Sears Island - MDOT's $100K search for containerport wannabes got zero responses

Looks like our lawsuits have been doing their work well: MDOT got No responses to its Sears Island RFEI (Request for Expression of Interest. This according to the following letter to the editor in the Free Press by Steve Miller: (links & map added for clarity)

"According to Maine Port Authority chief John Henshaw, MDOT "received no responses to our [Sears Island] RFEI by the November 25 deadline." The Request For Expression of Interest RFEI (34 page pdf ) was prepared for MDOT by California consultant Moffat and Nichol at a cost of $100,000.

Hired by MDOT in July, Henshaw said then that the response to the Moffat and Nichol RFEI "will help the state determine what kind of interest there is in developing a port on the island, as well as what the current needs of the marine transportation industry are, given the state of the economy. That will tell us what ultimately ought to be built there and when."

Given that there were absolutely no responses to the RFEI, it would appear that those who argue that Sears Island cannot economically support a container port are correct.

For example, Chop Hardenbergh, editor of Atlantic Northeast Rails and Ports, who spoke to the tugboat pilots organization in May of this year, said, "No new container terminal is needed in Searsport." He went on to say, "Studies claiming we need a new terminal in Searsport start with questionable assumptions, miss the boat on local need and port congestion elsewhere, over-estimate the value of rail capability, and anticipate a tsunami of traffic that is a mirage."

It is unclear what MDOT will do with the 350-acre portion of Sears Island set aside for possible port development now that it is known there is zero marine industry interest in building a container terminal on Sears Island."

Stephen Miller, Islesboro Islands Trust"

END

Sears Island - A guilty Sierra Club flees the spotlight

WERU's recent effort to convene a Sears island panel in Bucksport featuring supporters and defenders of the state's divide-the-island initiative fell flat, when Sierra Club (and other NGOs who facilitated the state's "deal" splitting the island) fled in all directions, unavailable for speaking engagements or even for comment!

Sierra Club of Maine's leaders are suddenly all "too busy" with other concerns to spend time justifying their incredible sellout of Maine's biggest undeveloped island. Ditto for Steve Miller and Becky Bartovics. Not available for comment.

Why? Because the one hope, the one thin straw that Sierra Club of Maine, Islesboro Islands Trust & the other sellouts clung to, banked on - that the state of Maine would take a loooong time to decide if Mack Pt was container-portable -has been dashed.

Since June 15th in fact, when these eco-yups were told "No, it isn't suitable unless Irving Oil and Sprague Energy move out" at a secret MDOT mtg in Belfast where engineers from Fay, Spofford and Thorndike did a presentation on their report to MDOT.

To their dishonor, these guardians of the public interest did not then see fit to alert the public as to this fact. and to the looming assault on the west side of the island and its adjoining fish nursery shoals.

So will these three greenish groups honor the agreement they signed with great fanfare alongside of Governor Baldacci and the shipping industry? That agreement endorses a "marine transportation project" on Sears Island, if Mack Pt didn't fly.

Mack Point didn't fly. This was the entirely predictable result of the study, carried out by MDOT's hired consultant Fay, Spofford& Thorndike.

So what do Ken Cline and Joan Saxe of Sierra Club (Maine chapter) do? What will Steve Miller of the Islesboro Islands Trust do? Becky Bartovics who repped both Sierra Club and tiny "Penobscot Bay Alliance" at the Sears Island meetings with government and industry; what will she do? All three signed the agreement. Will their honor make them stand by as the state attacks the western side of the island and its wild groundfish nursery? Or rather, their cupidity.

They ARE busy. Still meeting monthly with government & industry. Money is starting to flow. Judging by the vigor with which green sprawl on Sears Island is moving ahead, the Sierra Club, Islesboro IslandsTrust and their greenwash entity called "Friends of Sears Island" are okay with the industrial port plan. They are getting each their pound of Wasumkeag's flesh.

John Muir's ghost warns Maine Sierra Club: don't side with port sprawl!

The spirit of Sierra Club founder John Muir - shown here awarding the Maine Sierra Club Chapter his Rubber Duck Award for "Quack Environmentalism"- joined our band of grassroots activists last week outside the Maine governor's mansion in Augusta. (photos here).

Inside, Governor Baldacci, Sierra Club and assorted hangers-on were receiving the 2009 Down East Environmental Award from the publisher of a local magazinethat is funded largely by real estate developers.

Muir loudly dressed down (short mp3) the present day Maine Sierra Club Chapter and its henchpersons: Islesboro Island land Trust, Maine Coast Heritage Trust and a handful of astroturn green groups for colluding with Big Government, Big Green and Big Trade in an attack on Sears Island, located at the top of Penobscot Bay in Midcoast Maine.

This latest skirmish brought to the state capital our fight to keep the western third of 940 acre wild Sears island from being turned into railyard and container port, and our estuary's nursery shoals from being blasted and dredged to let container ships come close to the island.
Did you know the difference between the old "New England Sierra Club chapter" that protected Sears Island through state and federal courts in the 1980s and early 90s, and the present day "Maine Sierra Club Chapter" that received an award for signing off on the dismemberment plan? As late as early 2008, Sierra Club Maine supported protecting ALL of Sears Island

So we go to Augusta on a hot May 22nd to challenge the Governor's Sears Island "environmental award" ceremony! Nature was on our side: way too hot to close the mansion's windows. Attendees at the Governor's Sears Island whackers award ceremony could hear our power bullhorned taunts and imprecations, and could see the coffined Rachel Carson speaking from the grave and the ghost, too of Sierra club founder John Muir, who gave Sierra Club a Rubber Duck award for "quack environmentalism".
The Kennebec Journal covered our protest as did WBZ TV.  In addition, Maine Public Radio included us in their coverage of the award event,    

MDOT may use stimulus money to destroy Searsport's Long Cove Ledge and Sears Island fish nursery to help container ships,

The date was fitting. On Friday the 13th of March, the Legislature's Transportation Committee was given a plan by MDOT Commissioner Cole to use 10.5 million dollars of federal stimulus money to (1) destroy a third of the Wasumkeag Fish Nursery's juvenile cod habitat with dredging, and (2) use explosives to destroy a nearby ledge used by salmon and other fish during their brackish transitions between river and bay.

Here's a 7 minute excerpt Cole and Damon are going back and forth about using a chunk of MDOT $timulus money for dredging near Sears island (mp3 file) And about giving money to Montreal Maine Atlantic railroad, and about blowing up the Long Cove Ledge for easier shipping.

The attack on the estuary would come in two waves: dredging out the the northern most sheltered third of the Nursery shoal, and using explosives to destroy Long Cove Ledge - a shoaling ledge only 1 foot deep near its southern end, used by wild salmon during their Switchover from salt to fresh and vice versa.

Click here for the complete 20 minute recording of Cole and staff talking to the transportation committee about stimulus money for many projects, on March 13, 2009.