Critical Thinkers Wanted!

As you enter the auditorium to listen to the Vision Task Force Report a handful of selected people have developed for Wilbraham, please consider and do not lose sight of the following: The headline for the project as posted on the towns website is:
It is easier to fool somebody than to convince him that he has been fooled Mark Twain

RE- IMAGINING WILBRAHAM: Our Vision | Our Future

This clearly indicates that there are changes planned for our town. If you like Wilbraham for being a cozy single family bedroom community, a quiet place to raise a family and send your kids to school, and a place where your neighbor lives far enough away so you dont have to like his kind of music or cooking, make sure you understand the changes which are being introduced here as being part of what the people want. The ultimate goals are for the most part not being openly discussed and they will fundamentally change the character of our town. While the members of the Vision Task Force will tout the great participation of towns people in this process, please know that they have been unwilling to share any of the actual information gathered through their process. To date nobody has been allowed to review questionnaires that have been complete, they will be released after these meetings. The information as presented was prepared under the leadership of a chairman who was handpicked and appointed as chair by the Planning Board. The same person serves as chair for the Open Space Committee, another component of the new Master Plan for Wilbraham. While this will not be presented as a Master Plan, the process is clearly laid out on the Towns website: Visioning Process is Phase 1 and the Master Plan is Phase 2 of the process. In Phase 2 the Planning Board will formulate a Comprehensive Plan based on the values and goals of the community vision. The Comprehensive Plan will contain an action plan with specific goals, delegated responsibilities, and timetables and benchmarks to measure progress. You will hear talk about an Action Plan, and promises to implement what has been defined as indispensable goals for Wilbraham. This will be presented with great urgency, there is no time to waste!

THE ROAD TO HELL IS PAVED WITH GOOD INTENTIONS! We can have bike paths, open space, and small shops, and still preserve the character of our town while preserving the opportunity of the American Dream of owning your own home to our children and grandchildren. Lets preserve and use our much praised and envied Open Town Meeting form of local government and shape the future of our town as we have for the past 250 years!

Inform yourself!
Google these terms and find out what some Wilbraham "do-gooders" are buying into. They may be clueless or they may be dishonest about their ultimate motives, but the outcome will be the same.

Have you ever heard of: Sustainable Development?

- designed to sound like something everyone wants, it is never mentioned who decides what development is and isn't sustainable or based on what data. .

Valley Vision 4?
- the Pioneer Valley Planning Commissions plan on implementing progressive principles aligning the commissions member communities to Agenda 21.

Mass House Bill 3216?

- the legislatures attempt to regulate Smart Growth and Sustainable Development by giving legal authority to local Master Plans.ing legal authority to local master plans.

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YOU Wilbraham Master Plan PVPC Valley Vision 4 HUD/DOT/EPA
The Pioneer Valley Planning Commission (PVPC), in partnership with the Capitol Regional Council of Governments of Hartford, was awarded a $4.2 million Regional Sustainable Communities Grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. This award is being used to implement a bi-state Knowledge Corridor Regional Plan for Sustainable Development in the Springfield and Hartford regions. It is a major implementation strategy for Agenda 21 on a regional basis, bypassing local and even state governments, and empowering unelected bureaucrats to decide on factors which affect every aspect of our lives. Richard L. Butler of Wilbraham is the current Chairman of the PVPC and has been a Commissioner for about 30 years. During the same time frame he has been a member of the Town of Wilbraham Planning Board, about half the time as Chairman. Is it possible for a human being to serve two masters for half a lifetime and not lose sight of whose interests are truly represented when the action of one may disagree with the action of the other? As an elected official of Wilbraham he is charged with the representation of property rights and interests of Wilbraham taxpayers. Yet, there is no Open Forum for residents to address the Planning Board at their public meetings. As the Chairman of the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission he is beholden to federal and state bureaucracies who offer grant money and in return expect the full alignment of the Commissions work with the expectations of people who do not live here and are not concerned with our wellbeing. There is a direct conflict of interest for Mr. Butler any time the interests of Wilbraham do not align with the interests of the PVPC. When the Planning Board gave special permit to Kent Pecoy to add three 3-story buildings housing 30 families each at Cedar Ridge, do you think Mr. Butler represented the best interest of the residents of Wilbraham or do you think he worked to implement the larger plan of the PVPC, as dictated by federal dollars? (Cedar Ridge received a Smart Growth award from the PVPC!).

Sustainable Development
THE SMART GROWTH FRAUD
For decades urban planners have adhered to the mantra that urban sprawl increases pollution and housing costs, more driving time to work and shopping, stress, and the escalating consumption of scarce farmland and open space. Urban planning to implement what Al Gore calls smart growth supposedly corrects these problems and creates more livable, inexpensive homes for all. Irrefutable evidence, however, shows that urban planning creates the very nightmares it is supposed to eliminate. In the process, it strips urbanites of one of their most fundamental civil liberties property rights. ( Michael S. Coffman, Ph.D., July 15,
2003, NewsWithViews.com)

Designed to sound like something everyone wants, never mentioned is who decides what development is and isn't sustainable. The purposes of the "sustainable development" agenda are to limit people's ability to use their own land as they see fit, to severely curtail people's energy consumption, and to cram people into metropolitan centers (stack 'em and pack 'em) while prohibiting development outside of "approved" land areas, what these "smart growth" planners call "suburban sprawl," as if land development is a bad thing. The agenda aims to corral people into such close quarters that they will be encouraged to walk or use a bicycle everywhere they go instead of drive those evil cars. Whatever your agenda, sustainable development to the rescue.