CAPE VINCENT 2011 A Windy Year in Review

January 13, 2011 : The Town Board meeting marked the beginning of a tumultuous year for Cape Vincent and wind development. Acciona, Voters for Wind and Town Board Members, Marty Mason, Donny Mason & Mickey Orvis formed an alliance , calling for an investigation in retaliation for Urban Hirschey’s release of FOILED documents that exposed Acciona’s sound study as fraudulent. Additionally, EX Supervisor Reinbeck called for Hirschey’s immediate dismissal. Their plan backfired, bringing attention to the content of Acciona’s fraudulent sound study. The Attorney General dismissed their request to investigate.

February 9: Even though the Planning Board meeting was canceled, BP’s SDEIS was submitted to the planning board behind closed doors somewhere around Feb. 10, 2011. By chance, a citizen discovered the existence of the documents in the Lyme Library, however the board had not formally accepted it. BP’s former senior project manager, Jim Madden, said in a newspaper interview that he expected the SDEIS to be accepted by the end of March.

February 10: At the Town Board meeting Supervisor Hirschey proposed that a community wide Zogby survey be conducted to gain a better understanding of what direction to lead the community. Additionally, Supervisor Hirschey Called for a resolution for a property Valuation Assurance Policy as a condition for the Town Planning Board's approval of Cape Vincent’s wind turbine site plan applications. Marty Mason said, "I'd like to table it for a moment.” In addition, Donny Mason said, "I agree with Marty." In anticipation of the ZOGBY poll’s results Voters for wind conducted their own scientific telephone poll, the results of which were never made public.

March 16: Michael G. Sterthous, from Whiteman Osterman and Hanna,(WOH) sent a letter to BP advising them that the Cape Vincent’s Planning Board review of their project is “ongoing” and that comments on the status of the completeness of the SDEIS will be delivered to BP Wind Energy‘s technical consultants over the coming months and ultimately lead to iteration of the document.

March 22: Jim Madden, BP’s project developer, left Bp for an opportunity with a smaller company . Madden had been with the Cape Vincent wind project from its inception under Greenlight Energy. At the same time, Todd Mathis departed from Whiteman Osterman & Hanna this left questions concerning the nonexistent documentation regarding expenditures from the Developers escrow accounts (Over 100,000 was billed by the lawyers and engineering company on the SEQRA process.) Supervisor Hirschey is still waiting for WOH to fulfill their promise of sending the accounting records or the minutes that Todd Mathis kept.

March 23: The PB meeting was cancelled. Planning Board members were to consider the supplemental draft environmental impact statement for British Petroleum's Cape Vincent industrial wind complex at this meeting.

May 30: The results of the Zogby poll were published. The poll revealed that Sixty three percent of those surveyed were seasonal, the feelings of those who opposed wind development were becoming stronger and dissatisfaction with the board’s actions concerning wind development was high. Additionally, fifty-nine percent of those surveyed wanted a moratorium on wind development.

June 3: Urban Hirschey, John Byrne and Clif Schneider committed to run as Republicans for positions as Supervisor and Councilmen on Cape Vincent's Town Board. The three candidates released a final unified position statement outlining issues and actions they collectively would undertake if they were successful in the upcoming election one of which was a moratorium on wind development.

June 8: At the Planning Board meeting BP’s new project manager, Peter Gross, was introduced to the community. This was the first meeting that Voters for Wind (VFW) attended without wearing their green shirts. It was at this meeting that Mr. Gross mentioned that BP might be using larger 3-megawatt turbines, thus requiring a smaller number of turbines in the array plan.

June 11: Marked the beginning of the voter registration drive.

June 27: The results of the McCann Appraisal were in and it indicated those homes within 2miles of wind turbines would suffer a 40 % decrease in value.

June 29: Voter for Wind and leaseholder Harvey White announced that he would be challenging Supervisor Hirschey in the republican primary.

June 30: Planning Board Chairman Richard Edsall abruptly resigned without explanation. Additionally, he did not leave behind any records of the planning boards activities.

July:5 McCarthy resigned as well without explanation.

July 6: Reinbeck followed suit telling the media he was leaving due to harassment and threats over the wind power controversy. These resignations left the planning board without a quorum.

July 6: In light of all the negativity, surrounding their project Acciona issued a press release which was a public relations move to introduce a newly prepared brochure extolling the virtues of their proposed wind development, Additionally,
the Watertown Times did a story giving Acciona’s Wind project a positive spin.

August 2: British Petroleum’s project manager Peter Gross sent a letter to planning Board member Richard MacSherry explaining that they were anxiously awaiting the anticipated comments from the Planning Board on their Cape Wind SDEIS. Additionally, Gross stated that BP would like to advance their project in a timely, efficient manner. Mr. Gross also requested that the Planning Board schedule a review of the SDEIS by the Planning Board and asked for a schedule.

August 4: Article X is signed into law making siting of large power plants a state-run process.

August 8: Planning Board member Richard MacSherry sent a letter to Mr. Peter Gross, Project manager Bp Wind Energy, telling Mr. Gross “I have no knowledge of any dialogue that Mr. Edsall could have possibly had with Whiteman Osterman and Hanna, which would have led
them to indicate that any review was active and that comments regarding the SDEIS would be forthcoming under any period.” Additionally, Mr. MacSherry stated that, “The primary obstacles which I (as the board's acting chair ) face are: 1.) the time it will take for the Town Board to fill Planning Board vacancies, 2.) a reasonable period for all members to become familiar with BP draft and supplemental EIS documents
and 3.) an opportunity for the Planning Board to meet with our consultants to share and compare our findings. I have spoken with the Town Supervisor, Mr. Hirschey, and he is aware of the situation. At this juncture, I cannot speculate as to when all of the above-mentioned matters will be concluded: I will commit only to keeping you informed as to our progress.”

August 5:Voters for Wind devised a plan to prevent the seasonal population from voting. They would become champions against Voter Fraud. Their scheme began with a petition asking the Town Board to take action to stop the illegal, unethical and immoral voting methods that
were being used to manipulate the outcome of the election.

August 12: Harold Wiley presented a 200-signature petition to the Board Donny Mason who was prepared in advance with a resolution to stop voter fraud by requiring voters to show a current New York state driver's license with a Cape Vincent address to prove residency. Donny Mason, Marty Mason and Mickey Orvis all voted in favor and the resolution carried.

August 16: at a press conference in Watertown, the Attorney General dismissed the Mason law as unconstitutional.

August 18: Supervisor Hirschey took action to repeal the Mason’s illegal law. Donny and Marty Mason voted against rescinding their unconstitutional law while Mickey Orvis voted in favor of repealing the voter fraud law citing concern for the community. The resolution to rescind passed. Additionally, Orvis had prepared his own resolution proposing that the Town Board actively solicit the State to take over the development process under the statutes of Article 10. Orvis discovered prior to the board meeting that this was something that is not within the scope of the Town Board’s authority, however he read his resolution any way. Moreover, he said it would resolve the conflicts before the election.

AUGUST 25: Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman announced the indictment and arrest of Jeri Mason, the former Town Clerk, who was charged with stealing up to $50,000 from the Town of Cape Vincent.

Sept 1: As the Republican primary drew near ,BP arranged to have a group of pseudo scientists, (New York Wind Education Collaborative, a conglomeration of the Alliance for Clean Energy New York, Albany; Citizens Campaign for the Environment and Climate Center at Pace Law School,
Westchester.) Carol Murphy & Marion Trieste were center stage touting the virtues of wind development for our community.

Sept 13: MetalCraft Marine announced that they were opening a new design and manufacturing facility in Cape Vincent.

Sept 13: Supervisor Hirschey won the republican primary, 277 votes to 99 for challenger, wind leaseholder Harvey White.

Sept 19: Harold Wiley chair of the Cape Vincent Democrat party in Cape Vincent
was too preoccupied circulating petitions and assisting the Mason’s with their illegal Jim Crow resolution that he dropped the ball and failed to meet the filing date requirements for the Democrat Caucus. Consequently, there was no Democrat line on the Ballot.

October 13: Harold C. Wiley, Chairman Cape Vincent Democratic Party, teamed up with Gary King ,Chairman of a new group (Citizens for Fair Government). Their next tactic appeared to be intimidation or exacting retribution against those people that had either registered to vote in Cape Vincent or changed their primary residence in order to vote in Cape Vincent. Harold Wiley and Gary King collected a hit list of names of each new voter in Cape Vincent and sent letters to the assessors of those communities where these residents own another home. Alerting the
assessor that these people have registered to vote, the letter stated, “We provide you with this information in the event that there are implications for your community's implementation of the STAR program.”

October 17: The Citizens for Fair Government conducted another letter, writing campaign. They wrote letters to all the newly registered, unethical and immoral, voters in Cape Vincent asking them to consider voting for the very men that wanted to take their voting rights away.

October 19: Gusty winds prevailed and suddenly the safety of personal wind turbines became an issue when Rodger Alexander’s personal turbine was visibly broken and was spinning wildly out of control. Eventually it ceased spinning and it was reported that it was
a test.
November 8: The elections arrive and Hirschey, Byrne, Schneider & Knuth win their respective positions.

November 29: Former Cape Vincent Town Clerk, Jerry Mason, admitted in court that she took nearly $15,000 from the town while working there. Sentencing was scheduled for January 20, where she is expected to pay full restitution and will be sentenced to five years’ probation. If she fails to pay restitution, she will be ordered to serve six months in jail in addition to the five-year probation.

December 8: Marked the last Town Board meeting for Town Board members Donny and Marty Mason.

December 21: Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman requested that the state’s 932 towns send his office their codes of ethics, a major point of contention in towns including Cape Vincent.

December 24: The Watertown Times began a series of stories devoid of in-depth reporting and factual content, fanning the flames of controversy over Cape Vincent’s election process and ethics problems.

BP used their surrogate organization Voters For Wind to thwart efforts to craft a wind law.

 May 2010~   Voters for Wind were successful in derailing Cape Vincent’s efforts to enact a wind law. 

Cape Vincent has made several unsuccessful attempts to develop a zoning law to properly address the siting of industrial wind towers.

A committee convened in 2010 and over the course of the process they had reached a consensus on a wind law.  However through the efforts of wind lease holders and a Voter for Wind spokesperson, that agreement was sabotaged.

 A wind lease holder and Voter for Wind spokesperson introduced a spread sheet and data containing facts and figures to support a less restrictive developer friendly wind law .The lease holding committee members agreed with the VFW spokesperson consequently subverting the process. 

  Three days after this last wind law committee meeting, BP’s business developer, Jim Madden sent a letter to the Cape Vincent Town Board containing the exact same data that the Voter for Wind spokesperson had presented to the wind law committee as her own. .  

 DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED  to the TOWN of CAPE VINCENT, 
by BP PROJECT DEVELOPER, JIM MADDEN