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Journal
News
By
BLAIR CRADDOCK
September
9, 2002
Activists
see need to protect Torne Valley |
| RAMAPO
— Environmental activists savored a power company's decision not
to build a plant in the Torne Valley, but said the valley isn't safe
from development yet. "This is only half the battle," said
Raymond Kane, one of two co-chairs of the Torne Valley Preservation
Association, an environmental group that mobilized residents and
other community activists to oppose the plant.
His group banded
together with the larger Rockland County Conservation Association
and with civic groups from Hillburn, Montebello, Suffern and other
areas to oppose the power plant proposal filed in 1999 by American
National Power, a subsidiary of British-owned International Power.
They formed a coalition with the town of Ramapo, Rockland County and
the Palisades Interstate Parks Commission. The county hired lawyers
to battle ANP's application, and the town dedicated two of its own
attorneys.
Meanwhile, grass-roots organizers mobilized hundreds of
people to attend public hearings and speak out against the power
plant.
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"It really was a lot of people pulling together,"
Sarah Mondale, a co-founder of the Suffern Civic Association, said
last week. Dorice Madronero, a member of the Rockland County
Conservation Association, agreed. "It brought people together
who really would not usually have had anything to talk about, other
than a glib 'hello,' " she said.
On Wednesday, American
National Power announced in a report to shareholders that it would
not pursue its Torne Valley application. It cited market uncertainty
and "continuing concerns" about wildlife habitat. The
power company then formally notified the state that it was
withdrawing its application.
For environmentalists and local
officials in Rockland County, ANP's withdrawal was a victory,
especially sweet because the company mentioned wildlife habitat as a
reason to withdraw.
Timber rattlesnakes have nests near the valley
and use the valley as a hunting ground for the mice and other small
creatures they eat.
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| The coalition opposing the power plant had urged
state authorities to deny ANP's application because of the snakes,
which are designated as a threatened species in New York. Betty
Hedges, the Rockland County Conservation Association president, said
local environmentalist Geoff Welch had been the first person in her
group to insist on making the snakes an issue. "I can remember
poor Geoff, when everybody was saying, 'Oh, nobody's going to be
interested in the rattlesnakes!' " she said. That view changed.
When Rockland County Executive C. Scott Vanderhoef announced last
week he had received ANP's withdrawal, he gave tongue-in-cheek
credit to the rattlesnakes for delivering a "final bite"
to the power plant.
Hedges said environmentalists couldn't have
stopped the plant without governmental help. "It was the
powerful opposition by the government — the county, the town, the
Palisades Interstate Park Commission and the state of New Jersey —
that made the difference," she said.
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She said she had seen
community members rally to oppose many other development proposals,
but they did not succeed when government officials didn't join their
fight. "Here, all the pieces came together," she said.
"We're so fortunate."
Kane said he hoped the coalition
that worked to fight the power plant wouldn't fall apart now. The
issue of development in the Torne Valley has hardly gone away, he
said. Braen Stone has applied to the state Department of
Environmental Conservation for a permit to dig a quarry on land it
owns in the Torne Valley.
Ramapo Supervisor Christopher St. Lawrence
said the town would oppose the move. The town's zoning code does not
allow quarries now and won't allow them under the new master plan,
he said. Kane said the only way to stop future development in the
valley is to make the land part of the Palisades Interstate Park
system. That's been the mission of Torne Valley Preservation
Association since it formed in 1999.
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| St. Lawrence, who favors that
idea, said he has met with the valley's largest landowner, the
Ramapo Land Company, to discuss it. But even if the company agreed
to sell, such projects can require prolonged fund raising and
grant-seeking. A similar effort was successful in preserving
Sterling Forest, but it took years.
St. Lawrence announced last week
that the town had applied to the state for $4 million in
low-interest bonds to purchase 50 acres in the valley for a town
park, adding that the County Solid Waste Management Authority is
seeking to buy 30 more acres in the valley for leaf composting.
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Those 80 acres in the southern part of the valley are only a small
part of about 1,500 acres in the area that the Torne Valley
Preservation Association has hoped to incorporate into state
parkland.
To accomplish such preservation, Kane said, coalitions are
needed, like the one that successfully helped stop the ANP plan.
"We're hoping everybody will stay together," he said.
"If you just drive out a power plant and allow somebody else to
come in and develop, you haven't accomplished very much."
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