Spitting Into the Wind

  Remarks to the Prince William Planning Commission: October 12, 2022 My name is Bill Wright and I live in Gainesville.   I oppose the conduct of the Planning Commission, specifically as demonstrated during your public hearings of September 14 th and 28 th . I am not complaining about a difference of opinion, which you are entitled to have.   I am taking issue with suppression of evidence, an abrogation of due process and a disregard for public input.   I also believe it is probable that your decision-making process is unduly affected by political considerations which override factual ones. On the subject of suppression of evidence, I supplied verifiable information to the commissioners and the Planning Office on multiple occasions that the county was reaching the upper limit of the forecasted demand for data centers without the Prince William Digital Gateway.   With Stack Infrastructure’s recent announcement to develop a total of four million square fee...

  Remarks to the Prince William Board of County Supervisors: October 11, 2022 My name is Bill Wright and I live in Gainesville.   I oppose the Prince William Digital Gateway.   In my brief time in Prince William County, I’ve come to the conclusion that our government needs a lot of remedial training.   But I’ll admit to one area where we are absolute world beaters.   Pitting neighbor against neighbor. East versus west, black versus white, Democrat versus Republican.   It’s hard to keep track of the division our elected leaders try to stoke and exploit as a means to advance their preferred program.   Insincerely feigning sympathy for one group while demonizing another must be some kind of market-tested strategy because it is employed repeatedly and in the most laughably transparent manner. You may think this provides cover for your true objectives but it really exposes your self-serving motives since the intended beneficiaries are yourselves, no...

  Remarks to the Prince William Planning Commission: September 28, 2022 My name is Bill Wright and I live in Gainesville.   I oppose the land use chapter update being pushed through in a single evening.   Your recommendation must be deferred until there is greater public understanding of what is being proposed.   Like maybe discuss it with affected residents. The Planning Commission should be smarting from the public rebuke it received for its sham hearing on the Prince William Digital Gateway just two weeks ago.   Have you learned anything from that experience?   Possibly not, because here we are again poised to quickly run extraordinarily impactful changes past an uninformed public. The land use chapter is an exhaustive document that the average citizen cannot possibly digest and review in a single evening.    It is too important and sweeping to be thoroughly understood and commented upon tonight.   A cursory review of this complex ...

  Remarks to the Prince William Planning Commission: September 21, 2022 My name is Bill Wright and I live in Gainesville.   I oppose the Prince William Digital Gateway and would like to lodge a complaint about your conduct of the September 14 th public hearing. Before the hearing convened, I approached the dais where Gainesville Commissioner Berry and Vice Chair McPhail were standing.   I handed them a copy of an e-mail I had previously sent to the Chair and the clerk that contained excerpts from the Planning Commission by-laws limiting the public comments of applicants during public hearings.   Despite this, a large number of applicants were permitted to speak, pre-empting the input of over 80 non-applicants, who were unable to remain until their opportunity came in early morning hours. The whole concept of who the applicant is became muddled.   The CPA application says it is Mary Ann Ghadban, who was also permitted to speak during what was supposed to b...

  Remarks to the Prince William Board of County Supervisors: September 20, 2022 My name is Bill Wright and I live in Gainesville.   I oppose the Prince William Digital Gateway.   Supervisors are perfectly entitled to disagree with me on the merits of this proposal.   What they are not entitled to do is stonewall legitimate citizen inquiries, suppress evidence, dismiss responsible precautions and otherwise use their influence to subvert what is supposed to be an impartial review process.   The applicants are entitled to advocate for their interests.   They are not entitled to collude with public officials, advertise improper proffers or present false motives to elicit public support. Any lingering doubt trusting souls might have had about how seriously impaired this CPA review process is went out the window with that comically pre-ordained Planning Commission public hearing.   Reason and judgme...

  Remarks to the Prince William Planning Commission: September 14, 2022 My name is Bill Wright and I live in Gainesville.   It’s time for closing arguments against the Prince William Digital Gateway.   There are too many unanswered questions. 1) Needlessness .   Prince William County already has more data center capacity operating or under development than the Camoin report said would be needed for the next twenty years.   Our government shamelessly withholds this information under the guise of non-disclosure agreements that place the greed of QTS and Compass above our citizens’ right to transparency. 2) Water Quality . The Fairfax County Planning Department, Fairfax Water Authority, the Prince William County Department of Public Works, the Prince William County Watershed Management Branch, the Washington Post and others have warned of the risks.   Our supervisors deny and deflect. 3) Noise .   Documented problems with excessive noise at Amazon...

  Remarks to the Prince William Board of County Supervisors: September 13, 2022 My name is Bill Wright and I live in Gainesville.   I oppose the Prince William Digital Gateway.   I am still trying to figure out how you do things here in Prince William County.   I lived in a number of places during my time in the Navy, but this place has me stumped. This is the first place I’ve known where the government seems to have declared war on its own citizens.   Normally you’d think that wasn’t a good long-term strategy, especially since elected officials depend on popular support to sustain them.   There must be some masochistic expectation that the people appreciate punishment.   More likely, some appreciate others being punished. How else can you justify the odd phenomenon practiced here, which I’ll call “revenge zoning”?   As it’s been explained to me, every so often those in power get to choose which region is due for a measure of civic vandali...