noisy and messy choices. And this town is averse to making noise, unlike Bar Harbor. The sustainability committee is only concerned with recommending how the town comports itself during the crisis. But shouldn’t every department head already be doing that, applying a sustainability sensibility to everything? Isn’t that the personal responsibility of every citizen? Why do we need a plan to chart the obvious?
The notion that one small town can effect a major difference in this fight is fraught with parochial hubris.
Among noises the town should make though:
- Seek to intervene in the cruise ship debate in Bar Harbor, as while Bar Harbor is the only town which benefits economically, it is not the only town which breathes the foul air, navigates the polluted bays and cleans up the flotsam. Support the anti-cruise ship voters in Bar Harbor with a public information campaign to counter the misinformation from the industry.
- Declare an “intervenor” status to protect Frenchman Bay, as Bar Harbor has, to fight the application by American Aquafarms to farm salmon on 120 acres. Cruise ship critic and gadfly James O’Connell estimates that AA must burn 2 million gallons of shipping diesel per year to pump 1,100,000 olympic size swimming pools of cold ocean water up from 100 feet deep. “AA will use 8.76 times the volume of dirty diesel fuel as all the seasonal hoteling cruise ships use per 100-day season - equivalent sulfur dioxide as 16,500 idling semi trucks parked in the middle of the bay year round.”
- Work with Acadia National Park on planning for the rising seas from Northeast Harbor to Pretty Marsh and on the impact of severe weather such as the storm which closed the carriage roads for months. What infrastructure and natural habitats in town are most vulnerable and how to mitigate against the effects? How do we guard against threats to our lakes and ponds - our drinking water? What will the town need to adapt to a new coastline? What grants are available?
- Insist that ANP cap its visits. The national parks can’t have it both ways - wringing their hands lamenting the damage wrought by climate change and yet allowing an unfettered and indefinite army of visitors to assault our most scenic assets.
- Connect with experts in our midst who already have protocols for net zero energy homes and zero waste homes. Bob Harris is such a person. A former member of Jimmy Carter’s Council on Environmental Quality, Bob lives in a net zero energy house on Beech Hill in the summer, having retired from his consulting firm and teaching at Princeton. He is a member of Rethink Energy New Jersey. And QSJ wrote about Sarah Currie Halprin on Aug. 28. She is a leading expert on zero waste. Does the sustainability committee even know these folks?
- Partner with other towns to create an MDI climate action plan and not just a town of Mount Desert plan. (I spent much of the Nineties trying to convince media companies such as Gannett and Tribune that they were too small to take on Google and that we needed to join forces. An island-wide effort may still be too small but it has a fighting chance because of the park and all the folks with resources here. (Where is a John D. Rockefeller when you need one?) The last item on the Sustainability Committee meeting Sept. 16 is: “Work with other area Municipalities to share resources and possibly a shared Sustainability Coordinator.” It should have been the first item. We need a Climate Czar.
- Develop better transportation to safely and affordably move people between work, homes, commercial centers and civic spaces, with zero emission technology, and help transform freight and goods delivery on the island. Develop more bicycle routes, and incentivize ride sharing.
Or the town can just write a small check for $9,630 to ACTT and declare victory. That would be the definition of greenwashing.
SWH’s ‘sidewalk’ project may be done by 2023; one can only hope …
SOUTHWEST HARBOR - The long suffering constituents of the town’s stretch of road from Apple Lane to the condos at Ocean’s End will continue to suffer through this winter, but interim town manager Dana Reed this week noted some progress.
“Only one easement left to be signed, and they have agreed to do so,” he reported on the tortuous process to seek easements for Versant to move utility poles to make way for rebuilding storm drains and a new sidewalk.
“State DOT is saying right of way work is scheduled to finish by early January. The project can go out for bids at that time,” Reed said.
The project from hell involves 0.2 -mile of road on Rt. 102 which is the main artery to Tremont. It is arguably the worst stretch of roadway on MDI.
The town is using $180,000 from the American Recovery Act as its part to finance the project which will require three construction seasons because work will pause during the summer of 2022, Reed said. That puts the completion at some time in the first half of 2023.
Vacation rentals in Bar Harbor soon to be one quarter of its entire housing stock …
BAR HARBOR - The last time QSJ checked into vacation rental registrations in this town there were about 545 units. As of Thursday the number was 592 with 35 more pending. With about 2,795 single-famlily units in town, VRs will make up about 22.4 percent of the housing stock.
In June it was 19.4 percent.
AirDNA, the website which tracks rentals in Airbnb and VRBO, reported 557 active rentals Friday averaging $330 a night. Most of the rentals can haul in more in one week’s rent than they could in one month for a year-round lease.
The town’s proposed amendment to the zoning ordinance to cap VRs on the Nov. 2 ballot faces an uphill fight even if a supermajority is not required. That is because the owners of vacation rentals are highly motivated voters.
The Planning Board’s 2-2 tie last week muddied the question of whether that constituted approval or denial. A denial would require a two-thirds vote No. 2. Town counsel Ed Bearor said a majority was needed for action. The town council will likely settle the question Sept. 21.
The question Nov. 2 will ask voters to disallow transfer of VR registrations to new buyers until VRs lower to 9 percent of the housing stock.
The report Thursday from Code Enforcement Officer Angela Chamberlain showed 102 new registrations, 492 renewals and 35 pending so far in 2021.
TRIBUTE: Dana Richard Haynes 1938 - 2021
(Reprinted from Jordan-Fernald Funeral Home)
NORTHEAST HARBOR - Dana Richard Haynes, 83, died peacefully on Sept. 8 at MDI Hospital holding his daughter's hand.
He was born in the same hospital on April 29, 1938, son of Richard M. and Margaret M. (Cousins)Haynes. Dana grew up in Northeast Harbor, learning the ropes at Haynes Garage starting about the age of 12.
When Dana graduated from Mt. Desert High School, he was already working beside his father and mother in the family business. Work was his hobby, and his work ethic was one of his strongest traits. While his family knew he was there for them, Dana's love for the business and doing for others were his passions. He could often be seen at the dock, working on boats in the early years, and watching them in later years. Dana was truly a down-to-earth man. He was honest, thoughtful, kind--all the words that are good--all wrapped up in a true Maine son
Dana and Lucy, his wife of 63 years, lived and worked side-by-side. They enjoyed many vacations in Florida with extended family, and while it is hard to believe, he actually enjoyed walking on Indian Harbour Beach looking for sea glass. He loved spending time at their camp "Cedar Breeze" on Long Pond. Boating down the pond on the Idle Hour with a cocktail was a 5:00 tradition. Dana was a man of few words! "Ayuh", "Finest kind", and "Yep, I can fix that" were ones often heard at Haynes Garage. If he talked to you, it was to teach you something or leave you with a lesson.
Besides his work at the garage, Dana served the Town of Mount Desert by joining the Northeast Harbor Fire Department starting at the age of 17 in 1956. He was chief from 1970-1992. He also served on the NEH Ambulance Committee, the Warrant Committee, and the Harbor Committee (later named the Marine Management Committee) for more than 60 years.
His dedication to the town helped to shape the way these organizations operated and helped make them what they are today.
Dana is survived by his wife, Lucy; two children, son Daniel and his wife, Becky, daughter Wendy Littlefield and her husband, John, all of Northeast Harbor; stepson Stephen Tracy and his wife, Darlene, of Hubert, North Carolina. "Boppie" also leaves behind grandchildren: J. Dana Haynes, Jr., Master Sergeant Richard M. Haynes II and his wife, Sarah, Meghan Leddy and her husband, Matt, Dara Beth Beck and her husband, Sean, Ryan Littlefield and his girlfriend, Carley Sevene, and Haley Littlefield and her fiance, Specialist Cody Cronk. He will be missed by great-grandchildren: Kaya Ashleigh Haynes, Rowan Haynes, Kellum Beck, and Madeleine Ashleigh Littlefield.
He has been met by many friends who passed before him and leaves a community behind. Dana was met in Heaven by his parents; brother, Blaine; son, Jeffrey Dana Haynes, Sr.; and granddaughter, Ashleigh Margaret Littlefield.
Dana was a loving husband and son, an amazing father, brother, Boppie, uncle, cousin, and a genuine friend. He was a "rock" of Northeast Harbor, and more than anything, a kind man. They don't make them like him anymore. Cherish all of the loving memories that will last forever.
Graveside Services will be held 1:00 pm, Friday, September 17, 2021 at Forest Hill Cemetery, Northeast Harbor followed by a private family burial.
In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to The Northeast Harbor Ambulance Service, PO Box 122, Northeast Harbor, ME 04662.
Arrangements in care of Jordan-Fernald, 1139 Main St., Mt. Desert. Condolences may be expressed at www.jordanfernald.com
Where were you on Sept. 11, 2001?
SOMESVILLE - I started the day Sept. 11, 2001 at the Westchester County Airport about to board a flight to Boston when my cell phone ran and Scott Meyer, general manager of nytimes.com, called to tell me about a plane which just crashed into the World Trade Center.
I was chief operating officer of New York Times Digital. I ran all digital operations of the company, including boston.com, the website of the Boston Globe, which the Times acquired in 1993. We were still learning how to be a purveyor of online news when this story broke. The Times newsroom was not a great partner those days hoarding news only for its print edition the next day.
I told Scott we could not just rely on wire service reports and to push our young digital staff to watch TV news and post it online.
It was very un-Times like.
Shortly after the call, my flight was canceled.
I got into my car and attempted to drive to my office at Seventh Avenue and 38th Street. I got as far as Pelham when the traffic came to a stop on I-95. It was a scene out of one of those world-ending apocalyptic movies with sirens from ambulances, fire trucks and police cars at their highest pitch amid total chaos.
Luckily I was able to exit and turn round on I-95 and return to my home in Greenwich, CT. where my first stop was Eastern Middle School to make sure my 11-year-old son was okay.
The rest of the day was a blur. I drove out to Greenwich Point Park and saw the amazing plume of black smoke, intact as a horizontal column streaming slowly east against the backdrop of a clear blue sky across Long Island Sound.
I drove back to my house where luckily the TV and the landline were still working. The rest of the day was a fog of trying to manage nytimes.com and boston.com remotely while viewing the non-stop coverage on television.
I do not remember dinner that night, nor any activity other than emailing my colleagues and watching TV.
For me, the only day similar to 9/11/2001 was 11/22/1963.