Folks, let’s just go back to the May 2025 Sterling Annual Town Meeting and recall what the Sterling Planning Board, our Blow-In-Payroll-Patriot Town Planner from Framingham, the Select Board, and the Finance Committee ALL pushed—the re-zoning of “Performance Zone 1″ along Route 140 and Dana Hill Road to Commercial.
WHY? To encourage development there IN ODER TO INCREASE THE TAX BASE AND PROPERTY TAX REVENUES FOR THE TOWN OF STERLING. They got their way.
SO WHAT DID THE STERLING SELECT BOARD PUT ON THE NOVEMBER 2025 SPECIAL TOWN MEETING WARRANT???
NONE OTHER THAN COMPLETELY VAGUE, OVERBROAD, AND UNDEFINED ARTICLE 4–
https://www.sterling-ma.gov/sites/g/files/vyhlif1266/f/uploads/stm_warrant_final_2025.pdf
–that would permit the Select Board Cretins to enter into a SWEETHEART GIVEAWAY DEAL WHEREBY THE OWNER/DEVELOPER OF A PROPOSED, HAZARDOUS LITHIUM-ION BATTERY PARK OFF METROPOLITAN ROAD NEAR THE WACHUSETT RESERVOIR WOULD MAKE PAYMENTS TO THE TOWN OF STERLING “IN LIEU OF [PROPERTY] TAXES.”
IN OTHER WORDS, THE SELECT BOARD WANTS TO ENABLE THAT OWNER/DEVELOPER TO DODGE FULL, ASSESSED PROPERTY TAXES–POTENTIALLY FOREVER.
NOT ONLY IS THE SELECT BOARD COMPRISED OF TWO-FACED CRETINS—SO IS THE STERLING FINANCE COMMITTEE THAT ENDORSED THIS TAX DODGE BY A VOTE OF 6-1.
THE PROPOSED TAX DODGE IS BAD ENOUGH. THE FACT THAT LITHIUM-ION BATTERY PARKS ARE A FIRE HAZARD MAKES THIS SCAM EVEN WORSE.
Such a battery park has been proposed in the Town of Oakham, Massachusetts, in the Quabbin Reservoir Watershed.
This is what the Town of Oakham Fire Chief and some residents had to say about it:
“The potential is there. It’s not unprecedented.. we’ve seen fires at these storage facilities,” Danielle Stevens said. “It’s not unprecedented and it’s not old technology – some of these fires just happened this year.”
One of the biggest battery storage sites caught on fire back in January in Monterey County, California. The blaze forced 1,500 people to leave their homes. Fires have been reported at a handful of other battery storage facilities in California and New York over the past few years.
“No one could handle a fire in a place like this,” Oakham Fire Chief Timothy Howe said. “They burn for days. It doesn’t matter If you are a small town like us with an on-call fire department or a large 400-person department, you’re not putting it out.”
Howe said a battery fire in Oakham would be even worse because the town doesn’t have a public water system and relies on 20 volunteer firefighters.
But fire risk is still just one of the reasons the town is banning together to block the project.
Residents expressed concerns about the proposed site’s proximity to the Ware River Watershed, which runs into the Quabbin Reservoir.
“People need to understand that they might not know where Oakham is or have ever heard of the town before but this could impact a lot of people’s lives in a very, very difficult way,” the Stevens said.
Oakham residents said they worry the project would impact the drinking water for millions of Massachusetts residents who rely on the Quabbin Reservoir.
“If a fire did break out and there was run off into the ground, residents are going to lose their drinking water,” Howe said. “If we pollute that water, its not just us that is going to have a problem it is all of metro Boston.”
In a statement, Rhynland Energy told 7 Investigates, “The project is being developed in compliance with applicable state and federal regulations and includes modern safety systems designed to meet or exceed the established national standards.”
Brian O’Connor is a senior engineer at the National Fire Protection Association. He acknowledges that lithium-ion batteries can be hazardous.
“It generates toxic gas, flammable gas, has an explosion and fire potential, but these are things that regulations are constantly looking out for and trying to make sure that we’re mitigating and reducing these risks in a way that they can be acceptable to the community when they are installed,” O’Connor said.
SEE https://whdh.com/7-investigates/7-investigates-battery-park/
Check out the disastrous consequences of the Monterey, CA, lithium-ion battery park fire–
The Sterling Special Town Meeting has been rescheduled to 13 November 2025. Article 4 is yet another Warrant Article Sterling voters should vote to shitcan.
See you there!
J.G.
STERLING, MASSACHUSETTS, OVERWATCH 