Extreme Albany Bureaucracy Run Amok

The Massena Electric Department's decision to kill its hydroelectric dam project on the Grasse River is disappointing and troubling at the same time. While I understand and support the Electric Utility Board's decision to pull the plug on the dam, I am troubled by the circumstances that forced them to make the decision.

You see, this very creative and positive project was killed by the bulletproof bureaucrats in Albany, Watertown, and points in between - the so-called civil servants who control almost all aspects of our broken, counterproductive state government.

Oh sure, the politicians play their part in fouling things up when it comes to the budget, runaway spending and foolish laws. But it is the insidious meddling and control by power hungry "lifer" bureaucrats that are the real problems with the state (and federal) government.

The MED dam project is a perfect example of this. The NYS Department of Environmental Conservation and the NYS Department of State threw up roadblock after roadblock to this project, for no meaningful reason other than they could.

The bureaucracy is so deep and so poisonous it extends far beyond Albany. In fact, with the DEC it comes as far North as Watertown; maybe even as far as Canton.

You see the DEC's Watertown office is headed by a lawyer named Judy Drabicki. She started with the DEC as their environmental attack dog attorney who persecuted businesses big and small as well as local governments all over the North Country.

When the Massena downtown dam failed the first time in the 1980s, the DEC refused to let the owners or the village government repair it. That decision was made by extreme environmentalists who wanted the Grasse River to "return to it natural state" although the river was doing just fine with a dam that had been built a hundred years earlier.

So Ms. Drabicki was part of the team that turned a once-vibrant portion of the river through Massena and Louisville into a slow-moving marsh that all but dries up every summer.

Bet that's good for the fish and other animals who call the river home!!

Back then, Ms. Drabicki worked for the M. Cuomo administration and was handed her walking papers when Pataki took over. When Lothario Spitzer became governor, Drabicki was back, this time as the head honcho for DEC in this region because she had great ties with the Democratic machine.

There was one message to be taken from that appointment: Look Out, local government and businesses.

Look, I know DEC has an important job to do. But we don't need more oppressive bureaucracy in the state that is known far and wide for having the most dysfunctional government in the country.

That kind of foolishness just cost MED rate payers $5 million.

And can someone tell me why the Department of State has such influence over our rivers and waterfronts? I thought these guys were a bunch of clerks whose jobs centered around licenses and corporations. But not in Albany eyes. They are the keepers of the river.

Doing a great job in Massena, huh? This portion of the Grasse is all but dead. No more salmon, not much in the way of fish at all, from what I am led to believe.

But forget about our portion of the river, or MED's money, or the dam that would have restored our riverfront downtown. What kind of message does this send to businesses that might be looking to come to NY or our North Country?

Here's what kind of message: don't cross swords with the bullet-proof bureaucrats because it will only cost you millions of dollars and lots of headaches.

Is it any wonder there are no jobs for our young people? Is it hard to see why thousands of people and dozens of businesses are pulling up stakes and leaving the once Empire State?

Things will never change if we sit back, shut up and let the bureaucrats beat us into submission. The system is broken, plain and simple, and the inmates are running the asylum.

It's time to "put up our dukes and get down to it," as the song goes. Something has to change and we are obligated to make sure it happens.

Remember all of this when you head to the polls next week and on Nov. 2.