At The Same Time Of The Alexander Illegal Solar Project, Records Show The Cape Vincent Town Supervisor Mr. Urban Hirschey Also Had An Illegal Solar Project Up And Running.

You can also read the report in the Watertown Daily Times at this link:

http://www.watertowndailytimes.com/article/20131016/NEWS03/710169855

I had this post ready to go for a while  but decided to wait and see if the WDT was going to cover it. Thanks to Jae at the WDT for a good article.  However, the Times only has so much time and space, so here is the rest of the story.

Yup…it’s true.  At the same time of the Alexander solar zoning mess where a neighbor Mrs. Grogan got thrown under the zoning bus as an aggrieved party, Mr. Hirschey, the Cape Vincent Town Supervisor also had a similar illegal solar project up and running.  Although he did the right thing and took it down…for now!

And let me make it real clear...Mr. Hirschey IS NOT trying to hide this fact.  He on his own actually volunteered the information to me and then I FOILED town records. He is trying to do the right thing, but it appears he got caught sideways in a run amuck zoning crisis created by his very own  "zoning experts". 

However, that being said he is not completely blameless.  He can not simply skate free of all of this.  As town supervisor he still has a responsibility to continue to do the right thing, not just for his own personal solar project but for the integrity of our CV zoning law and process, and straighten out a complete zoning fiasco that appears to have over whelmed him. 

 Lest we not forget that another CV citizen was seriously hurt by a process he himself is now involved in under a law he promoted and approved. He can NOT just get his project approved and simply move on. I wish he would do the right thing for Mary Grogan too.  He has had 4 years to do that but has not so far.

Mr. Hirschey now has some very tough choices, and I hope he takes steps to clean up this mess and do the right thing.  First this seriously calls into question the competency of a number of his zoning officials. 

Here are the records on Hirschey's solar project from CV town files :

                                           Mr. Hirschey's original permit - 4/25/13.

But there is something really odd about the granting of this permit. Our law clearly shows that any residential ground mounted solar project should have a special use permit from the Zoning Board of Appeals.  The table is on page 12 of our new zoning law.  But our law makes his project illegal.  That after all that is why Mr. Hirschey took his project down.  But  if Hirschey and the ZBA are now trying to sell us that these big solar arrays are ok,  and residential, then  it needed a special use permit that it never got.  Then the ZBA can involve  the planning board to do a site plan review of the project as part of their SU permit approval. Apparently none of this ever happened.  Just like the original Alexander solar project also required a site plan review it didn't get either.

 I have looked through all the ZBA minutes for all of 2013.  Hirschey has NO application for a special use permit or approval of a special use permit from the ZBA.
NONE!!!  Why is that? 

Because ZEO Millington apparently just gave him a permit and said go ahead, no problem.  No matter which way you cut it or what excuse is applied that is a big violation of our zoning law.

No wonder Bob Brown of the planning board once caught up in this mess,  took it upon himself to do a little impromptu "educational session" (my ass)  during a PB meeting to try to explain away this whole special use permit fiasco.    And he didn't even get that right.

So how in the hell was the above  permit above ever granted?  Once again the rights of CV citizens were strangled by the town "zoning geniuses".  Apparently the new mode of operation of CV zoning!

  Official  verification the project was taken down.  But note the date of 10/10/13. My FOIL request was delivered only the day before, and I was given the records on 10/11/13.  I did request any records that showed the project had been take down. It looks like there weren't any and was a bit of scramble to have Millington actually produce a document that verified the project has been removed.  Probably not illegal...but real odd!

The above document is Mr. Hirschey now applying through the correct legal zoning process to the CV Zoning Board of Appeals for a variance since his project does not comply with the new CV zoning law.

But look at the top.  There is NO date or appeal number!  This is a legal document.  When I got it, it took some time to figure out when this was applied for.  Same as the Alexander permits...lots of things incomplete or missing.  Geeee... see a pattern here? Actually I think this makes this application invalid. 

No problem, according to ZBA member Joe Martin.  He says they aren't perfect, and so what if important legal documents are missing important information...you know... LIKE DATES!!! Last year, this year, ten years ago...no big deal!  I guess we are supposed to get a psychic to figure out the missing information.

In regards to the Alexander solar zoning and permit fiasco created by the town something began to really bother me.  It appeared instead of just admitting the mistake, correcting it and moving on,  the town zoning experts seemed to be going to extreme lengths to rationalize, justify, and sanitize an obviously screwed up process.  A process even they admit was wrong.  And each time they opened their mouths trying to justify what they had done it just made it worse.   Made me wonder what was going on. This was bizarre behavior for intelligent people!

I don’t like it when I am investigating something and  2+2 keeps coming up 5 … not 4.  It makes my antenna go up!

So I was viewing the video of the last part of the Cape Vincent  Zoning Board of appeals meeting where we tried to convince them to do the right thing and overturn the screwed up permits granted for this solar fiasco.  They refused, but that would be after  nearly all of them freely admitted it was done wrong, yet they STILL approved the permits in question.  I left the meeting in disgust and missed the last part.  But I got a quiet tip that I should view the video of what I missed.

Here is a link to Steve Weed video.

http://www.steveweedproductions.com/

One other thing is odd here.  Apparently according to some ZBA members, until now and on this issue NO video has ever  been done of ZBA meetings.  So why now????   Makes you wonder doesn’t it??? More oddities in the process.

Well I did view the video, and lo and behold they  are discussing a request  for a variance on a  permit for a solar project for the Town Supervisor Mr. Hirschey.

WHAT????  

The hearing on a  variance on Mr. Hirschey’s project will be at their Nov 4^th ZBA meeting.

But wait a minute… a variance request sometimes comes  AFTER a permit has been denied and you want to appeal that decision.  Hhhmmm…So I decided to FOIL ALL town zoning records regarding Mr. Hirschey’s solar project.

The records you see above verify that Mr. Hirschey had been granted a permit for his solar project  in April of 2013 under the NEW law. There were no excuses here that he had a permit from the old law like the goofy justifications of the Alexander project.  Then he took it down.  But why would  he take it down?  Because he recognized via the Alexander solar fiasco I had uncovered that his project was illegal.

So…where I thought we were dealing with one illegal solar project, we actually had two, and one belonged to the town supervisor.  YIKES!!!  AND when I notified Mr. Macsherry of the planning board that there was a problem with the Alexander permit they were about to approve, and that created the current controversy, apparently Mr. Hirschey actually dismantled his solar project and took it down.  Good for Urban...it was the right thing to do, and he showed far far better judgment than his "zoning experts" on the Alexander project. But now Hirschey has a big problem.

This whole thing will probably be costly to him as well to put up a project, take it down, and then possibly put it up again.  Too bad he couldn’t get his other "zoning experts" to do the right thing instead of throwing another CV citizen under the bus over the Alexander solar issue.  Even though they admit it was WRONG!

So in my opinion  the question becomes, were the CV zoning experts in severe spin and justification mode on the Alexander solar fiasco because they  KNEW (and they damn well DID know) Mr. Hirschey the town supervisor had an illegal solar project up and running as  well???  Actually I am not accusing them of doing that, but the sad part is that is the way it comes off.  Based on all the irrational behavior of the CV zoning officials on this issue it just doesn’t look good or pass the sniff test when you find out the supervisor also had an illegal project up at the same time and they (and other own officers) knew it!    And as with any political controversy they should have just come clean right up front and that would diffuse the problem.  But that is not what they did. 

And if you look at the ZBA video 10/7/13 it now appears they are willing to ignore a part of the law they consider confusing and apply the part they like to the Hirschey project.  They can not legally do that. Not to mention it makes this mess look worse for Hirschey and them.   If they think the law is messed up they have an obligation to notify the town board to amend the law.  They can’t just cherry pick the parts they want which would probably create more law suits.  And it is worse when it appears if they  are going to cherry pick the law on behalf of the supervisor’s project, when they just admitted the other solar project permits were wrong but threw another citizen who was complaining under the bus anyhow.

What a mess!!!

If the town board does choose  re-write the law, then Mr. Hirschey would definitely have to recuse himself from any discussion or voting on the revision.

 Now Mr. Hirschey is going through the proper legal zoning process to try to rectify his dilemma.  However, as  I said in a previous post…the real answer here is for Hirschey to call for a temporary moratorium on solar until they can re-write  the law if they think it is confusing. 

In addition I give him credit that actually before I did my digging into his permits, he actually told me personally what had happened with his project.  He was campaigning in my neighborhood, and came by my house.  We discussed the Alexander solar project and he told me about his project and that he took it down until the issue is resolved.

Now I am not writing this without having talked to Mr. Hirschey.  I have had several friendly conversations with him on the issue and I believe he has been forthcoming as best he can.  I have also offered him my blog to say anything he would like to explain what happened, not only on his project but on this whole zoning fiasco under his leadership and under the people he appointed.  It is the old "The Buck Stops Here Thing!" And his desk is definitely where the Buck stops in CV town govt!

In my opinion it appears his zoning geniuses on the planning board and zoning board of appeals, and particularly Mr. Millington the new CV  Zoning Enforcement Officer  have created a real severe political headache for Mr. Hirschey. They have him caught crosswise in a real zoning/political mess.   But let’s see what happens next.

He and the town board appointed the people who administer the law…and in my opinion on this issue they badly failed that responsibility, and a review should be done of their appointments and behavior, and training.

And don’t forget that Hirschey and his candidates and his supporters and blogs have been telling us over and over and over  how lucky we are to have these “zoning experts” and this  law they created with an expensive attorney is THE answer to the BIG wind issue and defeating BP and against Art X.  Yet the very process that they claim was supposed to protect us came completely apart when even a little pressure was applied to it. Not good... so we better hope BP just walks away clean!

Now we will see how Hirschey handles the rest of this mess.  This is not over yet.  And I will have more on it.   And also let’s not forget that what makes this worse is that one CV citizen Mrs. Mary Grogan was badly aggrieved over this, to which the town supervisor is now attached.  

Basically some heads need to roll! 

And Mrs Grogan had repeatedly begged Mr. Hirschey to do something about the other CV zoning mess…Alexander’s illegal private and dangerous wind turbine that looms over her house.  Yet after 4 years Hirschey and his “zoning experts” have done virtually NOTHNG about that!

I hope Mr. Hirschey will use my blog to explain his side of all of this.  The community needs to hear from it’s leader.  He emailed me last night wanting to know the address of my blog, and he has been invited by me to tell the whole story here. I assured him I will post what he says verbatim as long as it addresses the issue and is not a campaign promotion.  I also told him we need an immediate solar moratorium to clean up the zoning law if they think there are problems with it.

Stay tuned here because the other blogs aren't going to say a word about this. One of the most important issues to date, involving a major zoning crisis over our new zoning, with major implications and they are SILENT!!!

And who else in the Hirschey govt.  knew about this and joined the "faithful" and kept silent?????