Vermont F-35 activist joins local opposition at press conference
The Cap Times, Sept 24, 2019 – Erik Lorenzsonn
Activists and local politicians are still speaking out against a plan to base F-35 fighter jets at Madison’s Truax Field, and on Monday brought a leader of a similar fight in Burlington, Vermont, to weigh in.
Roseanne Greco is a retired intelligence officer with the Air Force who has now become a vocal opponent of F-35s that the military recently stationed at Burlington International Airport. She was one of eight speakers at a press conference organized by the local opposition group Safe Skies Clean Water Wisconsin, outside the East Madison Community Center. Her main message: Don’t think the Air Force’s F-35 basing decision is a foregone conclusion.
“There are numerous places where the voices of the people caused the military to change their basing plan,” Greco told a small gathering of activists and reporters.
Activists and local politicians are still speaking out against a plan to base F-35 fighter jets at Madison’s Truax Field, and on Monday brought a leader of a similar fight in Burlington, Vermont, to weigh in.
Roseanne Greco is a retired intelligence officer with the Air Force who has now become a vocal opponent of F-35s that the military recently stationed at Burlington International Airport. She was one of eight speakers at a press conference organized by the local opposition group Safe Skies Clean Water Wisconsin, outside the East Madison Community Center. Her main message: Don’t think the Air Force’s F-35 basing decision is a foregone conclusion.
“There are numerous places where the voices of the people caused the military to change their basing plan,” Greco told a small gathering of activists and reporters.
A “community speak out” event at Hawthorne Elementary School followed the press conference, which Greco was also slated to attend. The purpose of both events, said Safe Skies leader Tom Boswell, was to engage residents who may have not had a chance to attend the recent public input session held to collect feedback on an environmental impact statement evaluating the basing. That meeting was held at the Alliant Energy Center, six miles to the south of the airport.
“It really wasn’t very convenient for most of the people in the affected community, probably. We decided we needed to have a people’s hearing out here, in the community that’s going to be affected,” said Boswell.
Boswell said he organized the events to encourage people to weigh in on the draft environmental impact statement before the deadline for public comment this Friday. He also said it was an opportunity for people to talk with Greco, whom he personally invited for the visit.
Greco was an alder on South Burlington’s City Council when the Air Force first proposed basing 18 F-35 fighter jets there in 2012. She quickly became opposed to the jets, and in the years following has worked extensively with the group Save our Skies Vermont to block the basing. Recently, police arrested her after she staged a sit-in outside the office of Sen. Patrick Leahy, an advocate of the F-35 basings.
At the press conference, Greco said Madison has been exposed to a lot of what she called “misinformation” and “lies” regarding the F-35 basing. For one thing, she said it’s impossible to truly mitigate F-35 jet noise.
“You can try to soundproof your homes. That only works, however, if you never open a window, open a door, or go outside,” she said.
She also asserted that the environmental impact statements for all F-35 basings have under-estimated the rate of afterburner use on takeoff. Her claim comes after the Vermont news website VT Digger recently reported on internal Air Force documents that suggest as much.
Other speakers at the press conference included state Rep. Chris Taylor, D-Madison, who said that she has requested the Air Force extend the public comment period on the environmental impact statement by 60 days, and called for better public outreach efforts by the military.
Madison activist Brandi Grayson also spoke out against the F-35 plan as a resident of the neighborhood. She asked for Madison residents to oppose the basing with the same verve they did during the recent climate strike.
“We just heard someone with personal experience, a military vet, that we’re being lied to,” Grayson said. “How can we as a city, as a community, support an initiative, any military strategy that we know directly impacts those who are the most vulnerable?”
Grayson also called out the Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce for its support of the basing and Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway for signing “a resolution saying that we leave room for this thing to happen.” The resolution in question, passed by the Common Council last week, asked the Air Force to reconsider the basing of F-35s if the final environmental impact statement “does not provide strategies to affirmatively mitigate the noise and/or reduce the number of training flights.”
That resolution passed as an alternate to another resolution that outright opposed the F-35 basing.
Monday’s press conference came shortly before the Madison School Board passed a resolution also asking the Air Force to reconsider the F-35 basing.