News & Opinion About Huletts Landing, N.Y.
The Lake George Park Commission released this letter today thanking those who took the time to comment on their proposed stream regulations. The process now moves to the next phase because the LGPC approved the Final Generic Environmental Impact Statement at their May meeting.
To learn more about what happens next, read the letter.
Bravos to Ed Briody as he finished scrapping the last side of the Casino today. The plan is to paint the remaining side of the Casino this week. I made Ed take off his mask and smile for the camera.
Ed gets the Bravo this week, because he takes the time to see that no paint flakes get in the grass. He carefully places a tarp under the area he scrapes, then vacuums the flakes from the tarp, and disposes of them properly. This way no flakes get in the grass.
I call this the environmentally friendly way of painting. It takes a lot more time but see the result yourself. The paint flakes are on the tarp and not in the grass. Bravos to Ed for doing it the right way and being an example to us all!
I came across these two mallard ducks sitting on a dock and I creeped up as close as I could to get a good picture.
I was thinking about ducks because yesterday was the anniversary of the creation of Disney’s Donald Duck.
Birch tree at the end of the 5th hole.
Post Star Editorial: Whitehall Police
Read the Post Star’s editorial in favor of turning over the Whitehall police force to the Washington County Sheriff.
Springsteen to Play SPAC
Read how to get tickets for Aug. 25th.
Yesterday, on the way back from Whitehall, I stopped at the pavilion/walkway out over South Bay on Lake Champlain. I don’t want to beat a dead horse, but this little improvement shows the difference between how Dresden and Whitehall are facing their future.
Dresden Town Supervisor, Bob Banks, spearheaded this initiative a few years back and it’s a nice improvement. I met a couple from Whitehall and they said they loved fishing on the Dresden side because; “It’s nicer on this side.” There’s a parking lot, benches, the pavilion on the end, etc.
On the Whitehall side, there’s nothing and they haven’t even tried to improve things.
I’m going to be doing a story soon, on all the businesses that have closed in Whitehall over the last few years. It’s analogous to not seeing your nieces or nephews for a few months and seeing how they have grown. Except in Whitehall’s case it’s the reverse, when people come back for the summer they notice how things have declined.
I wish there was a concentrated effort by the Whitehall town fathers to do something, anything to stem the decline. It’s always more of the same though; “What can we do?”
Come up with a plan. That’s what. Try to bring business to the town, start or try to attract a college to come here, make the facades of the buildings like an alpine village. CUT TAXES. I don’t have the answer but try something. Use what you have and try. It’s a major thoroughfare to Vermont, get people to stop.
Getting back to the South Bay pavilion though, it’s dedicated to John Brooks who was the conservation officer for many years. I remember him as a child because he would issue permits for burning leaves, etc. and it always amazed me that he carried a gun. (He had to confront poachers and people hunting illegally who were armed so it makes sense.) As a child, he taught me things about the environment that I still remember to this day. I wish there were more people like him. I sense the environmental movement is creeping to an extremism that forgets people are part of the equation. That’s why I took a picture of the dedication to John Brooks that meets visitors to the pavilion.
He always gave me the sense that he would protect the environment but he also wanted people to enjoy the environment also. That’s why the last line of the dedication really hit home for me. He understood that there has to be access for PEOPLE to enjoy the environment.
Vision and enthusiasm are definitely needed on the Whitehall side.
I spoke to Leann this evening and one improvement that she will be offering at the Casino this summer will be wireless Internet access. So if you bring your laptop and stop at the Casino, you’ll be connected!
Google has recently launched a new tool designed to help web users find public data buried in hard-to-find government web sites.
The new service, called Google Public Data, is an effort to make information from all levels of government accessible to citizens.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Qt2n34VEr4
I personally would like to see all Adirondack Park Agency decisions including permits, non-jurisdictional letters and any determination made by the agency in it’s entire history available online and searchable by topic, year, town, county, etc.
The Adirondack Park Agency has been criticized for having little regard for administrative law, making different determinations based on arbitrary findings and in many cases making entirely inconsistent rulings. This is a major reason why the APA encounters so much resistance from local communities. These criticisms could be easily proven untrue if all of the APA’s decisions were online. In this day and age it is unfathomable that the APA cannot organize its permit and non-jurisdictional rulings online in a searchable and open manner.
Google along with Wikipedia and Amazon have all been trying to make it easier to find government information on the web. In 2002, the E-Government Act mandated governmental agencies to make information more accessible electronically but many have complained that federal and state agencies do not organize their sites so they can be easily indexed by search engines.
Sadly, the Adirondack Park Agency lives in the digital wilderness. Their determinations are not online or searchable at all through their website. Google can’t find them because they’re simply not there.
The citizens of New York clearly deserve better.
Lake Homes Sales Take Hit
Sales are slow this year on Lake George. Read the Post Star article here.
Please Don’t Feed the Bears
The Adirondack Alamanack had a good story on what happens when bears get fed.
Whitehall Police to be Outsourced
I wonder how the Washington County Sheriff will handle sightings of Bigfoot?
I’ve been trying to get a decent picture of this heron for some time. This morning I got close and finally got some. These were the best two.
The Washington Nationals announced this week, that they replaced Randy St. Claire as their pitching coach. Randy grew up in Whitehall and he and his family have many ties to Huletts. His parents ran the soda fountain for a few years in the 70’s and his brother Shane built some docks in Huletts in the 70’s also. His father, Ebba, was a major league catcher and actually taught me how to throw some different pitches when I was young.
Randy signed out of high-school with the Montreal Expos and played a number of seasons in the major leagues. He had been the pitching coach of the Washington Nationals for the last few years.
Sadly, I had recently submitted a request to the Nationals to interview him. We wish Randy the best and we know he’ll end up someplace good soon.
Here is a picture of his brother, Shane, (standing on the left) building a dock in Huletts in the 1970’s.
“A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.”
Oscar Wilde