Archive: Opinions

As people speak in favor of and against the Lansing Sewer project I have been struck by the argument that the Town should wait until it has a completed comprehensive plan.  The sewer and other projects should be put on hold while this important document is developed, the argument goes, and only brought back if the plan calls for it.  The comprehensive plan may be completed at the end of this year, so nothing should go forward until then.

The thing is, the town already has a comprehensive plan.  Sure, it is being updated.  The new version will have some new ideas, but it is not being created from scratch.  So to say we have to wait to do anything until we have a plan ignores a lot of hard work citizens have already done, and ignores the larger picture that the old plan addresses (and the new plan will address better).  Building a sewer is in keeping with this plan, and is very likely to be be in keeping with the updated version.

Sewer is not a new idea in Lansing.  There have been at least two other attempts to bring sewer to the town over the past few decades.  Those projects failures had nothing to do with following a comprehensive plan, which they did do.  They had everything to do with the projects being too expensive.

The 2011 Town Center iniative revealed wide support for the idea with many different people weighing in.  While not a comprehensive plan, the work of that committee will certainly be folded into the revised plan, as it was an offshoot of the old one.  A town center is not realistic without sewer.  Also 2011 was only two years ago, not ten, so that initiative still has pretty strong legs.

Realistically, if this circle is allowed to prevail nothing will ever get done.  There is always just one more thing that needs to be done before you do something important.  The Sewer Committee itself has been spending the past several weeks coming up with little things that might hurt the project's chances and trying to address each one.  Even going over the project with a fine tooth comb is not going to find everything, because no time is ever perfect and no project is, either.

My suspicion is that if you are against sewer because the Comprehensive Plan COmmittee isn't finished with its work there will never be a right time to build it.  If you are for it this is the perfect time, especially in light of onerous tax rises that are predicted in part beause of the dramatic devaluation of the local power plant, and in part beause of state and federal school aid reductions.

The argument is that we need planned development to increase the tax base in such a way that we end up with the town we want while continuing to afford to live in it.  Development to increase the tax base to make up for school and municipal revenue loss.  Planned so that we don't end up with sprawl such as strip malls fronting northern farmland.

WHile we can't know what the final version of the updated comprehensive plan will say, we probably know more or less what it will be.  Town committees made up of citizens post their agendas on the Town Web site, and are available at the Town Hall.  They are not functioning in a vacuum.  Anybody can go to their meetings or read the minutes to find out what they are up to.  And people talk.  After all, Lansing is still a small town.  So we have a good idea of what we folks think even if we don't have a fully updated plan at this point.

There are a lot of good reasons to build a sewer now, and some good reasons not to.  It is either going to pass in a vote later this year or not.  Now is when sewer is happening, and rightly so.

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