A Small Effort To Try To Save A Small Portion Of The 1000 Islands - Some 35 Years Ago!!!

This comment came into my blog a few weeks ago under some pictures I had posted of our regional beauty.  Since I was traveling I didn’t have the opportunity to respond.

The comment below.

“Anyway, no matter how crazy you are and how many bridges you have burnt, you did have a part in it all, years ago. There are continued efforts to protect the Thousand Islands with a more permanent legislative action. I doubt after the way you went after them much to the glee of the pro wind that you will be involved in or even approve of the regional wide efforts.”

Of course this commenter does not  have a clue what they are talking about in regards to my feelings or efforts about protecting our regional scenic beauty.  I will get to that proof in a minute. My concerns and efforts for the preservation of the 1000 Islands region go back a long long way.

For some time now since the industrial wind issue sunk its claws into our area there has been talk of getting the 1000 Islands region designated as a Scenic Area of Statewide Significance (SASS) due to its incredible scenic beauty and natural resources.

I do agree with this effort in general terms , although I think we should take a hard look at it since there are some inherent weaknesses, and there may be some ways to plug those holes, or ways in addition to SASS to strength the protection of our area.   But in general I am in favor of this idea and am 110% in favor of protecting the scenic and natural resources of the 1000 Islands and Golden Crescent and I think even further down the Eastern Ontario lake shore.

 Because of my long time concerns about the scenic beauty of the region I was one of the first people in the wind battle to expose the significance of the 2003 CV Comprehensive Land Use Plan and its significant protections of scenic resources, and how ANY wind law would violate that plan. I repeatedly spoke on those ideas and that this plan was the foundation of protecting us from wind energy and protecting the scenic beauty of this area.  Apparently my commenter has a real short selective memory on that account.

And my objections to this CV 's efforts is that they did not go far enough to protect us in CV.  The scenic protections in our zoning law are almost absurd.  For example a mile and a quarter scenic buffer from the Seaway Trail, and 12E isn’t scenic protection when it comes to giant wind turbines…it is a joke!  Pushing giant wind turbines into the CV interior isn’t protection…it too is a bad joke.  Writing a law that allows some industrial wind development in CV isn’t scenic protection…it too is a joke!  None of this even comes close to actual scenic protection on the wind issue.  It is absurd. Our zoning law allowing some industrial wind  development is in fact a violation of our new comprehensive land use  plan which is primarily about community scenic resource protections.  How absurd is it to allow for some extremely visually invasive wind development, and then restricting logos on the turbines?  Put up 500 ft turbines then you are going to worry about a small logo on the turbine?  This is scenic protection nor is it serious or responsible.  What the hell is wrong with this picture?  How do you write a wind law allowing some wind development and with this nonsense in it, and then out of the other side of your mouth claim you want to protect the scenic resources of the region.

Or like CV councilman John Bryne interviewed in the WDT about his run for NY Assembly.  He claims he is not against wind development, just the improper siting.  He better get a clue that there is NO “proper” siting of giant 400 or 500 ft. industrial machines if you are actually serious about regional scenic protections. Byrne is trying to be milk toast to attempt appease everybody.  If you want true scenic protection you need people with a clue and some actual backbone.  The only thing Byrne is interested in protecting is his political future!  His comments on wind energy are absurd and shows how badly out of touch he is with real protections of our scenic resources.

So even though I fully support the efforts at scenic protections of our area, it makes me wonder if leaders truly have a full comprehension of the idea or what it will actually take.

I am glad to see town officials WPEG and others getting behind the SASS idea.  But they better get a lot more serious about actual effective protections.  But once again why are we just like Art 10 waiting for the State to solve our problems.  There are significant things we can do to have vision, and protect the area ourselves.  I will have more on this SASS plan later.

But back to my commenter indicating I might not approve or support efforts to protect our region.

Oh really??? Well let me ask my commenter where he or she has been for the last 35 years on protecting the area’s beauty?

As this issue came up and seeing  my commenter’s opinion, it jogged my memory to about 35 years ago to 1979. That would be only one year after Save the River was formed.

Below you will see responses to my letters regarding a small effort I engaged in to try to bring awareness to protecting at least a small part of the 1000 Islands and Cape Vincent.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You will see it was an effort to bring awareness to saving Cape Vincent's Carleton Island from development.  It is sad it was never protected because I believe it represented a real gem and potential tremendous opportunity for Cape Vincent and the 1000 Islands and nobody was really publicly talking about protecting it, and the opportunity sadly slipped right by us.

The Canadians, despite their recent environmental wind fiasco on Wolfe Is. had the vision to save some of the 1000 Islands as a national park years ago. This action has greatly enhanced the 1000 Islands protections and its natural beauty.

On the American side we were not so visionary, and other that some nice state parks there was no real preservation of the islands on a much wider scale.

As a young kid as soon as I had access to a small boat, sometimes with oars and sometimes with a small motor, I would endlessly explore Carleton Island and that continued as a young man.  There were cows ranging there back then, but soon even that was abandon and the island began to take on a sort of incredible beauty of a river wilderness island. Even today my wife and I still enjoy kayaking along the shores of Carleton, even though it has been developed looking for little pockets of the island that reflect that past, and a taste of the river beauty. 

 I felt very strongly back in 1979 and even before that this island setting should be preserved as a park.  Trails could be established, docks could be provided for boaters like the Canadian Islands, and maybe a shuttle could be established to bring hikers, fishermen, hunters and mt. bikers etc over from Cape Vincent. The possibilities were wide and significant.

At that time in my life having lived in the West and been deeply involved in the wilderness outdoors for about 10 years I had watched closely or been involved in a small ways in some big western environmental issues.  Although I always knew the 1000 Islands was a very special place, these western experiences significantly deepened my appreciation of the river and 1000 Islands and CV and what might be done here to preserve it.

It seemed to me this island right at the top of the 1000 Islands had tremendous environmental protection  and eco -tourism potential for the area.  Maybe even some economic potential for Cape Vincent.

I even spoke to the town supervisor at the time, and if memory serves me it was Otis Radley. It has been a long time and  I don’t honestly remember clearly his reaction.  However, because of the cost and other reasons there was not much enthusiasm. 

I regret now I did not push this effort much harder, and take it on with the same effort as the CV wind battle. Maybe that is why I fought hard in the wind battle this time around.

 I was 29 then, newly married and in graduate school then teaching in AZ with limited time in CV in those days. I had little political experience, and the size of the fund raising and effort seemed overwhelming to me then.  That was long before the Internet, and blogs and websites etc. that could have made the effort much easier if they had been available.  And getting people in general to process the idea of preserving  an island on only scenic and environmental , that could be developed and produce money instead was foreign to many people.  Unfortunately it still is to many.  What is the point of leaving empty land empty? 

But now we have had a real severe wake up call about the  preservation of the scenic beauty and natural resources of our area with the onslaught of the insane wind industry attack to industrialize our entire region, including the Lake and the threat it brings to regional beauty.

I don’t know if you have seen the excellent Ken Burns PBS documentary on our US national parks?  One thing I took away from it was how nearly every national park region was under some kind of significant environmental threat until people woke up to what would be lost if it was not protected.  It appears with wind energy that CV and our region has followed a similar path.

So to my commenter… You would be VERY wrong with your ignorance and limited and distorted view of me and what I actually stand for.  I was well ahead of the curve on this preservation and protection idea, as much as 35 years ago.  As I was in 2006 saying loudly with my name behind it that industrial wind energy develop in our region would be an environmental disaster, and we should prohibit it out right to save this area as real protection.  And that would be when many supposed anti wind people were too frightened to take that stand publicly. Many still are!

I am very pleased to see the towns and people of this region grasping the importance of this SASS idea.  It is too bad we didn’t grasp it and other serious protections in significant ways a hell of a lot earlier.  It might have deflected a lot of the industrial wind issue.

And in case my commenter has not been awake since my blog opened. Maybe they missed that  I have worked very hard with my camera and blog to showcase the incredible beauty of our region, not only along the river and lake but inland as well, hoping people take a second and more detailed look at what we have, how lucky we are to have it, and what it could cost if we don’t protect it properly and aggressively!

 

And also to my commenter…if you are actually serious about the protection of our region, are you going to put your name behind it…or with so much at stake are you going to be anonymous about that too????