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HOMES EVERY WEEK! Times of Ti
July 27, 2019
suncommunitynews.com
• EDITION •
Warren County seeks public access to historic Hague fire tower
BEYOND PLASTIC
Judith Enck seeks grassroots effort to end ocean contamination
By Thom Randall CORRESPONDENT
HAGUE | By next year, tourists and area residents may have a new destination where they can enjoy an impressive birds-eye view of southern Adirondack landscape. Warren County is seeking to provide public access to a historic fire tower on Swede Mountain, and recently they’ve taken steps toward that goal. The mountain is accessed from state Route 8 about six miles south of the Town of Hague’s namesake hamlet on the shore of Lake George. Swede Mountain has an elevation of 1,900 feet, and the fire tower, positioned not far from the peak where views are obstructed, is 47 feet tall — but its lowest set of stairs have been removed. The fire tower, built in 1918, was decommissioned in the late 1960s, when the state decided that forest fire detection by aircraft was more efficient.
$3,000
Horicon Supervisor Matt Simpson told Warren County supervisors July 19 that county Public Works Superintendent Kevin Hajos had evaluated the fire tower’s condition, and he estimated that it could be renovated and restored to public use for about $3,000. Simpson is chairman of the county’s Public Works Committee. “Kevin figured out what was needed to be safe and accommodate the public,” Simpson said. “I think it’s going to be a spectacular attraction. The view from the top of the fire tower is incredible.” » Fire tower Cont. on pg. 2
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‘LANDFILLS’
By Tim Rowland STA FF W RITER
LAKE PLACID | Having given up on the federal government’s ability to accomplish much of anything these days, Judith Enck, a former regional EPA administrator, is counting on local boards and civic groups to apply bottom-up pressure to decouple Americans from habitual use of cheap plastics that are ending up in the oceans and are contaminating our food supply. Taking microphones anywhere she can find them, Enck says that the quantity of use-and-pitch plastics that end up in the oceans is escalating precipitously. Each year, 8.8 million tons of plastics wind up in the sea, and at the current pace, there will be one pound of plastic in the ocean for every three pounds of fish by 2025. By 2050, the ratio will be 1:1.
“We’re turning our oceans into landfills,” Enck told a large gathering Tuesday sponsored by the Adirondack Garden Club and the Garden Club of Lake Placid. A senior fellow at Bennington College in Vermont, who is also rallying students to the cause, Enck has concluded that the fight against plastic bags, drinking straws and takeout food containers must primarily be waged at the local level. It’s the same formula used in 1982 when grassroots support was key to passage of the state’s bottle deposit bill. Most people are aware that plastics in the oceans are an issue, but they do not know the scope, nor do they know what they can do about it, Enck said. When she asks the wait staff at a restaurant to hold the straws, she said she’s usually greeted either with borderline hostility or else a faint glimmer of recognition and the inquiry. » Plastic Cont. on pg. 7
An Erie coincidence Surveyors who conquered ADK conquered canal, too By Tim Rowland STA FF W RITER
North Country Community College Professor Pete Nelson lectures on the Adirondack contribution to the Erie Canal. Photo by Tim Rowland
Business classes made easy
TICONDEROGA | In the late 1700s, a young surveyor was thrashing around the western Adirondacks trying to bring some sense of order to a massive tract of land where French nobles, for some reason, felt they might be able to regroup after fleeing the French Revolution’s bloody Reign of Terror. He failed. But in the course of his career, failures were few and far between. Indeed, the surveyor, Benjamin Wright, went on to many great successes, becoming a crucial cog in the construction of the Erie Canal. In 1969 he was awarded the status as
Father of American Civil Engineering by the American Society of Civil Engineers. Speaking before a packed house at North Country Community College, mathematics professor Pete Nelson cited Wright as an example of how the early Adirondacks — long regarded as little more than a howling wilderness — played a crucial role in the canal, and provided a foundation for American history in general. Wright and fellow surveyor Charles Brodhead earned their chops lugging 200 pounds of gear up and down some of the Adirondacks’ most precipitous topography. Perhaps most notable was the northern boundary of the Totten-Crossfield purchase, which was sketched on a primitive map sight unseen — and so happened to run over the crest of Giant Mountain and straight up an 800 foot cliff on Wallface Mountain, which today is a challenge, even for modern rock climbers. » Canal Cont. on pg. 6
NCCC offers online course with personal touch By Tim Rowland STA FF W RITER
TICONDEROGA | Online learning is easy. In theory. But those who were not born into a digital world may find computer classes daunting, so for them the North Country Community College in Ticonderoga has announced a business program that’s largely online, but with enough personal touches to get them over the rough spots. Joe Keegan, president of NCCC, said southern Essex County presents challenges because of the distance between communities, spotty internet and a workforce that might have reservations about distance learning. » Business classes Cont. on pg. 2
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Dignitaries at North Country Community College celebrate the official unveiling of a new online business course.