Minutes of Sierra Club Niagara Group Meeting on July 25 2000

Present: L. Beahan, R. Drake, M. Kukla, M. Reeves, B. Reeves, G. Robins, J Bunn, R. Lippes, J. Hufnagel, L. Kaszubski, A. Klein, M. Warner, N. Tufts, M. Graham

Treasurer's report: no income or expenditures

Minutes of previous meeting: deferred

Report from the Chair: Joe Demare published an excellent article on wind power in the Buffalo News ViewPoints section on Sunday July 23. The Atlantic Chapter Board of Governors will meet to interview Senate Candidate Richard Lazio in NYC on Aug 5. Sierra Club's national BOG has endorsed Al Gore for President. There was debate about delaying endorsement to promote discussion of environmental issues in the campaign but the importance of promoting a Democratic win carried the day for Gore. The Sierra "One-Club Meeting" Aug 18-20 in New Mexico still may have some vacancies for WNY members interested in attending. The Amherst Town Board will hold an informational meeting on Amherst State Park 7 PM Wed. July 26 at the Main Transit Fire Hall. Jim Bunn agreed to represent us there. Ballots and candidate biographies for the fall elections to the Niagara Group Steering Committee (new name for Ex-Com) will be in the next (October) issue of the Trail Blazer. Biographies of those wishing to run should be submitted for review by the nominating committee (Kaszubski, Warner and Bunn) by the end of August to meet the September 10 Trail Blazer publishing deadline. Park School Nature Preserve: N. Joe Tufts, of the neighborhood organization N.I.C.E., made a presentation on her campaign to prevent Park School from converting 2 of their 3 acres of wild land into soccer fields. She has done a dynamic and so far successful job. We invited her to join us. Endorsements for candidates for US Senate and President: Richard Lippes and Murray Warner expressed vigorous and opposing points of view on the elections Erie County Fair: Gen Robins proposed we set up a Sierra Table at the fair. The group consensus was that our efforts might be better spent elsewhere. Trail Blazer, Gen Robins suggested more local content. We all agreed. The cost of an additional four pages is only $30. Suggestions were made for articles on Zoar Valley and, New bye -laws and regular departments e.g. the Chair, Programs and a Letters to the Editor. The membership is urged to use the Trail Blazer to publicize local problems and projects.

Web site and listserv: Mike Kukla reported both are up and running. He urged members to sign on to the list serve and will email the means to do that once again. The local web site is available and has much useful material. Integrating it with the national system with its larger storage space will take some more doing.

Klydel Wetland: Liz Kaszubski reported that she and her North Tonawanda Citizen's group have taken the DEC before a Wetland's Review Board in a little used type of action complaining that the DEC has incorrectly classified 17 acres of the 70 acres of Klydel as not wetland and thereby declared it eligible for development by its owner. She described the efforts underway to circumvent the various roadblocks in the way of this action.

Natureview: Robyn Drake and Richard Lippes reported that the case awaits a new judge in that the judge in charge withdrew because of conflicting interests. Dan Ward, one of the Amherst Town Board members, suing the Town on the issue of breach of its Natureview contract, is making a claim for the Town to meet the legal expenses involved in the suit against itself. He has found legal precedent for this claim.

Group bylaws: Richard Lippes will review and update our bylaws to bring them into compliance with new national standards. Zoar Valley: Jim Bunn summarized recent correspondence with Jo Ann Zurek, Conservation Chair of ADK. She is urging the promotion of land along the Catauraugus from the DEC Open Space Committee b list to its a list. At JoAnn's request, Larry Beahan wrote a letter from Sierra to the Town of Concord Board urging them to urge the DEC in this direction. Jim will contact Friends of Zoar with regard to this issue.

Zoar Valley + Niagara Gorge outings: Mike Kukla outlined the arrangements for our Zoar Valley Hike July 29. Robbyn Drake will contact outings chair, Joe Demare and arrange a weeknight hike in Niagara Gorge shortly. Art Klein suggested we plan a monthly outing to an environmentally sensitive location each month preferably on the same day of each month so that members could plan for that date.

Meeting closed at 9:30

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Respectfully submitted,

Larry Beahan