Opposes gas-expansion project
I am writing in response to the T&G article “Healey’s plan could relieve high gas rates,” published Feb. 19.The 20%-plus increase in the price of natural gas is another increase that Massachusetts ratepayers can’t afford. While the utility company, Eversource, is blaming these increases on the MassSave program, this program helps to lower energy usage and reduces the need for expensive infrastructure projects to distribute gas in the future.
Ironically, while MassSave is helping to increase efficiency and reduce the need for infrastructure projects in the future, Eversource has expressed interest in participating in Project Maple, a gas pipeline expansion project in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York and Rhode Island, proposed by the fossil fuel company Enbridge in 2023.
“Natural gas” is an industry-created pseudonym for methane, which is 80 times more potent at warming the planet than carbon dioxide over a 20-year period. Why would Eversource support a new pipeline at the same time MassSave will help reduce energy needs in the future? The simple answer is profits. Eversource is guaranteed a profit on infrastructure improvements. If built, the cost of this new pipeline, plus a profit, will be passed along to ratepayers in future years.
If Governor Healey wants to reduce rates and help Massachusetts reach its greenhouse gas reduction targets, she should strongly oppose Project Maple and other “natural gas” expansions.
Denis Mahoney, Holden
Traffic snarls near Kelley Square
The traffic light timing issues at the I-290 off-ramp into Kelley Square are unfair and poorly sequenced. The Vernon Street lights at Exit 17 last for only about 20 seconds before changing to red. Meanwhile, the two main lights at that same Vernon Street intersection exceed 2½ minutes. I timed them recently with a stopwatch. That’s ridiculous. People avoid taking the Kelley Square exit because of it, which only snarls traffic elsewhere. I should not have to wait on that off-ramp for 12 minutes to finally make my way to work.
Compounding the problem is the Ward Street side road pouring out onto the Exit 17 off-ramp itself, which has to be one of the strangest traffic configurations I’ve ever seen in Massachusetts outside of inner-city Boston. Ward Street causes huge delays on that off-ramp as drivers try to pull out into both turning lanes.
If you are going to allow Vernon Street drivers and buses almost three minutes to drive north and south over I-290, then Ward Street drivers should also be using that same main road instead. Perhaps they could take Endicott over to Millbury Street as an alternative? There are any number of ways Ward Street could be rerouted by changing around several one ways in the Kelley Square area.
But let’s start with making the light timing fairer for all users at the Exit 17 intersection.
Tim Kane, Brookfield
Goodbye to drama in W. Boylston
Congrats to the Select Board of West Boylston for ending the contract for the newly hired town administrator. They could see the writing on the wall that this small town didn’t need the drama.
If the Worcester City Council and the mayor could take a page out of the playbook in West Boylston, that would eliminate most of the nonsense going on in their chambers.
It’s time society takes a step back and stops the enabling. We are all different, that’s not breaking news.
Let’s get back to the business of what is important: that is to make our lives better minus the drama.
Last I checked, Adam and Eve were the only two in the garden.
Dan Henderson, Spencer
True hero mistreated
Today I am ashamed to be an American. I just witnessed two cowards – Trump, Putin’s puppet, and Vance, Trump’s puppet – mistreat a true hero. They humiliated and disrespected President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Their behavior is despicable. They essentially have greenlighted more death and destruction of Ukraine. It is unethical, immoral and borderline criminal. This administration, its allies and supporters are very dangerous. Trump and his other deputy Musk will likely pull Starlink next. Our world is not a reality TV game show or card game. What have we become? Today’s performance is the last straw for me.
Dean B. Lacoff, Clinton
Extortionist in Oval Office
Five weeks of watching Trump and his rogues gallery of a cabinet dismantle the federal government is not good for one’s health. Domestically, his policy pursuits will devastate our country. What concerns me now is Trump’s love affair with Putin’s Russia. Trump tried to extort Zelenskyy in 2017 to initiate a sham investigation into Biden’s corruption in Ukraine, a totally debunked accusation. Now he is trying to extort Zelenskyy again. Trump’s pitch is you give us your precious metals and we will give you ???? something, but apparently no weaponry. Trump thinks Zelenskyy owes the US. The reverse is the truth. We have given Ukraine money (most of which has stayed in the US with our defense industry). Ukraine has given their blood, more than a fair exchange. Our extortionist POTUS should be called out for what he is.
Timothy Dada, Charlton
Founding Fathers would be appalled
Lately, doesn’t one often pine for some pure, old-fashioned patriotism? I found myself hearkening back to Paul Revere’s intrepid midnight rides, warning Colonists of impending British forces, “One if by land, two if by sea!” What daring!
Yet many Americans think we’re under siege now. Forces of Elon Musk, claiming to be “eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse,” are dismantling institutions, policies, and values that defined our long experiment in democracy. So why aren’t more of us screaming: “One if by disinformation, two if by photo-op, three if by pink slip”? Otherwise, this upheaval and pain may soon make our country unrecognizable.
For who could imagine President Zelenskyy getting badgered by President Trump and JD Vance or USAID workers being given 15 minutes to clear out or 18 US Inspectors General getting sacked without cause? To claim all this is legitimate because “elections have consequences” is to yield to a purge. The assault on federal employees and programs seems based on political nihilism: the claim that government is so flawed it must be destroyed; or it’s all a pretext to pass massive tax breaks for insiders.
Either way, the Founding Fathers would be appalled. And hopefully more of us will insist reasonable cost-cutting and functioning government can co-exist — and soon!
R. Jay Allain, Orleans
This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: Letters to the editor
