Newsletters
February 2018 - Rail Trail, Billboards, Mary Ann Wordell
WELCOME TO GREEN FUTURES !
FEBRUARY, 2018
“Leave it as it is. The ages have been at work on it and man can only mar it.”
- Theodore Roosevelt
“The greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it.”
- Robert Swan
EMAILED IN THIS MONTH – Thank you to our readers who forward articles they wish to share
Watching wildlife. http://www.pressherald.com/2017/12/31/wildlife-watching-in-maine-draws-fans-for-a-reason/
Shrinking national monuments https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jan/02/us-ocean-monuments-environment-trump
To compromise. https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/01/17/the-collaboration-trap/
Rewilding in the UK. http://www.wired.co.uk/article/northern-forest-england-woodland-trust-rewild-lynx-beaver
Destroying Canada's environment to supply us with electricity. https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2018/01/22/land-full-hydropower-strife-comes-with-electrons/kBg42Zmo0iYIwkgwunel7M/story.html
Boar in the UK. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/oct/12/boar-war-the-forest-of-dean-pixies-fighting-against-the-cull-of-wild-pigs
More boaring news. Radioactive boars in Sweden. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5303341/Swedish-wild-boar-25-times-safe-level-radiation.html
Air quality and public health. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/01/180123101914.htm
Maine's Governor LePage proves he's no friend of the environment once again. https://www.pressherald.com/2018/01/23/lepage-draws-ire-with-nominee-to-board-of-environmental-protection/
Activists fight to change pullouting culture. http://www.nwitimes.com/news/local/lake/environmental-activists-fight-to-change-culture-in-northwest-indiana/article_05fd4934-fe49-5eca-9695-e2bbd2d2b207.html
Attacking wilderness areas. http://mountainjournal.org/an-unprecedented-assault-on-american-wilderness
Losing our bat species that hibernate. http://triblive.com/state/pennsylvania/13196274-74/pennsylvania-bats-some-species-headed-for-extinction
SAVE THE RAIL TRAIL – Update
The Alliance to Save the Trail, of which we are a part, has retained legal representation from the Boston environmental law firm McGregor and Lagere.
We are now busily raising funds to pay the legal costs involved in saving the trail. Thank you to those who have contributed.
Fund raising in an economically disadvantaged place like Fall River is not easy. It is a shame that residents of Massachusetts are paying twice for this beautiful trail; their tax dollars for the land takings, design and construction of the $8 million dollar trail and now by having to donate to the Alliance to save it. Unfortunately, due to self-serving politicians willing to destroy a part of the rail trail to accommodate a wealthy developer everyone else suffers.
Through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests the Alliance is in possession of some rather damaging information as to the hanky-panky and government chicanery that never should have been allowed to occur.
There are over 10,000 cities in the United States. USA Today's “50 Worst American Cities to Live In”, Fall River makes the list.
If you haven't been following this issue you can catch up by going here, http://www.greenfutures.org/?content=7hys3g0A9jsp1rkg and here http://www.greenfutures.org/?content=2hFpT1aWxhWU7rBC and here too, http://www.greenfutures.org/?content=8hnudPbgjh3rI2YP
Transparency in government? Not in Fall River.
This portion of the rail trail, that you paid for, would be destroyed, wetland filled, and expensive large caliper trees, planted spring of 2017, ripped out of the ground.
PRIORITIES ASKEW - Destroy a Beautiful Inner City Bike Path - Erect digital billboards
The request to the Fall River Zoning Board of Appeals for permits to erect six proposed digital billboards along the Quequechan River's valley and on protected water department land off Route 24 was withdrawn, without prejudice, this past Thursday. Withdrawn “without prejudice” likely means they will be back. Stay tuned.
For background, go here: http://www.greenfutures.org/?content=8hnudPbgjh3rI2YP
SOMEONE BUY THESE FOLKS A MAP – Still lost in the woods
After speaking with area environmentalists and open space advocates about the vague and ever changing plans of the South Coast Bikeway Alliance for what they are calling a “scenic greenway”, it appears that the Alliance has been hijacked and lead astray by two or three of its Dartmouth and Westport members.
We've offered enthusiastic support if they want to return to their original mission for being.
If interested in some background, here it is from last month's newsletter. http://www.greenfutures.org/?content=8hnudPbgjh3rI2YP
WATER WOES WORSEN – Got money? Everything in Fall River is apparently for sale
No transparency with this one either. Item added at the end of the agenda just before the Watuppa Water Board meeting illustrates, once again, how issues are kept from the public.
For background, go here. Last article at bottom of page. http://www.greenfutures.org/content=2hFpT1aWxhWU7rBC
For funny news on Invenergy vs. local Narragansett Indians read this: https://www.ecori.org/renewable-energy/2018/1/22/power-plant-water-deal-with-narragansett-tribe-terminated
Local Fall River water sale protest, here: https://upriseri.com/news/energy/2018-01-11-fall-river-invenergy/
MARY ANN WORDELL – An Exceptional Person
Mary Ann Wordell was a remarkable, highly respected, long time member of Green Futures.
Mary Ann passed away December 26, 2017 at Charlton Memorial Hospital, Fall River, not far from her beloved Steep Brook home where as a small child she learned to love all of nature.
Steep Brook, when Mary Ann was a young girl, was a much more rural place than what it is now. Mary Ann had many stories to tell of the meadows she played in, woods she explored, ponds she ice skated on and critters she encountered. As an adult she advocated for preservation of public open space land because, from her own childhood experiences, she knew that children who play and explore outside are happier, kinder, more attentive and curious to learn about the world they live in than children who spend all their time indoors. When she had her grandchildren with her she would often call us to ask where in area woodlands we had recently seen frogs, turtles, pussy willows blooming, snakes, wild flowers and other such flora/fauna so she could take them there to see and learn.
Although Mary Ann's sense of place kept her in the Steep Brook area her whole life, she enjoyed traveling far and wide on vacations and after her retirement. She retired in 1995 having worked as RN head nurse/nurse manager at the former Truesdale Hospital and at Charlton Memorial Hospital for 35 years.
Upon retirement there wasn't any slowing down for Mary Ann. She immediately added Green Futures to the lengthy list of organizations she supported and became our spokesperson at news conferences on many environmental issues such as heavy metal contamination in local fish, expanding the Massachusetts' bottle bill, protecting city parks, saving open space land and helping in the creation of the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve.
Through her long involvement in the Fall River Garden Club and later as a member of our group she became concerned that Fall River was losing its street trees at a rapid rate and few seemed to care. The city administration was just not interested, failing to understand all the benefits trees bring to a community. Mary Ann jumped in to fill the void and created the Fall River Street Tree Planting Program (FRSTPP) http://www.frstpp.org/
The FRSTPP became Mary Ann's passion ...and woe to those that got in her way. The FRSTPP was going to plant trees and that they did and are still doing today.
Over the years in advocating for our natural environment we've discovered that a Mary Ann Wordell doesn’t come along very often. We were privileged to have her as a member. We miss her and we are sure Mother Nature does too.
A few photos of Mary Ann out in the nature she loved.
CELEBRATE THE HOLIDAY – Had enough of winter? Maybe not?
A groundhog mom and her kit never experience a New England winter.
Notice the sun is setting later each day and rising earlier? February is here and with February comes weather prognostications from groundhogs.
Fall River Freddie, one of the groundhogs that lives along the Alfred J. Lima Quequechan River Rail Trail (AJLQRRT) is so concerned and upset about the ill-conceived plan to ram a road across and paralleling the trail that he doesn't even feel like leaving his burrow on his Big Day, this coming Friday, February 2.
We were fortunate to find Fall River Freddie out on the rail trail a week early checking on his shadow ...”just in case,” as he said, he decides to appear.
Not only Freddie, but also all his turtle, duck, turkey and fishy friends are worried about the plan to destroy their homes and habitat along the lovely rail trail that they enjoy as much as we do.
Freddie and his friends would like you to please contribute to the legal fund to help save the trail. All contributions, large or small, vitally needed and gladly accepted. If you can't give a large donation, give a small one. It is amazing how even small donations of $5 or $10 add up. Only you know what you can afford to give. All contributions sincerely appreciated by Freddie, his animal friends and also by the friendly humans in the Alliance to Save the Rail Trail. Green Futures is part of that alliance.
Go to our home page for information on sending in donations.
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