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Show By Jack Wallis The first amendment to the Constitu-M Constitu-M states, "Congress shall make no i respecting an establishment of eligion, or prohibiting the free exer- thereof, or abridging the freedom 'speech, or of the press ; or the right of people peaceable to assemble, and petition the Government for a 'dress of grievances." The interpretation of this amendment "d its literal meaning has been the "bject for much debate. Almost every k we see the wisdom for providing is that insure individual freedom of gion, press and speech, but not so Hen do we see demonstrated the im-"tance im-"tance of the freedom of the people to wceabily assemble. Last week after attending the public Ming concerning the problems entered en-tered locally with aerial spraying foe control of alfalfa weevil and slening to the second hand informa- concerning the public meeting held Dinosaur, Colorado concerning the ltin8 of a large power plant, we see i more clearly the wisdom for and meaning of "to peaceable fcmble". Sometimes these meetings Anything but peaceable. At the meeting concerning the promts pro-mts encountered in aerial spraying, as a confrontation between those j have experienced physical prop's pro-p's and frustration and financial on one side and those who depend 'aerial spraying to protect their , Ps. Also represented were those who i"e business out of spraying and "cing the chemicals used in spray's- e center of the argument were wentatives from the various Ration agencies. One side express-" express-" concern abput better reeulation of mIl paying, the other side maintain-mat maintain-mat everything possible was being ! nd that the present laws were be-iS! be-iS! strictly complyed with. To the out-j out-j r, the person not directly involved, 11 be hard to tell which side was i:. or partly right and partly wrong. 'Jjre are still many unanswered Uons that even those who study it essionally can't answer. There are i exceptions to studies that have made. About all those involved L. is lo Eive the experts more lce and let them weigh the pros eons of aerial spraying. Then let T Pecialists come up with restric-jn restric-jn ' and regulations that will best r' general public. Ve Dinosaur, Colorado public un8 concerning where to build the Deseret Generation and Transmission Cooperative's Moon Lake power plant, we were told it had a lopsided attendance atten-dance of over 200 from Colorado favoring favor-ing the Rangely site to only three persons per-sons from Vernal favoring the Bonanza site. Many arguments were given by the Colorado people stressing reasons why the 400 megawatt generating plant should be sited near Rangely. Deseret Generation has favored the Bonanza site as the preferred site. Much expense has gone into the planning plann-ing for this site. The reason for the Utah site preferrence has been the uncertainty uncertain-ty of the water requirements at Rangely Range-ly and the environmental problems in Colorado. To begin with the Utah site was chosen because Colorado did not want the plant in its state, especially if most of the power was going out of state. Air quality restrictions in Colorado were more restrictive than Utah and even thoueh a mine-mouth plant at Rangely would te more practical, the problems appeared too great, so the preterrence was the Bonanza site. Colorado recently changed its stand concerning the Rangely power site and is now doing all it can to get the site preferrence back. Even though there were only three from the Vernal area supporting the Bonanza site at the public meeting, we understand that Bonanza is still the preferred site and that Deseret Generation Genera-tion is still going ahead with plans for this plant site. So, one may ask, what is the use of holding public meetings to get input from the public? No one seems to really listen. As discouraging as it may seem, it is necessary to hold many meetings with those involved and the general public to make decisions involving the general public. Sometimes the greatest barrier in these meetings is the lack of communication, com-munication, or the lack of understanding. understan-ding. The purpose of the public meeting system is to let everyone who will be affected af-fected have a right to have his say. Then those responsible will weigh the information and make decisions or change regulations affecting those con-cerned. con-cerned. This is the ingenuity of our Constitutional Constitu-tional freedom to peaceable assemble and work out our differences and come up with a working solution best for all . concerned. |