By Beth David
We’ve got a jam-packed issue for you this week, and a jam-packed weekend coming up, including the fall encampment at Fort Phoenix (see page 10)
Now, I’ve said it before, and I’m willing to bet that I’ll say it again: If you have never seen the cannons fired off at dusk, you need to get there! It is a spectacular sight.
This encampment will be a bit different, especially for the militia members. They lost one of their own with the death of Frank Mathieu last week.
Frank was quite the character. He let me shoot off his pistol one year. That was cool. He was also a contributor to the Neighb News cause, donating to the paper just a couple of months ago, even though he was sick.
I know he enjoyed reading the paper, and, as a writer, that just tickles my fancy. He was also just a fun guy to run into at various events, or at a restaurant here or there.
People like Frank make having this paper the kind of fun that it is. I get to meet people like him all the time.
He will be missed, not just by his militia pals, but by all the people who attended the many events he was part of.
We’ll be thinking about you as those cannons blast, Frank.
We’ve got some meeting coverage for you this week. On page 3, you’ll find a story on the Marine Resources Committee. Go figure, just as they finish up those rules and regs on aquaculture, Rod Taylor goes and gets himself kicked out of his own company.
Life is funny, huh?
On page 4, you’ll find the Selectboard story, with a little more detail on those rules and regs.
I know aquaculture is supposed to be the cool thing, but, I still think it’s a rip-off for the public.
It’s a classic case of a public resource being taken for private gain. It’s a land grab (okay….a water grab), and it’s public land (okay, water) that’s taken. It’s not fair that we can’t kayak and boat on acres of water because someone has a business there. The lease cost is an insult.
Even if we do get to bump it up to the maximum $200 a year, it will still be a rip-off.
Imagine if a flower farmer got the right to use a corner of Cushman Park to grow flowers because that was the only place he could grow his special crop, and that would mean we could not use that part of the park because he had his flower garden there. People would go nuts. No one would stand for that. But because aquaculture is in the water, somehow that makes it okay.
I don’t know whose idea this whole aquaculture thing was, but it was a bad one.
I hope the town’s rules and regs help to keep them to a minimum. The ocean belongs to all of us. It shouldn’t be roped off and made off limits to create huge profits for a corporation while the rest of us get relegated to what’s left.
That’s it for this week, Folks.
Please consider a donation to the Neighb News so we can continue to keep you informed of all the local news you need.
Until next week then…see ya,
Click to download the entire 9/22/16 issue: 09-22-16-issbaysidebikerun
