By Gwendolyn Craig
ALBANY — A contingent of Adirondack Park supporters swept the Capitol on Monday, calling for more forest rangers, more funding to protect the area from overuse, bolstering of the Adirondack Park Agency and strengthening laws to protect Adirondack waters.
It has been at least a decade since a group of this size representing the Adirondacks got together for one lobbying day, said David Gibson, of Adirondack Wild: Friends of the Forest Preserve.
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“It’s unusual, and we hope to do it more often,” Gibson added.
The day was spearheaded by Gibson’s group along with the Adirondack Council, Adirondack Mountain Club, Protect the Adirondacks and the Sierra Club’s Atlantic Chapter.
Some of the lobbyists’ goals are to encourage lawmakers to change the draft 2021 budget for New York State. For example, no new forest rangers are listed in the state Department of Environmental Conservation’s proposal to add 47 new staffers. The groups want more rangers.
The groups also discussed wishes for the state’s $300 million Environmental Protection Fund.
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While glad to see that money in the draft budget, Gibson said the part of that fund going toward land easements and purchases has been cut by $3 million. Lobbyists will ask for it to be restored to $33 million.
Environmental groups are also worried about language in the budget that could use those Environmental Protection Fund dollars to pay for DEC staff.
“That’s a horrible precedent,” said Michael Barrett, executive director of the Adirondack Mountain Club, adding that it would undermine the whole purpose of the fund and was not a good way to balance the budget.
The groups are also asking for more specifics on Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s proposed $3 billion Restore Mother Nature Bond Act. Barrett said the Act is a “big, shiny object,” but not enough information has been released about it. Lobbyists will ask for some specific projects to be listed in the act, which will need to be approved by voters in November.
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Of concern to all the groups, too, is the future of the Adirondack Park Agency.
Peter Bauer, executive director of Protect the Adirondacks, noted that the 11-member board has three vacancies. Four of the board members are serving on expired terms, and another’s term is set to expire in June.
Bauer and others are calling on lawmakers and Cuomo to get the board back up to full strength and appoint board members with “greater professional experience.” One of the complaints of a number of the environmental groups is a lack of environmental attorneys, scientists and regional planning experts on the agency board.
The environmental groups have submitted about a dozen names of people willing to serve on the board, Gibson said.
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Lobbyists are also hoping to garner more support for legislation that would reduce road salt use and protect waters in the Adirondacks and across the state. Willie Janeway, executive director of the Adirondack Council, also said he wants to see aquatic invasive species legislation strengthened.
Assemblyman Steve Englebright, D-Setaucket, made an appearance at the start of the lobbying day, encouraging attendees “to protect a legacy that’s important to our state.” Englebright is also the chair of the state Assembly’s Environmental Conservation Committee.
“We have work to do,” Englebright said.
Well my, I’m impressed already with the matching scarves, pants and jackets/vests. If this is the environmentalists’ version of Beatle suits, then I’d say that Michael Barrett is off to a smashing start! If history teaches anything, Mr. Legal Beagle Barrett would know that the evil empire has already plundered about $1 Billion from the EPF for general fund budget purposes since the inception of the fund, so it’s hardly a precedent, and the sky is not falling. It’s old school NYS executive budget chicanery, like trying to find out who’s working for the Governor in the Executive Chamber at the Capitol when many staff members are placed on agency payrolls. Go figure! And for those who they’ve advanced to fill vacancies and serve on the APA, we’d all be better served if they remembered Sherman’s pledge not to accept if nominated, nor serve if elected. The APA needs more common sense and balance to represent all of the people and their legitimate interests in the diverse use and classification of State lands, not just that advanced by the Green Mafia. The proposed $300 Million will fund whatever expenses and projects HRH Andy and the Legislature deem appropriate, with the caveat that no man’s life, liberty or property are safe as long as the Legislature is in session. My hope is that at least part of the funding is directed to create and expand necessary facilities, improving trails and maintenance, to enable and increase year round public access and use, and perhaps a few new patches and badges to placate this group. What’s not to like about patches, badges and awards anyway?
I am sorry – I may have missed the point you are trying to make.
From a know it all like you Boreas, I was sure you’d have some “knowledge” to share with your endless comment on almost every post. Here’s a hint: it’s non-authoritarian access for the mobs. How’s your patch collection?
Still looking for a point… I am trying to understand your point of view, but am having trouble figuring out what it is. Perhaps some clear examples without all the hyperbole, contempt, and sarcasm would help. Otherwise, you are just ranting. That is all right as well, just don’t expect anyone to listen.
Ahh yes, people who “represent the Adirondacks” just not the people who have to live there. They could care less since they all make good money while towns continue to shrink because there not allowed to have any viable businesses that actually make a competitive salary like the rest of the state. They claim to protect the land and encourage the state to buy more of it and allow people to use it where they were never allowed before. Now you find garbage where there never used to be, trampled down paths where there never was. But hey that’s protecting it, I guess? They like spending tax payers money to benefit themselves. Hire more rangers they demand! Wouldn’t need them if you would stop asking this governor to buy and open up more land to people! What’s it going to cost the state when they have to fund fire departments and EMS squads because there’s nobody left young enough to manage them, or there is nobody at all left to run them? In the town’s where tourists keep coming more and more how far will they have to come from to help someone out on a snowmobile trail that the state thinks is the key to our viability and long term health of our towns, or put out a fire! Many towns will be mostly empty within 50 years. There’s nothing here to keep people who want to make a decent living. My town already no longer has a grocery store. We have 2 motels. 35 years ago there were 20-30 kids in a school class. There are 4-20 now in many towns. Soon the environmentalists will have the Adirondacks all to themselves and all there tree hugging friends, but with no services. They will then ask the state to take care of them on the taxpayers dime!
agree scott, but i think APA should make sure every job they create is given to residents first. all The small towns are being destroyed by poor employment. controlled logging should also be reinstated across adirondacks, it creates way more animal food, diversity and population. reduces likely hoods of massive forest fires as we see out west yearly, supplies needed jobs for many locals.
But all state, county and town jobs should be going to qualified locals, regardless of race, to actively create programs and spend money to try and recruit minorities to move to the adirondacks to take jobs is just wrong. that money is being spent to recruit people to move to adirondacks and then handing them jobs that local are being denied because they are not the right “color”.
Just wrong, increasing population, spending money to do this, instead spend that money to create more local jobs, allow locals to be hired regardless of color, requiring a job to be filled by a minority and denying a qualified local is just racist.