Wednesday, July 09, 2008

Partnerships in Preservation Work

By Chip Young

Looking at the big picture reaps dividends

If there is one generalization I would make regarding most environmental initiatives, it is that partnerships do indeed work.  (I would also argue that all “environmental” efforts are also economic endeavors, so please read it that way every time one evokes an environmental cause.)  Sure, there are instances of groups having a falling out with one another, but nothing along the lines of restaurant partners chasing each other through the kitchen with butcher knives (which I have personally observed), brothers Adi and Rudi Dassler breaking up to form the archrival Adidas and Puma athletic shoe companies, or the Beatles breaking up.  That damned Yoko.

Despite the fact the environmental community has a reputation for standing for peace, love and Kumbaya, people and organizations can get very protective of their little corner of the world, state or neighborhood.  Dare we say “turf”?  As cynics remind us, if we all ever worked as a single unit, there could only be one executive director. Oops.

But things are looking up.  It is getting to the point in Rhode Island and nearby Massachusetts where not only do groups talk the economic talk, when they walk the environmental walk they aren’t out for a stroll on their own.  There is still a ways to go to reach nirvana in my mind, but slowly the folks who deal with land are addressing water issues with a little more interest and knowledge, and vice versa for the watery sorts and their soil-oriented colleagues.  Add to that the economic seasoning, throw in a healthy dose of alternative energy and global climate change, and, voila!—we have a full course meal.

A group I am associated with recently formed the Sakonnet Conservation Coalition.  It is comprised of the five leading open space and farmland preservation organizations in Tiverton and Little Compton who have been working alongside each other for decades, saving fairly amazing parcels of land in their very special little place.  Realizing that when they pulled back and looked at what they had accomplished, they have decided to promote the bigger picture of what all their individual efforts have achieved, while continuing to maintain a focus on their own organization’s site-specific priorities.

It is a first step in partnering and collaboration, but a very good and important one.  Their past successes and future goals are spelled out in this recent opinion piece by the group, of which it is worth taking note.  This from The Sakonnet Conservation Coalition, a partnership among the Little Compton Agricultural Conservancy Trust, Sakonnet Preservation Association, The Nature Conservancy, Tiverton Land Trust and the Tiverton Open Space and Land Preservation Commission:

CONCERTED CONSERVATION SERVES THE COMMUNITY
By The Sakonnet Conservation Coalition

Preserving land and open space is a shared responsibility.  No more so than in the region on Newport’s quiet side, east of the Sakonnet River in Tiverton and Little Compton.

Over the past decade, land and farm conservation groups in this area—the Little Compton Agricultural Conservancy Trust, Sakonnet Preservation Association, The Nature Conservancy, Tiverton Land Trust and the Tiverton Open Space and Land Preservation Commission—have been working shoulder-to-shoulder to protect and preserve open space in the region.  Thanks to this cooperative effort, which frequently involves partnering with the R.I. Departments of Environmental Management and Transportation, the Natural Resources Conservation Service, local municipalities, and the Champlin Foundations, the individual benefits provided by each of the groups are significantly enhanced.

The fruits of those collaborative efforts are readily evident just by taking a drive south down Route 77 through the two communities that make up the Sakonnet landscape through the communities that line the eastern shore of the Sakonnet River. 

You first pass Pardon Gray Preserve on the left, a huge expanse of meandering meadow set against a wooded ridge, the largest forest in the East Bay, known as Weetamoo Woods.  This area is a major touchdown spot for forest birds that migrate and disperse over the entire region.  Further south, also on the left near the Little Compton town line, is the Eight Rod Way Management Area, where farming continues to serve local needs and provide an economic boost on land now open for visitors. 

More roadside farms continue on both sides of Main Road, from Hathaways’ farmland across from Pardon Gray Preserve to the area surrounding Sakonnet Vineyards, past Peckham Road and to Walker’s Farm Stand and The Last Stand, where customers literally eat up the local corn, fish and produce. Many of these have been preserved for continued family farming by the Youngs, Peckhams, Samsons, Richmonds, Lebreuxs and others.  Some of the colonial era stone walls here have even been restored by conservation efforts. 

Just past The Last Stand, on the right, is historic Treaty Rock Farm, still and forever destined to be another vibrant, contributing working farm, as well as a cultural and educational icon.  And beyond the turnoff to Little Compton at Meeting House Lane, the iris meadows at Taylor’s Lane have all been preserved as has the Middendorf farm, which from Main Road provides the first view of Sakonnet light and harbor, long a commercial lobstering landing point.

All along the way, you will have passed innumerable smaller tracts of forest, shrub, orchard, meadow or pasture, each protected in their own right along with these larger properties for nature, farming, or public benefit.
If you veer off the beeline of successful projects displayed on Route 77, there are similar efforts taking place throughout the neighboring area.  They include Middle Acres Farm, with 238 acres of farmland, wetlands and forest along Crandall Road heading from Tiverton to Adamsville that have been conserved by a similar joint effort.  This area preserves the wetlands area of Adamsville Brook which feeds the west branch of the Westport River and also protects the cranberry bogs and other farming activities on this land for the future.

As the summer of 2008 arrives, the Sakonnet landscape partners have their eyes set on more preservation and conservation efforts for farms and open spaces through separate projects and as a supportive team.  The Ferolbink farm is looking to join in being preserved with its neighboring working agricultural lands. Across the road from the Sakonnet Vineyard, efforts are going on to preserve 55 acres of Peckham family farmland.  Protecting the Watson Reservoir watershed and buffer and the Nonquit Pond reservoir and greenway are high on the list of priorities.  Preserving land in Pocasset Ridge, the forestland north of Weetamoo Woods and Pardon Gray Preserve, is also a key ongoing effort to the challenge of preserving the largest, and last remaining, unfragmented forest in the East Bay.  The initiatives are moving forward with full backing of all the area organizations.

The value added being brought to the region through this collaborative effort is immeasurable, and the diversity of interests and the backing of hundreds of local residents continues to be considerable.  The return on these strategic, mutually supportive initiatives is appreciated just by taking a “windshield survey” of the accomplishments as one moves through the Sakonnet landscape.  Hopefully this cooperative work can serve as a model for other ongoing conservation efforts of Rhode Island’s farms and open spaces while they can still be preserved for generations that follow, as the opportunity to do so was handed down before.