NStar runs amok with no control, no cooperation and no common sense.
In Middleboro, NStar cleared massive swaths of land with no regard for the environment, endangered species, boundaries, or common sense.
Corporate tyranny doesn't belong in people's backyards.
Cape delegation pushes for end to NStar spraying
For the second time this year, Cape and Islands legislators met privately with state officials Wednesday to raise concerns about NStar and its herbicide use in power line rights of way.
But unlike the October meeting, which was mostly informational, Wednesday’s discussion with Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resources officials got out of the weeds, said freshman state Rep. Brian Mannal.
Mannal, who arranged the 90-minute Statehouse sitdown, said the discussion focused more on exploring regulatory changes that would respond to Cape residents’ concerns with chemicals potentially contaminating the groundwater.
“(The state officials) volunteered to go back and work with us and take a crack at trying to redraft parts of the regulations so we can achieve the goal of closer monitoring and better notification,” Mannal said in an interview.
While they have been willing to meet with legislators, state Sen. Daniel Wolf said the agriculture officials believe their mandate to enforce regulations is “fairly black and white.”
“They don’t feel they have a lot of latitude,” he said.
“My wish list would include a little bit more creativity in holding the utility’s feet to the fire to be responsive to what the communities have asked for,” he added. “I’m not sure (the department) has exhausted all of their opportunity to force NStar to do the right thing.”
The meeting was the first since NStar resumed spraying herbicides in November, ending a voluntary four-year moratorium. With the public comment period on NStar’s yearly plan for 2014 ending in early January, Wolf said the delegation pushed for a 45-day extension similar to one granted earlier this year for the utility’s vegetation management plan.
The delegation also pushed for more monitoring and relayed concerns that NStar was spraying in high winds, which raises the risk of chemicals blowing beyond the target plant, Mannal said. The utility has repeatedly defended itself as heavily regulated and accountable for less than 1 percent of the Cape’s herbicide use.
Michael Durand, an NStar spokesman, said he could not comment because he was unaware of the meeting. Durand has said in the past, however, that the herbicides are approved for environmentally sensitive areas and applied directly to unwanted vegetation with backpack sprayers.
In the meeting, state Rep. Timothy Madden, a Nantucket Democrat, criticized NStar’s residential notices as too small a step toward notifying residents of spraying near their property, noting that many of his constituents live on the Islands part-time and might go months before seeing the alert.
To the delegation’s surprise, state officials told the legislators that no “specific requirement” exists for notifying residents whose property abuts a right of way, Mannal said.
“That means that NStar has, out of the kindness of its corporate heart, put door hangers on door knobs,” Mannal said. “That shocked us.”
Earlier this month, on a parcel the Brewster Conservation Trust owns beneath NStar power lines, volunteers pruned the land by hand to preclude the need for herbicides.
Drawing inspiration from their effort, Mannal said the legislators discussed working to encourage more property owners to “proactively get onto these rights of way.”
In an emailed statement, Department of Agricultural Resources spokeswoman Mary-Leah Assad said the department plans to continue working with lawmakers.
“We met with members of the legislature today to further discuss (the department’s) approval process for herbicide plans and discuss concerns,” Assad said. “We remain committed to working with our legislative partners throughout this process and look forward to a robust public comment period.”
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