Londonderry Fish & Game Club has submitted for site plan review Plans to construct a 200 and 400-Yard Range on Property it owns in Londonderry. Earlier in the month, Londonderry Planning decided the project has "Regional Impact" because LFGC enters its' facilities via Litchfield and LFGC borders Litchfield residential neighborhoods.
On August 22, The Derry News' Julie Huss featured an article about the finding, quoting Planning Board member Maria Newman who asked, What regional impact meant? “It doesn’t stop (the plan) in its tracks?”(Newman) asked.
Reading the Derry News article in the manner it is written lends difficulty for readers in understanding the context of Newman's remarks or questions. Thus, let us not try and guess.
But it is time for some plain facts. First, LFGC has paid its fees to the town to have its plans vetted to construct a 200/400 yard range. This is not a new idea. This idea has been in concept internally for nearly 15-20 years. LFGC has not been able to contemplate or undertake the range project because of expensive litigation that took place in the last 5-7 years.
With the litigation behind LFGC and a stabilized financial situation, LFGC began the engineering work needed to produce a viable plan. Our plans were submitted to various state agencies and now, to the town.
So what is LFGC building? LFGC seeks to build two ranges: a 200-Yard Range and a 400-yard range. The ranges will be constructed to accommodate the existing club membership, not for the purpose of expanding the Club's operating footprint. The purpose is to give members longer distances to shoot and to meet the existing needs of our members.
LFGC is not a commercial venture. LFGC ranges are not available to commercial interests for regular use. LFGC is a private club with a finite number of members. While membership in the club is reasonably easy, (provided one seeking membership is not a "prohibited person") there is a point where LFGC will no longer be accepting memberships and that number is fast approaching.
The purpose of the proposed LFGC ranges are to meet the needs of the existing membership body. Building these ranges will mean no change of impact to the Lund, Brenton or Burgess Street neighborhoods for either sound or traffic. In fact, LFGC asserts that some sound impacts currently taking place may be reduced when these ranges are built because many firearms now being utilized on the 50/100 Yard range will be used on the 200-400 Yard range when constructed.
LFGC has taken measures to substantially reduce sound emissions from our proposed range project. N.H. Department of Environmental Services recently approved the LFGC "alteration of terrain" application. LFGC seeks to reduce the terrain height by roughly 18 feet. Lowering the terrain will substantially aid in reducing sound. Inversely, LFGC could easily forgo that process, thereby saving the club costs in planning, permits and construction.
LFGC has plans where the height of the berms will reduce sound emissions. The National Rifle Association Range Source Book Standards call for impact berm heights of twenty-feet. LFGC proposes to build the impact berm twenty-four feet high. Side berms under those standards are eight feet; LFGC seeks to build side berms to a height of twelve feet.
The width of the range area is considered small by national standards at seventy-five feet wide. This will provide for six to eight shooting stations which clearly falls short of National Match Criteria.
LFGC plans, available for inspection and review at the Londonderry Planning Department, contemplates no modification or alteration to LFGC's existing vehicle parking foot print. LFGC has not increased its parking for this range project because, as stated earlier, this project is not an expansion of the Club, but an accommodation for our membership body.
LFGC asserts this project will have no impact beyond what has existed for the last forty years since LFGC has been in it's present site. The manner in which LFGC operates, the nature of the membership and character of the club facilities factually supports that assertion.
Turn-about being fair play, no concern for the "regional impact" to LFGC was contemplated in 1999 when Sawmill Brook Estates submitted its plan (No. 30116 as recorded in the Hillsborough County Registry of Deeds).
At an August 20 Litchfield Town Planning meeting, an alternate member of the Planning Board lamented on record that the presence of LFGC was not disclosed when he purchased his home on Lund Street. That assertion was factually incorrect. All of the warranty deeds for homes on Lund Street contain the following language:
“The Londonderry Fish & Game Club operates a shooting range on Lot 8-12 as shown on the Town of Londonderry’s Tax Assessors Sheets, which is located easterly of Lund Street and to the east of the power line.”
A typical Warranty Deed, provided at a closing contains roughly 350-500 words and takes less than 45 seconds for the average person to read. For any resident in that area to assert the presence of LFGC was not disclosed, is simply disingenuous and pandering to other notions and motives.
It is not lost on LFGC leadership that people are disturbed by the gunfire that comes from LFGC. That is regrettable in and of itself and while we are sorry for that, the situation does not rise to the level of LFGC changing its operation or character thereof.
When people purchase homes near train tracks, trains will be heard; In homes near airports, aircraft will be heard. Live near a shooting range? Gunfire will be heard. We live in a time when people will "come to a so-called nuisance," and then attempt to extinguish that which bothers them. Enter the commentary of Sir William Blackstone:
If my neighbour makes a tan-yard, so as to annoy and render less salubrious the air of my house or gardens, the law will furnish me with a remedy; but if he is first in possession of the air, and I fix my habitation near him, the nuisance is of my own seeking, and must continue. (Sir William Blackstone 1766: 402-403)
Londonderry Planning Board finds the Club project to have regional impact. What this means is that the town of Litchfield has a seat at the table as an abutter. Litchfield has raised concerns with the Londonderry Planning Board about traffic and Sound impact.
The Planning Boards appear to be treating this project in the context of a new start-up project, while LFGC continues to assert this range project is an accommodation for our members. Ample evidence supports LFGC's assertion.
Some of the members and leadership are concerned that these towns are attempting to make an end-run around RSA 159-B and believe that imposing unrealistic restrictions on the new range will overlap into existing ranges not subject to such restrictions. It cannot be said for sure that that is the case and is best left to the analysis of the legal team.
Despite assertions by the town planning boards that traffic and noise have not been addressed, LFGC has fully addressed both. The plans themselves speak to those issues.
