E-News from the
Center for the Forest Preserve
Volume 3, No. 2
March 16, 2005
Association Receives Recognition
At its President's Dinner on March 12 in Glens Falls, the Adirondack Mountain Club (ADK) presented their David L. Newhouse Conservation Award to the Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks, recognizing the Association's origins as defender of the Constitution's "forever wild" clause in 1901, our many legislative and judicial victories in this defense, our partnership with the ADK since ADK was founded in 1922, our Adirondack Research Library, our annual series of conferences and our "continuing education for the public and private defenders of the Catskill and Adirondack Parks." Dave Newhouse, twice-elected President of the ADK, was on hand to make the award presentation to Dave Gibson, with Peter Brinkley, President, and staff members Ken Rimany and Kathy Bozony in attendance. As you all know, Dave Newhouse personifies 40 years of collaboration between the ADK and Association in the protection of the Forest Preserve, having served as our Treasurer, Conservation Committee Chairman and President during the 1980s and 90s. Dave is currently our Honorary Trustee. It was a distinct honor and privilege to receive this award from ADK and from Dave Newhouse, the recipient of the Association's 2002 Howard Zahniser Adirondack Award for wilderness preservation. Our thanks also go to the ADK Board of Governors and to its Executive Director, Neil Woodworth.
Kathy Bozony Joins Association Staff
Kathy Bozony, a resident of Porter Corners, NY just outside the Adirondack Park, joined the Association staff as its Administrator in February. We are delighted to have Kathy on hand to administer the Association's developing donor data and record system, improve our donor recognition program, issue timely donor and administrative reports, and generally improve our overall administrative functions from the Center for the Forest Preserve. Kathy has over nine years of administrative experience at an executive level. Over the past two years, Kathy has also received a natural resources degree from Paul Smith's College. She has an intense interest in the mission and all the programs of the Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks, and considerable knowledge of Adirondack aquatic systems, especially under Upper Saranac Lake where she spent all last summer mapping populations of Eurasian watermilfoil! Kathy is proving herself every day to be of immense value to the Association. Welcome, Kathy.
Adirondack Raised Relief Map Restoration Project
Fine Arts Professor Walter Hatke, a member of the faculty at Union College, has spent the past four weeks restoring the great 12' by 10' Raised Relief Map of the Adirondacks, a unique educational map created over eight years by Paul Schaefer and associates from 1945-1952 and a critical exhibit at our Center. Professor Hatke has not only found paints that exactly match the original colors used in those years and touched up wherever paint had flecked off over the years, he has also painstakingly re-constructed certain sections of the map that had chipped off over time and during the year-long construction of the Center. Using topographic maps, he has redrawn streams and other features lost when the plaster had chipped. Professor Hatke has largely donated his services, requiring only a minimal honorarium and expenses for a job that would otherwise cost the Association thousands of dollars. We are so very grateful for this generous donation of Professor Hatke's extraordinary skills and time for an absolutely critical restoration project, and to Professor Emeritus and Trustee Carl George who made contact with him on our behalf. For those not familiar with our map, it is an original with only one copy ever made for Harold Hochschild, founder of the Adirondack Museum and a great friend and colleague of Paul Schaefer's, a copy that still greets visitors at this world famous museum in Blue Mountain Lake.
Kevin Prickett Organizes Group Letter re. Siamese Ponds Wilderness
The Association's Wilderness Stewardship Advocate, Kevin Prickett, has organized a group letter to the Adirondack Park Agency voicing concerns about the actions proposed by the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) in the Siamese Ponds Wilderness Final Draft Unit Management Plan (UMP). Signing the letter were representatives of Adirondack Council, Adirondack Mountain Club, Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks, Environmental Advocates, Residents' Committee to Protect the Adirondacks, and Sierra Club Atlantic Chapter. Siamese Ponds, at 112,500 acres, is among the largest, most popular and famous Wilderness areas in the Adirondacks. Among the group concerns are failures in the Draft UMP to comply with crucial sections of the Adirondack Park State Land Master Plan. For more information, go to www.protectadks.org. The Association was on hand at the APA's March meeting to reinforce its concerns with APA Chairman Ross Whaley and members of the APA staff. Attending the meeting were Dan Plumley, Conservation Committee Co-Chair, Dale Jeffers, Committee member and Dave Gibson.
Recent Meetings at the Center
Ken Rimany, our Director of Operations, has been working with the Explorer Garden Club to create new gardens and landscaping with native plants at the Center for the Forest Preserve. One evening this past week, Ken invited the leadership of the Garden Club to present their conceptual master plan for these garden beds and plantings. The Explorer Garden Club presented a masterful set of sketches, maps and plant lists for us to consider, including a Schaefer family garden planned in front of the Schaefer homestead exactly where the family had a garden during their residency. We are absolutely delighted with their ideas, and plan to work closely with the Explorer Garden Club to begin to implement them this spring. Thanks to Ken Rimany and the leadership of the Explorer Garden Club for creating this wonderful partnership that will truly flower beginning this year.
Also meeting at the Center in March was the Environmental Awareness Network for Diversity in Conservation (EANDC), an organization spawned by the Association's Education Committee in 2001 as a network to increase learning and career opportunities in the conservation and environmental fields for underrepresented youth and all people of color. Association Trustees Twitty Styles and Carl George are leaders of EANDC, along with Yusuf Burgess and Laurel Remus of the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation, Jim Beil, Association member and retired Assistant Director of DEC's Division of Lands and Forests, Joe Gardner of the Appalachian Mountain Club and many others. As a result of the meeting, the Association's Center will host a summer field trip and workshop about trees and forests for young Schenectadians in the Science and Technology Enrichment Program, a session led by Dr. Twitty Styles with support from EANDC volunteers.
That's all for now,
David Gibson, Executive Director