Addison’s Council Successfully
Settles The Wind Turbine Lawsuit
By Susan M. Halpern
Former Addison Councilmember (1992-1999)
The terms of the wind turbine settlement have finally been announced, and they are favorable to Addison. The Town will essentially receive a refund, with the complete removal of the turbines and attendant repairs to the roof of the water tower. The staff did a great job describing the legal issue regarding recovery of attorney’s fees, and the current council (which inherited the whole mess) did a great job salvaging the situation and negotiating a good settlement. Addison can finally to put the issue to rest.
The negative spinners don’t know what to do. They can’t attack the settlement, because it’s a good one. And, they’ve lost their negative campaign issue. Out of sheer desperation, they have instead attacked me, falsely alleging that I was privy to the terms of the settlement before they were publicly announced. From that untrue premise, they incorrectly claim I was given information that was discussed in executive session. It is utter nonsense and all patently false. Truly, these people know no boundaries.
I knew what everyone knew: On February 27, 2018, the council made a motion to settle the lawsuit and the lawyers announced “settled” to the court. I learned the terms of the settlement when I read Addison’s newsletter last week. No one gave me information from an executive session.
So, what is the basis for the recklessly false accusations against me? Well, it revolves around my use of the word “finally” in a recent article, expressing my exasperation with the length of time it took to resolve the matter. In mid-April I took the negative spinners to task because they were disrespectful and rude at the Mayor’s recent coffee. They asked aggressive and hostile questions. They called Mayor Joe Chow “the man in the blue suit,” refusing to use his name or title. Then they cited their conduct as supposed evidence of general dissent, implicitly leading the reader to think that the rudeness had been spontaneous. When it was all staged. Then, I predicted that the same folks would use the same tactics at the upcoming Town Hall meeting, with one subject being “the wind turbine lawsuit that has (finally) been settled.”
The negative spinners have now twisted that wording to support their false narrative. They write that a “reader” (unnamed, of course, and likely non-existent) found it “interesting” that I “was somehow able to report the final settlement” before it was publicly announced. Note the change from what I wrote (the lawsuit has (finally) been settled) to their wording (final settlement). They are two different things.
It’s a long, tortured jump to get from what I wrote to the utterly false allegation that somehow I knew the terms of the settlement. These accusations have no basis in fact whatsoever, and they are malicious.
Such nonsense is beneath Addison. But it demonstrates yet again why it is so important to exercise our vote to keep Addison moving in the right direction.
The Addison Way is finally back, and we have to keep moving forward.