Pownal Citizens for Democracy

Pownal Citizens: Please sign the petition online or in person at the Village Market.

 

We have the right to say no. This is our town.

Empower Pownal, Second Meeting:
On July 25th there will be a “dot vote” which is an illegitimate way to vote for anything that will drastically change our town. We need to make sure that decisions about Pownal are being made by the people of Pownal.
This project is being sold to us as “trails, playgrounds and farmer’s markets”. There is a cost to everything and it should be up to the people of the town to discuss and then decide what they are willing to pay for or give up to achieve the goals of outsiders.
We are being told that we can not vote ‘no’ on any initiatives from this upcoming meeting. How is that a democracy? It’s not about wind until they install turbines on your property. It’s not about eminent domain until they want to cut a hiking trail through your back yard for the public to use and then tell you you cant hunt or use your ATV there anymore for the “better good of all”.
What is the Climate Economy Model Community Program (aka Empower Pownal)?
This is a new program created by the VCRD (a not for profit) that brings a large team of "experts" to our town to lead discussions. These discussions are being advertised as the "the town" coming together to democratically decide what it wants. However, the goals of the program are to build a "climate economy", and to encourage projects that combat climate change by using something called smart growth, regardless of what we want as a town.
What is smart growth?
Smart growth is an urban planning and transportation theory that concentrates growth in compact walkable urban centers to avoid sprawl. The term 'smart growth' is particularly used in North America.
Smart Growth is one of the goals of Empower Pownal. This means that development of new housing will happen in town centers, and measures will be taken to "encourage" you to move off of your land into one of these central areas. They are specifically targeting the trailer parks. This can be done a few ways…through extreme taxation, taking over all or part of your land through eminent domain and/or creating new zoning laws that controls how you use your own land, building subsidized compact housing that they will encourage us to move into. This can also be referred to as social engineering with a definition of: “management of human beings in accordance with their place and function in society”

We, the undersigned request that no action be taken on any individual initiative that comes out of the Climate Economy Model Communities program’s “dot voting” exercise on July 25th and that no town resources (human or financial) are used until the Select Board holds a town wide vote by referendum with a yes/no legal and democratized vote on each initiative