To the editor:

Highland Wind came to our town two and a half years ago with a plan that sounded exciting on the surface.

Angus King and Robert Gardiner made a proposal to the people of Highland Plantation to build a massive wind turbine plant here, and the financial benefits they pledged seemed to be an answer to prayers. Just a couple of years earlier, our property tax rate had been among the highest in the state — if not the highest.

Naturally, locals had questions; because when something seems too good to be true, it usually is. Neighbors began to look into this topic, and we realized it was far more controversial and complicated than we believed.

After a long, careful process, the majority of the residents in Highland Plantation signed petitions opposing Highland Wind’s project.

We hoped that would be the end of it. After all, their website stated, “ Independence Wind only selects wind power sites that meet all important criteria. Perfect characteristics in one category cannot offset unsatisfactory scores in another category.

In other words, only sites that achieve acceptable ratings across the board will be pursued.”

And one of those “important criteria?” The last bullet point on their website listed “acceptability to local communities” as being critical to their wind development plans.

The website has since been removed. We saved a copy of it before that happened.

We hope the owners of Independence Wind stand by their word. We would like them to tell us they will not build their industrial wind facility here.

Patrice Drummond

Highland Plantation