The following was published in response to Retired Middleboro Town Manager Jack Healey's involvement with the proposed Southbridge Mega Landfill:
To the Editor:
Our Board of Health doesn't need any more of Healy's relentless
pressure, which has been deemed inappropriate by both the landfill
Hearing Officer and by Marcia Benes, the director of the Massachusetts
Association of Health Boards. Perhaps Mr. Healy should give the MAHB
lawyer a call before continuing with his fear mongering to intimidate
these five volunteers who are doing their best to do their job: to
make their decision based on health and environmental facts—not fear.
Healey decried fear-mongering then threatened to cut every aspect of
the Southbridge budget. Sadly, Healey does have a poor reputation
financially; he left Middleboro a mess that auditors are still working
to sort out. The Middleboro Gazette coined the phrase "fuzzy math"
when talking about his tactics of trying to use short term revenue to
fund the current budget. His character was "assassinated" by his
hometown, not us, though his history is repeating itself here. Notice
he can't deny any of the facts.
As for recycling, the problem with the "single stream" recycling is
that much of it ends up in the landfill. Check out Recycle Bank
financials. Casella owns 20% of it and it's losing money. Not that
there is any evidence that Casella is interested in recycling. In New
York Casella was fined $90,000 for dumping carefully washed but
less-than-lucrative recyclables in their landfills. The fines were
used to pay back 2000 customers for recycling service they didn't get.
In the landfill hearings the words of public health research David
Carpenter were devastating, especially given that many of us who live
in a three mile radius of the dump have children. Statistics signify
regions surrounding landfills have increased hospitalizations for
asthma, infectious respiratory disease, diabetes, Cardiovascular
disease, hypothyroid syndrome and genital disease in women. Dr.
Carpenter clearly explained how the inhalation of toxins in the air
and known carcinogens leaching into the water were his primary
concerns. He was especially concerned about children because of their
sensitivity to toxins during development. He cited research results of
higher rates of birth defects and hormonal disruption of babies born
of women living in areas surrounding landfills.
None of us are going anywhere, we will continue to fight the landfill
expansion and the bigger fight for state legislation so this doesn't
happen to any community. The Massachusetts DEP needs to join the 21st
century and adopt policies that are truly protective of health and the
environment. If this modification goes through and we have 405,000
tons of unsorted raw garbage coming into Southbridge every year, it
will harm the air and water in the entire tri-community area. It's an
undeniable fact that eventually two layers of plastic and the
imperfect technology of gas collection will not contain the toxins in
that mountain of garbage and then we'll have a Superfund site
here—but
will there be a Superfund to clean it up?
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For Mr. Healey, getting a "free lunch" from Casella seems like the
easy path. However, as a pregnant woman with two small children, well
water and a home no more than a mile from the dump, I can tell you
that in this instance the easy path is not the right one.
Sincerely,
Lara DeRose
DEP asked to nullify hearings LINK
CarverChick raised the issue of the impacts of effluent on the Nemasket River, a treasured resource that Mr. Healey dismissed in his haste to cram a casino onto a Town, while the Middleboro Board of Selectmen behaved like Bobble Heads and blindly followed:
Of Special Concern.
The Middleboro Board of Selectmen authorized Mr. Healey to investigate the interest of the Mashpee Wamppanoags to locate a casino in Middleboro, but specifically instructed Mr. Healey NOT to negotiate the terms.
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Mr. Healey auctioned the proposed casino land to investors at a bargain basement price of $14,000 per acre, at a time house lot were selling for $200,000 per acre, in a poorly advertised auction as was his custom in ALL other Town auctions.
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Mr. Healey (along with Attorney Whitten, who lacked ANY experience in the area of law) instead negotiated an Agreement that set the bar at $7 MILLION AND WAS GROSSLY FLAWED.
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Twin Rivers, the Rhode Island casino, will net the host community + $20 MILLION because it provides for a percentage of slots.
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Check out the recent articles about casino profits:
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Mr. Healey cheated the Town of Middleborough out of + $20 MILLION per year because he picked a number out of the ethers.
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There are other linked blogs on the right side of this screen that provide greater detail of the casino fiasco that Jack Healey created.
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Fortunately, the Commonwealth House of Representatives has defeated Class III Gaming this year and the Secretary of the Interior Kempthorne has correctly viewed this process as 'Casino Shopping,' in which the newly recognized Tribe has no historical ties to the host community. Mr. Healey's grandiose scheme has been successfully thwarted by others.
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Businesses love to see Mr. Healey coming because he fails to gather his facts or research the details.
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How is $7 MILLION close to + $20 MILLION?
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Please don't allow Mr. Healey's FUZZY MATH to prevail in Southbridge.
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4 comments:
What Jack did in Middleborough was bad enough but these poor people are going to get a toxic waste dump thanks to Jack. He needs to retire and leave towns alone.
Always in the thick of it! Gotta hand it to him.
A friend in Sturbridge told me Jack was upset by your criticism. What a shame we had no outlet to criticize him when he was TM. I live near Fuller St and it was stupid to buy that land.
He had 20 years with no criticism after all he did.
What you said is public record and Jack's a public figure.
Welcome to the real world, Jack!
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