As everyone knows by now, the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection has overturned the Wakefield Conservation Commission’s denial of Northeast Metro Tech’s plan to build a new vocational high school

The decision means that NEMT can now proceed with plans to build a much-needed new regional vocational high school on a wooded parcel across Hemlock Road from the current school.

MassDEP’s decision to allow the Voke to go forward with its plans to build a new school was not surprising. It was rooted in science and facts.

It’s a shame that the environmental activists who opposed NEMT’s plan can’t accept the decision with a touch of grace. But humility and decorum are not in their DNA. Instead, the “Save the Forest” gang have responded with their standard cocktail of slanderous vitriol and supercilious acrimony.

After eight months of hearings, the Wakefield Conservation Commission issued an order on June 6, 2023 denying the Voke project based on its opinion that the project could not be conditioned to protect the interests of the Wetlands Protection Act and associated regulations.

Northeast Metro Tech then exercised its right to appeal the ConCom’s decision to MassDEP, which spent four months conducting a thorough review of the case before overturning the Wakefield Conservation Commission’s denial.

It’s OK to disagree with MassDEP’s ruling and it’s OK to be disappointed. What’s not OK is to accuse people at the MassDEP and Northeast Metro Tech of corruption without offering a shred of evidence. But that’s exactly what the environmental activists from the “Save the Forest and Build the Voke” group have been doing.

On their official Facebook page, the leaders of the Save the Forest group modestly describe their members as “well-educated and evolved in their thinking.”

Let’s take a look at some of the “evolved thinking” espoused by these “well-educated” individuals in the wake of the MassDEP decision.

“Someone got paid off,” a member of the group wrote on the Save the Forest Facebook page, without offering an iota of evidence.

“It will make sense when we figure out who’s going to profit,” another “evolved” environmentalist wrote.

“There are obviously entities that are gaining something,” was another comment on the Facebook page. (I guess it’s so “obvious” that they didn’t feel the need to furnish any proof.)

“Corruption at its best,” was how another “well-educated” Save the Forest member described the MassDEP decision.

“The corruption is unbelievable,” wrote another evolved ecologist, again without any evidence or substantiation.

And of course, there was the old standby: “Follow the money.”

“Follow the money,” is what lazy people say when they want to suggest corruption but have nothing to back up their claim.

Baseless accusations are nothing new for the Save the Forest group. It’s been their stock in trade from the beginning.

After the district-wide election where voters overwhelmingly approved the new Voke school building plan, the activists repeatedly claimed that school officials deliberately “hid” the location of the new school from the voters. Quite a feat, considering that the specific location was being discussed at open public meetings at least a year prior to the election.

Last summer, the activists petitioned Middlesex Superior Court for an injunction to stop the Voke’s contractors from doing any preliminary site work. A few days after the judge denied their petition, the Save the Forest Facebook page cover photo was changed to an image of a judge’s gavel on top of a pile of cash.

Subtle.

They even disrespected their natural allies on the Conservation Commission. At least one member of the Save the Forest group had to be muted on Zoom by the chairman when she ignored repeated requests to tone down her obnoxious behavior at ConCom hearings.

From the beginning and every step of the way, anyone who was not 100 percent on board with the Save the Forest agenda was deemed corrupt, stupid, or both by these self-described “well-educated and evolved” activists.

It’s one thing to be confident in one’s beliefs. But to conclude that anyone with a different take must be “corrupt” requires a special kind of ego.

I guess it’s a psychology I’m just not “evolved” enough to understand.
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[This column originally appeared in the November 16, 2023 Wakefield Daily Item.]