LETTERS From J. Wilson, Cowes:
THE most blatant outbreak of NIMBYism in last week’s CP was not the refusal of the wind turbine application but the opposition to the plan for an educational facility for children needing specialist education support.
Your correspondents (I will afford them the respect of not naming them) claim not to be NIMBYs but offer no rational reasons as to why they do not want this educational facility situated on what is, err, an educational site. That looks and smells like classic oak-aged NIMBYism to me.
It is glibly stated that it is not appropriate to site this facility near to young children. Why not? All we get is vague insinuation and conjecture that serves only to demonise and stigmatise a group of young people who deserve out support and understanding not Pavlovian suspicion and hostility. Like the classic NIMBY, your correspondents know where they do not want this facility but don’t offer an alternative suitable location.
I write this letter as someone who has lived all their life within a short distance of this proposed site. I welcome the addition of this facility and its students to the area and I hope they finally get the support and direction that has so far eluded them.
If that’s the case, then the interest of society as a whole, not just the narrow self-interest of the NIMBYs, will be best served.