My father never wanted us to engage in a “fair fight.” He advocated that if you are confronted by an aggressor you engage to win. If the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is aggressively alleging the town of Scarborough is not responsive and is threatening a fine then I suggest our elected senators and representatives in Washington, D.C., be contacted for help – not negotiate through the town manager. Share the results of the 2012 Piping Plover Project and the sentiments of the people who spoke against further leash restrictions. Do not appease the federal employees because next year the federal people will just want more control of our property. Let us have the public fight and get assistance from the people who we send to Washington who know what common sense is and represent us.

Federal bureaucrats are bullies of the highest order. They are the zealots of mission with little eye to common sense. The data is clear: Maine produced 192 fledged birds, but only two in five years at Higgins Beach. Scarborough beaches are not good habitat for plovers. The wasted effort is the problem. Their “solution” is no dogs, no outside cats, no kite flying, no ball playing, no people, more fences, increased trapping of predators, more forced contracts with property owners and importantly there is never an end point when the feds will agree that the effort is nonproductive. Let us stop the madness.

David Stahelski
Scarborough