AN OPEN LETTER TO REP. FRANK
PALLONE ON THE PRIVATIZATION OF SANDY HOOK
The NJ Chapter of the Sierra Club has joined the grass roots
group Save Sandy Hook (Svsndyhk@aol.com) efforts to oppose the National
Parks Service (NPS) plans to award a sixty year lease of public facilities
at Sandy Hook to a private real estate company.
It is respectfully requested that Representative Pallone
duly consider the following on the record facts while contemplating the
opinions of self proclaimed proponents for privatization of the now very
public north end of Sandy Hook.
1) A recent letter from Judith Stanley Coleman ( Middletown
Planning Board Chair) aptly pointed to "the public never really made part of
the process……. through the intervention of Representative Frank Pallone the
public meetings were initially held."
2) Section 5 of the original RFP published in 1999 required
that documented proof of funding be substantive parts of any/all proposals.
4 1/2 years later, there is still no solid, concrete evidence of where the
moneys are coming from. Fiscal responsibility like environmental
accountability cannot be accessed or addressed when the buildings' uses and
possible occupants are changed as often as the NPS has altered the original
conditions of the RFP for Wassel Realty.
3) The authors of the pro-development position state that
"the rehabilitation ….will have no effect on environmental assets." The
estimated 1600 cars/trips and infrastructure to support the this traffic,
along with new utility lines and needed expansion of the sewage treatment
plant will undoubtedly impact natural resources. The cursory environmental
report cited nine Osprey nests to be relocated, parking lot encroachment on
Piping Plover nesting areas and relocation of public parking to mention only
a few. Evidently, these along with the many other unreported cumulative
impacts from urbanizing the Hook's north end are expendable for the sake of
converting crumbling military structures into private businesses.
4) The environmental and traffic studies presented at the
public meetings (not duly noticed hearings) were prepared jointly by the NPS
and the preferred applicant, Wassel Realty. Lack of impartial objectivity
lends little credibility to any conclusions reached by vested parties with
much to gain from acquiring the public's prime waterfront real estate.
The problematic precedent setting 60 year private leasing of
the Hook to be used as a model for placing our national parklands in private
for profit hands undermines the purpose/mandates for public lands.
Pro-development proponents have suggested that Senators' Lautenberg and
Corzine support the Hook's development. Local newspapers have reported
otherwise. Senator Lautenberg stated on July 23, 2003 that, "It's the
people's property and whose going to profit when they put offices out there?
Not the people, but the developers. It ought to stay public property. " On
May 3, 2003 Senator Corzine said," I would rather leave it alone as is and
leave it in its current state. I guess I come down on the side of the
environmentalist. I think the less we do in tampering, the better we will
be."
Finally Representative Pallone, it is hereby suggested that
when you think about Sandy Hook you remember that it was saved for
preservation/conservation first and foremost to be enjoyed by the true
owners, the taxpayers. It is hereby further requested/encouraged that you
stand firm and continue to support the necessary and publicly beneficial
effort to keep public lands out of dubious deep pockets so that they stay
forever safe in the peoples' hands. Finally, for the public at large to
learn more about saving Sandy Hook please go to
Svsndyhk@aol.com.
Carole Balmer
Holmdel, NJ
(Carole Balmer is a Former Deputy Mayor Holmdel Township,
Planning Board Member, Environmental Commission Chair and Current Zoning
Board Vice Chair and Bayshore Sewage Authority Commissioner)
