A divided Chilmark conservation commission voted last week to approve a project to install a new culvert in Mill Brook headwaters off North Road. Proposed by the Sheriff’s Meadow Foundation, the project has kicked up a cloud of controversy.
Sheriff’s Meadow Foundation: 1959-2009
Half a Century of Island Conservation
The removal of plants and trees from conservation land owned by the Sheriff’s Meadow Foundation for use in a large private landscaping job began some two years ago, according to documents detailing the extent of the damage done by the operation.
Sheriff’s Meadow Foundation plans to appoint Adam Moore, a former land superintendent at the Martha’s Vineyard Land Bank, as its new executive director.
Mr. Moore is currently executive director of the Connecticut Forest and Park Association, a position he has held since 2001. He oversees 800 miles of trails. During his tenure, Mr. Moore doubled the size of the staff, greatly increased annual giving, and became a national and statewide advocate for conservation.
A longstanding and unprecedented gift of 156 acres at Quansoo Farm in Chilmark from the late Florence (Flipper) Harris to the Sheriff’s Meadow Foundation is now complete, leaders at the foundation announced this week.
Donated to Sheriff’s Meadow by Mrs. Harris over a period of years beginning more than a quarter century ago, the Quansoo Farm gift is the second largest land bequest in the history of Sheriff’s Meadow.
The dire forecast for the future of the Vineyard environment, signed onto by the Island's major conservation groups 10 years ago this week, was wrong. Dramatically, happily wrong.
Among other things, the 1997 white paper predicted the Vineyard would be built out within eight years, and that only a little over 25 per cent of Island land would be protected by 2005. History has proven these figures to be way off the mark.
Walking along the shore of Black Point Pond in Chilmark, Richard
Johnson of Sheriff's Meadow Foundation is nearly dwarfed by a
thick stand of 12-foot high reeds.
Also called phragmites, the reeds are an invasive species that have
formed a dense monoculture over what was once an open diverse habitat of
native pondshore plants. Dead reeds crunch beneath his boots, covering
the ground so virtually nothing else can grow through.
