Gov. Cuomo's Version of "Reasonable"

Recently NY Gov. Cuomo visited Fort Drum promoting a renewable bio mass power plant. This of course raised the nagging question about Article X and power plant siting and how much local control under home rule is “reasonable”.

In the context of the home rule zoning, and Article X debate, everyone trying to defend against A-10 is desperately scrambling to figure out what “reasonable” actually means. Fact is, despite what they will tell you, no one on the community side of the debate actually knows, and in fact is basically irrelevant. We formulated the wind development language in our new zoning law based on nothing more than guess as to what the State thinks is “ reasonable”.

 However, Cuomo gave us some clarity on what “reasonable” actually means in his comments in this Article X debate if you listened carefully to his language. And I don’t think Cuomo’s visit to the NNY at this time was just coincidence as the CV community in the heat of the wind debate just passed its new restrictive wind zoning. He was here with a clear message to NNY communities like Cape Vincent formulating restrictive wind zoning clauses as to what he thinks “reasonable” actually means. Here is what he said from a WDT article.

 “I think home rule is very important, where a locality decides their destiny,” Mr. Cuomo said. “There also has to be a reasonableness. We also have to remember at the end of the day that we need power. If you’re not constructing power plants or renewable plants or siting anything, you can’t power an economy. You can’t say no to wind and no to solar and no to biomass and no to power plants and then say, ‘I want jobs and a thriving economy.”

We look at “reasonable” and try to guess what it means from an environmental and community protection view point. Cuomo’s head on the other hand is in a completely different political place. He defines “reasonable” from a political, energy, and business point of view. His comments on home rule are nothing more than patronization of that concept, like patting a child on the head. As he says, we need power to run NY, particularly to keep NY open for business. Some of that power has to be renewable, and that translates in large part to mean WIND!!! Of course Cuomo has the power to force his version of “reasonable”  by simply taking away our home rule rights when we don’t agree.

Under these circumstances, wanna take a wild stab at whose version of “reasonable” is going to prevail????

 Mr. Bob Brown, the chairman of the Cape Vincent zoning committee on the other hand is very confident that our home rule zoning efforts will obviously be recognized as reasonable and won’t be preempted by an Article X siting board simply because they formulated those imbedded wind regulations on the health, safety, and welfare of the community. Here are Mr. Brown’s comments from the WDT article:

"As long as the Article X board recognizes it was done for the health, safety and welfare of the citizens, then they will not override the law. And that's what our intent was – to write a law that would not prohibit, but would discourage, and that would not be overthrown by Article X." Really, it’s that simple????

Mr. Brown has far more confidence than I do in that outcome. Mr. Brown’s thinking fails dangerously in my opinion on two critical points if we want to seriously defend against Article X. He fails to recognize that our community’s health safety and welfare has absolutely nothing to do with what Cuomo thinks is reasonable for his political and green agenda on behalf of big corporate interests.

Think about it. Article X is here for a reason. If all any community wanting to reject industrial wind had to do was use it’s home rule powers to pass a zoning law to restrict wind development simply based on health, safety, and welfare and this would be considered reasonable by an A-10 siting board in town after town, that is going to catch on quickly. Where does that leave Cuomo and other beholding politicians in furthering their green political agenda on behalf of giant energy corps like BP? The answer to that is obvious. It’s not acceptable.

And Mr. Brown’s misplaced confidence is rather disturbing and naive on this critical issue when he fails to recognize the fundamental politics of Article X, and that despite the zoning committee’s best efforts, they were not even invited to the party where the political code word “reasonable” has already been determined. Mr. Brown fails to recognize that he simply is not allowed to have a dog in this " reasonable"  fight. What he and the other "experts" think is "reasoanble" is irrelevent.

This does not translate well for an effective local fight against Article X when the fundamental political concepts are so badly misunderstood on such simplistic grounds.. In this context what fails to be recognized by many people on the reasonable zoning law band wagon is that it isn’t even about how good or bad or “reasonable” our zoning law is in addressing the wind development issue. That is irrelevant and has no bearing on the issue. That is not even the point now, nor has it been the point since Article X raised its ugly political head on behalf of wind developers!

 Cuomo just verified this when he tells us he believes in home rule…BUT communities have to be “REASONABLE.” Reasonable for who??????