By Adel MacLean
Rejuvenated FOJG Conservation Committee Organizing for the Year Ahead
Clout: Power through effective action. -Oxford Dictionary and Thesaurus
What are the ingredients of an effective Sierra Club conservation program? A time-honored maxim of political organizing holds that any campaign needs three things to be successful: people, money and time. The less the effort has of one, the more it needs of the other two.
If that is true and can be applied to our conservation initiative, the Falls of the James Group is poised to make remarkable progress. The reason is that the Conservation Committee is reorganizing with a new chair - Executive Committee member, Adele MacLean - and new members (people), with regular meetings (time), and with the enthusiastic backing of the Executive Committee (money and other resources).
At the committee’s first meeting on July 31, the group began to consider what to recommend to the Executive Committee in September about the Group’s conservation priorities for the coming year. Discussion focused first on the members’ core values about the work ahead and on what success would look like, then on broad array of possible issues and campaigns, and finally on priorities and assignments for follow-up. A consensus began to emerge around the following highest priority issues:
- Support for the new Canon Creek Greenway in Richmond’s Highland Park neighborhood
- Support for the Virginia Chapter’s Cool Cities (global warming) program and related tree plantings
- Support for the James River conservation easements initiative
- Participation in the James River Association’s Extreme Stream Make-over in Henrico County in October
- A possible new recycling campaign involving schools and/or apartment buildings
- A possible new regional bicycling campaign
- A series of “Favorite Places” outings and clean-ups
- Involvement with other regional land use and transportation issues as they arise.
In addition, the committee acknowledged that other long-standing issues might also require special attention in the coming year, such as water quality concerns related to the Swift Creek Reservoir in Chesterfield County and the water rights dispute between the City of Newport News and the Mattaponi Indian tribe.
The committee meets again on October 27th at 6:30 p.m. at the State Chapter office (422 E. Franklin Street, third floor) to continue the dialogue. Each committee member who volunteered for an assignment will prepare a one-page plan for the whole committee to consider in August to focus the conversation about these priorities. All interested FOJG members are welcome (and encouraged!) to attend. Executive Committee meetings are also open to Group members.
The process is just beginning, so there is plenty of room for new voices. Getting organized, identifying priorities, developing plans-we are off to a good start. Watch for FOJG’s rejuvenated Conservation Committee to be ready soon to start exercising its new clout.