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Good Wednesday Morning,
It looks like July 12th is going to be a busy day for Putnam County. On one side of the county there's a Garden Party hosted by yours truly to which PlanPutnam subscribers are all invited. In fact, those of you who donated to the cause last November should be receiving personal invites in the (snail)mail today or tomorrow.
On the same day but on the other side of the county there's a fund raiser for Assemblyman Greg Ball in Patterson. To get into the Garden Party you RSVP at the website, bring your family, a blanket or some beach chairs, some food for the pot luck and some friends you like. To go to Ball's party you bring $75 ($50 if you're an NRA member!) or for $3500 you can be a sponsor of the event, bring along 50 friends you don't really like and have your picture taken with Greg. (You can have your picture taken with me for free!)
At the Garden Party there will be live music and entertainment, friendly conversation, children, pets and general camaraderie. At the Ball Party there will be an overall siege mentality, men with guns, fearful farm animals and a chance to win jewelry, a canned hunt or something like that.
I can't decide which one to attend but I'll just make the assumption that if you're not here, you'll be there.
If you are a fan of Greg Ball's and you live in the Village of Brewster, the Assemblyman has moved into a new District office on Route 6 in that village.
This weekend there are two events of note taking place. One is the annual Hudson River Revival hosted by Clearwater at Croton Point Park in Westchester. This event is always a good time and goes to support educational programs for school children on the value and workings of the Hudson River. The second event is a benefit rock concert on Saturday evening starting at 6:30PM at the Cultural Center on Lake Carmel to support the Invisible Children Movement, an organization which helps support kids in northern Uganda displaced by a senseless civil war. Information about this event is below in the News Section below.
Walt Thompson of Keep Putnam Beautiful reports that the Keep Rockland Beautiful campaign collected 40 tons of trash cleaning up streams and waterfront areas in that county. 40 TONS of trash!
Firing Willie Randolph sure didn't help the Mets last night.
PlanPutnam reader John Dondero has a letter in the paper today about the new Union Place development proposal. He says this in part: "Anyone familiar with the area knows that the mere mention of Stillwater Road (one lane each way) is a joke, and the intersection of Route 6 and Baldwin Place is heavily congested. Let's talk about what will happen after Union Place is built." you can read the full letter here.
The Hudson River Watershed Alliance has released it's latest weekly newsletter which can be found at their website here.
And now, knowing that there is a world around us, some news:
- Shouting in the wind
- At meeting in Ramapo, Highlands committee recognizes Putnam County stream
- Complete streets and gas prices
- Benefit Rock Concert
- Greenway Celebrates National Trails Day; Announces $56,000 in Trail Grant Funding
- AirTran says it will end flights out of Stewart
- Freshman Legislator Threatens to Sue County
- Congress Pushes to Keep Land Untamed
- Tapped Out
- McCain Wants to Open Coast to Oil Drilling
- See a Huge Moon Illusion Wednesday
Shouting in the wind In January, the Carmel Town Board adopted rules that seemed designed for the sole purpose of muzzling the public and clamping down on dissent. The officials restricted public comment at board meetings to items on the agenda and relegated that limited comment to the end of meetings, after the official business was over and any issues to be considered had already been decided and voted upon. Frankly, they might as well have told members of the public to just shut up.
Understandably, residents balked at the limitations. The Carmel Town Board's solution? To move the public comment period out of the twice monthly regular meetings entirely. Sure, the board would allow each speaker up to three minutes to comment (still, only on agenda items), but only at the end of the work sessions, which are held on alternating Wednesday nights, are attended by fewer residents and are not broadcast on cable television.
That's a cynical move. Theoretically, it allows residents to comment before Town Board members vote on an issue, but in practice it reduces public comment to shouting in the wind. While some intrepid residents will agreed to wait through lengthy and sometimes tedious discussion of all sorts of municipal matters just to get their chance to address their elected board members (who seem none too interested in listening to them anyway), many more Carmel citizens will likely give up in frustration and keep their opinions and suggestions to themselves.
That's too bad. Democracy flourishes when opposing ideas are discussed and debated, not when they are muffled.
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At meeting in Ramapo, Highlands committee recognizes Putnam County stream
Peter Rostenberg came to Rockland yesterday with poster boards, a PowerPoint presentation and a request.
In short, the Connecticut doctor wanted members of the New York Committee of the Highlands Coalition to support his organization as it works to preserve an important drinking water area.
The committee held its spring quarterly meeting at the Rockland County Soild Waste Management Authority's Conference Center in Ramapo, drawing about 25 people.
Rostenberg explained that the Friends of Quaker Brook-Haviland Hollow Watershed had recently obtained the designation of "critical treasures" for the watershed from the Connecticut Committee of the Highlands Coalition.
He was at the meeting yesterday to ask the New York committee to issue the same designation, and with good reason.
The Quaker Brook becomes the Haviland Hollow Brook on the New York side, as it flows through Patterson, and into the Great Swamp in Putnam County, Rostenberg said.
A branch of the Quaker Brook also flows into Pawling, in Dutchess County.
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Complete streets and gas prices Tuesday, June 17th, 2008 Guest post by Barbara McCann, coordinator of the National Complete Streets Coalition As Americans watch the seemingly inexorable climb in gas prices, many are looking at their streets in a new way. They are looking for streets that can give them more than a way out of their neighborhood – they need a way out of paying at the pump.
The stories are everywhere – the American Public Transportation Association reports a surge in transit ridership, even as transit agencies prepare to celebrate “Dump the Pump Day“; NBC News is reporting on an increase in bicycle commuting and numerous stories have reported on more people choosing to walk. Mike Luckovich, editorial cartoonist for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, summed it up with his ‘bike jacking’ cartoon last week. (click to enlarge) But while some SUV owners may be on the lookout for a bicycle to steal, the first step for many commuters is more likely to be a close look at their streets: is there a sidewalk, and a safe way to cross? Are there bike lanes I can use? Where does the bus stop, and does it offer more than a pole in the grass to wait by? In too many communities, the answer is still ‘no.’ Bicycle and pedestrian facilities (and decent bus stops), have been treated as nice ‘amenities,’ rather than as essential transportation infrastructure. They have only been installed if some extra funding can be found, or if local advocates push hard enough. The folly of that approach is becoming all too clear, as Americans survey their neighborhoods in dismay – and resign themselves to paying at the pump.
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Benefit Rock Concert for:
The Invisible Children Movement Saturday, June 21, at 6:30 pm (to 10 pm)
Performers:
Aspheradora
(www.myspace.com/aspheradora)
Ken Connolly and the Southeast Connection
(www.myspace.com/sarkrock)
The Parthenon
(www.myspace.com/theparthenon)
*~Special Guests~*
The Locomotive Espada
(www.myspace.com/thelocomotiveespada)
Adam and the Animals
(www.myspace.com/rebirthreviveresurrect)
Admission is $6 ($5 for AotL Members)
This Concert is being produced by AotL’s Youth Committee.
Greenway Celebrates National Trails Day; Announces $56,000 in Trail Grant Funding The Hudson River Valley Greenway is pleased to announce that the 2008 Greenway Conservancy Small Grant Program applications are now available. A total of $56,000 is available for grants in this year's program. Applications can be requested by calling (518) 473-3835, by emailing the Greenway at hrvg@hudsongreenway.state.ny.us or by downloading at http:// www.hudsongreenway.state.ny.us/ funding/funding.htm. All applications must be received or postmarked by 4pm, September 8th, 2008.
AirTran says it will end flights out of Stewart Low-fare airline cites high fuel costs
By Craig Wolf
Poughkeepsie Journal
NEW WINDSOR - AirTran Airways will cease service at Stewart International Airport as of Sept. 3. High fuel costs have led to mounting losses for the low-fare airline, officials said.
There was no formal announcement, said Judy Graham-Weaver, public relations manager for the low-fare airline.
"Yes, unfortunately it is true. Due to skyrocketing fuel costs," she said in an e-mail.
Tad Hutcheson, AirTran vice president of marketing, said, "We've had continued mounting losses there and we just can't continue."
U.S. Rep. John Hall, D-Dover, in an e-mail urged AirTran Airways to continue flights.
Hall, vice chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee on Aviation, said he has offered to work with the company to ensure a continuation of services at Stewart would be beneficial to both AirTran and Hudson Valley residents.
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Freshman Legislator Threatens to Sue County Domestic Partner Registry approved for County
by Margaret Sternberg
A proposed local law threatens to balloon into a lawsuit if Putnam County Legislator Tony Fusco (District 9, Town of Carmel, Hamlet of Mahopac) is not allowed to continue what his colleagues unanimously have, in one form or another, labeled as selfpromotional, political advertising. At issue is Legislator Fusco's continued insistence that his name on "Adopt-A-Highway" signs is his right and his colleagues' collective belief that, as an elected official, he is using the signs as political capital and as a means of continuously keeping his name before the public.
The law, in part, reads that "no sign, placard, billboard or similar device shall be installed adjacent to or on public transportation, funded in part, or in whole by the county, as well as but not limited to any and all county owned or leased public places, facilities, roads or highways shall bear the name of candidates seeking public office, elected officials…engaged by the County."
Legislature Chairman Tony Hay noted that the current legislation was an updating and expansion of 20-year-old legislation that had been rescinded several years ago and that had originally been enacted to address the actions of a former County Executive who was using public billboards to take credit for public works projects. Chairman Hay said that despite protestations, "you can't say this is not political." Speaking directly to Legislator Fusco, Hay said that when someone lived in an area for three or more years and the Adopt-A-Highway sign suddenly appears when that person decides to run for election, "you can't tell me it's not political." Hay added that it becomes more suspect when, after a person is elected to office, "he puts the [Legislative] title on as well; it becomes a problem."
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Congress Pushes to Keep Land Untamed Bills Could Add Millions of Acres Of Wilderness
By Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, June 16, 2008; A01
INDEX, Wash. -- With little fanfare, Congress has embarked on a push to protect as many as a dozen pristine areas this year in places ranging from the glacier-fed streams of the Wild Sky Wilderness here to West Virginia's Monongahela National Forest. By the end of the year, conservation experts predict, this drive could place as much as 2 million acres of unspoiled land under federal control, a total that rivals the wilderness acreage set aside by Congress over the previous five years.
A confluence of factors is driving this wilderness renaissance: the shift in Congress from Republican to Democratic control; environmentalists' decision to take a more pragmatic approach in which they enlist local support for their proposals by making concessions to opposing interests; and some communities' recognition that intact ecosystems can often offer a greater economic payoff than extractive industries.
"It may not seem like it on most issues, but in this one arena Congress is getting things across the goal line," said Mike Matz, executive director of the advocacy group Campaign for America's Wilderness. "Nobody gets everything they want, but by coming together, talking with age-old adversaries and seeking common ground, wilderness protection is finding Main Street support and becoming motherhood-and-apple-pie."
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Tapped Out By LISA MARGONELLI
BOTTLEMANIA
How Water Went on Sale and Why We Bought It. By Elizabeth Royte.
248 pp. Bloomsbury. $24.99.
To paraphrase an old axiom: You don’t buy water, you only rent it. So why did Americans spend nearly $11 billion on bottled water in 2006, when we could have guzzled tap water at up to about one ten-thousandth the cost? The facile answer is marketing, marketing and more marketing, but Elizabeth Royte goes much deeper into the drink in “Bottlemania: How Water Went on Sale and Why We Bought It,” streaming trends cultural, economic, political and hydrological into an engaging investigation of an unexpectedly murky substance. Partway through her undoctrinaire book, Royte, a lifelong fan of tap water, refills her old plastic water bottle, reflecting that “what once seemed so simple and natural, a drink of water, is neither. All my preconceptions about this most basic of beverages have been queered.” And by the end of the book she will have discarded the old plastic bottle too, but not the tap.
“Bottlemania” is an easy-to-swallow survey of the subject from verdant springs in the Maine woods to tap water treatment plants in Kansas City; from the grand specter of worldwide water wars, to the microscopic crustaceans called copepods, whose presence in New York’s tap water inspired a debate by Talmudic scholars about whether the critters violated dietary laws, and whether filtering water on the Sabbath constituted work. (Verdict: no and no.) Water is a topic that lends itself to tour-de-force treatment (the book “Cadillac Desert” and the movie “Chinatown” come to mind), as well as righteous indictments and dire predictions (“Thirst: Fighting the Corporate Theft of Our Water,” “When the Rivers Run Dry: Water — The Defining Crisis of the Twenty-First Century”). Where others are bold, “Bottlemania” is subversive, and after you read it you will sip warily from your water bottle (whether purchased or tap, plastic or not), as freaked out by your own role in today’s insidious water wars as by Royte’s recommended ecologically responsible drink: “Toilet to tap.”
Read The Full Review
McCain Wants to Open Coast to Oil Drilling Would More Domestic Oil Make a Difference?
Oil companies want more access to more oil in Alaska and off the coasts of the continental United States. It's currently off-limits due to environmental concerns. Sen. John McCain, as president, would push to open off-shore sites to drilling, while Sen. Barack Obama would not (neither would open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge).
McCain said there are 21 billion "untapped" barrels of oil in the United States, and he wants to see each state, rather than the federal government, decide whether to exploit off-shore reserves.
It's a response to high oil and gas prices, which American voters tell pollsters are making them dizzy. But would new domestic oil production make much of a difference?
Most untapped oil (13.3 billion barrels, according to the Wall Street Journal) is in ANWR, which both candidates agree should remain off limits.
And tapping any new source of oil would take years to yield marketable oil.
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See a Huge Moon Illusion Wednesday By Robert Roy Britt
Senior Science Writer
posted: 17 June 2008
As the full moon rises this Wednesday evening, June 18, many people will be fooled into thinking it's unusually large.
The moon illusion, as it's known, is a trick in our minds that makes the moon seem bigger when it's near the horizon. The effect is most pronounced at full moon. Many people swear it's real, suggesting that perhaps Earth's atmosphere magnifies the moon.
But it really is all in our minds. The moon is not bigger at the horizon than when overhead.
The illusion will be particularly noticeable at this "solstice moon," coming just two days before summer starts in the Northern Hemisphere. The reason, according to NASA, lies in lunar mechanics: The sun and full moon are like kids on a see-saw; when one is high, the other is low. This week's high solstice sun gives us a low, horizon-hugging moon and a strong, long-lasting version of the illusion.
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