The Declaration of Independence makes crystal clear that the Founders fought for the proposition “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed …” Having lost the 2020 election, Donald Trump became the first president in our history to oppose the peaceful transfer of power and to try, in...
“I wanted to create a sense of community in a town that has no downtown or sense of cohesion given that it’s spread out over 53 square miles. And I believe the paper has done that to a certain degree.”
-- Simon Winchester, founding editor of The Sandisfield Times
Historian and Sandisfield resident, Ron Bernard, paints a sketch of “the fascinating and improbable saga of the original ‘colony’ of very poor Russian immigrants who were sponsored to Sandisfield -- of all places -- by a European philanthropist Baron Maurice DeHirsch.”
While the broadband ball is now rolling, resident Jean Atwater-Williams said she wants to make sure everyone knows where that ball is headed and, in an article in the Sandisfield Times, called for a revote on the new route the town is pursuing.
The towns of Sandisfield, New Marlborough, Monterey and Tolland decided to share the pain by hiring an attorney who helped them navigate a legal pathway that would allow the towns to bid out the construction of a fiber optic network and sign a 15-year contract with a service provider to operate it.
The Kinder Morgan subsidiary had negotiated with Sandisfield town officials, drafting a contract that said it would give the town $1 million to fix roads and other town infrastructure damaged by company equipment. The company walked away when it was time to sign that contract.
Tennessee Gas plans to use millions of gallons from Spectacle Pond to flush out newly installed pipes, raising concerns about chemicals from the pipes being released into the environment.
Kinder Morgan is backpedaling on assurances to Sandisfield that it would pay roughly $1 million to cover road and other infrastructure damage and pay the $30,000 in legal bills the town racked up negotiating with company attorneys.
Kinder Morgan subsidiary Tennessee Gas Pipeline has been in court since early spring to gain immediate access to clear 3.83 miles of state protected land in Otis State Forest.
At the same time, Kinder Morgan, the Fortune 500 corporation, is showing signs of reneging on $1,080,000 in compensation promises to the town of Sandisfield.
The situation in Sandisfield is fast becoming a precedent-setting testing ground for the power and teeth of Article 97 of the Massachusetts Constitution that preserves state-protected land. That’s why the Attorney General is now involved.
“This is a case of a forest of clean air machines being literally traded for the transmission of fossil fuels. Not a step in the right direction.”
-- Arborist Tom Ingersoll, on the Kinder Morgan proposal to cut a swathe through protected old-growth forests in Sandisfield to build a natural gas pipeline extension to Connecticut
