Last night the ‘Grok was invited to attend the Rochester City Council meeting as it sought Public Input on its signing onto the NH version of the Federal Government’s Sustainable Communities Initiative (“SCI”, also known locally as The Granite State Future Plan). The folks in Rochester have already been through a previous expensive Federal boondoggle – NSP which tried to inject Federal money to get local communities to spruce up neighborhoods.
Rochester bailed out of that “strings attached” program, learning that it was costing the City more than it was worth. Now the folks in Rochester and surrounding communities, as well as some folks that have been to the NH Regional Planning Commission (“RPCs”) that have taken this money to “forward” the Federal wishes of EPA, DOT, and HUD and their “transformational social engineering” at the municipality level, pleaded with the City Council not to get involved.
One was Warren Groen. A local Energy Star home builder (and NH State Rep), he explained how the once voluntary program is now becoming mandatory. What were once “suggestions” have now been codified into the building codes (yeah, voluntary my butt!) – and that what is being done there by the bureaucrats in EPA and NH will be the same modus operandi with new “suggested” zoning ordinances. Here, he tells the story via the common bathroom fan:
Sigh. Think about it – is there no pretext by which bureaucrats won’t stoop to simply because they think we’re too stupid to do the right thing for ourselves? Decreeing more and more expensive regulations on a fan simply because they believe we think its too loud to use? What’s next – how much water we can use in the bathroom for showering and…oh wait!
They’ve already gone there…
