UP THE CREEK!

Onondaga Creekwalk nearing completion

2010-08-06T12:15:00.002-04:00

Thanks to my pal Sharon Moran in Syracuse for giving me the alert about this article:
http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2010/08/onondaga_creekwalk_nearing_com.html

TCF ShortDocs Challenge: Book Odds

2010-07-17T12:21:00.001-04:00

As I continue to work on editing the recordings, I collaborated with my brother Farsheed on creating a short stand-alone piece for Third Coast's ShortDocs Challenge, which featured audio samples from my favorite band, The Books.

This piece, titled B-A-B, was submitted under the category "I didn't know that". Sisters Joyce Brilbeck and Kaye Logan share memories about growing up around Ballantyne Road near Onondaga Creek in Syracuse, NY.

http://www.thirdcoastfestival.org/library/864-i-didn-t-know-that-8

Third Coast International Audio Festival is my top resource for interesting audio documentary work. They are an inspiration!

Environmental Quality Award

2010-05-02T09:47:00.001-04:00

Onondaga County, Onondaga Nation and two environmental groups to be honored by EPA
By Tim Knauss / The Post-Standard
April 19, 2010, 6:57PM

Syracuse, NY -- Officials from Onondaga County, the Onondaga Nation and two non-profit environmental groups will travel to Manhattan Friday to accept an award from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for their work collaborating on a green solution to the sewer overflows that plague Onondaga Lake and its tributaries.

The regional office of EPA will give its Environmental Quality Award to County Executive Joanie Mahoney, the Onondaga Nation, Atlantic States Legal Foundation and the Partnership for Onondaga Creek.

They are being honored for working together on a new solution for overloaded sewers, using rain gardens, porous pavement and other green initiatives to absorb storm runoff. Underground storage tanks will be used in combination with those methods.

That plan, approved in November by a federal judge overseeing the county’s compliance with clean water rules, replaced a program of building controversial sewage treatment facilities in city neighborhoods.

EPA’s Region 2 office in New York makes the awards annually to individuals, groups or government officials for “significant contributions” to environmental quality. A full list of this year’s winners is expected to be released Friday.

http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2010/04/onondaga_county_onondaga_natio.html

Activists' persistence on sewage pushed Onondaga County to 'go green'

2010-01-22T15:41:00.004-05:00

Activists' persistence on sewage pushed Onondaga County to 'go green'
By Tim Knauss / The Post-Standard
January 18, 2010, 6:50AM

Community activists and Syracuse residents Aggie Lane, left, and Lionel Logan on the bridge at Midland Ave. and Blaine Street that spans Onondaga Creek. Their efforts helped keep more sewage plants, like the Midland sewage plant in the background, from being built.

Syracuse, NY -- In 2000, Aggie Lane demonstrated outside the home of Onondaga County Executive Nick Pirro to protest plans for a sewage treatment plant in her Midland Avenue neighborhood.

During a 2004 protest against the sewage plant, she was arrested.

But by 2008, Lane was advising the new county executive, Joanie Mahoney, and giving PowerPoint presentations to top state environmental officials in Albany.

Lane lost her battle to stop the Midland Regional Treatment Facility from being built. But she and other activists recently won the war to scrap Onondaga County’s costly campaign of building neighborhood sewage plants.

This is the story of how Republican politician Mahoney sought help from community activists to shake up a complex $560 million program to clean up Onondaga Lake and its tributaries — a program that had long been controlled by engineers and bureaucrats.

Convinced that change was necessary, Mahoney early in her tenure listened more closely to her band of outsiders than to her own county staff and paid consultants.

The result was a radically new plan to develop a citywide network of rain gardens, green roofs, porous pavements and other “green” infrastructure to reduce the need for sewage plants and giant pipelines in city neighborhoods.

“It’s really democracy at its best, with people who are really involved demanding and achieving change,” said Joseph Heath, a lawyer for the Onondaga Nation.

The role of activists such as Heath and Lane in framing the county’s policy is perhaps nowhere more evident than at the “pipe to nowhere.”

Before construction of the Midland plant was finished, contractors installed the first 1,000 feet of a massive underground pipeline that was supposed to bring in half the sewage and storm water to be handled by the facility.

But the pipeline, which was intended to stretch 1.5 miles, will never be finished. The $80 million Midland Regional Treatment Facility will forever operate at about half capacity.

To engineer Peter Moffa, who consulted with Onondaga County for three decades before retiring, that’s a tragedy.

“It’s just terrible,” Moffa said. “You’ve got a facility that was built out and ... it’s not being utilized to its fullest.”

But Heath, who fought to exclude the Midland pipeline from the county’s program, said burying a 12-foot-diameter concrete pipe along a 1.5-mile route would have been disruptive to the neighborhood.

The pipeline also would have brought more runoff to the Midland plant, which is designed to dump partially treated sewage into Onondaga Creek if flows exceed its storage capacity.

“The less it’s used, the better,” Heath said of the treatment plant.

The Midland pipeline was expected to cost about $62 million, county officials said.

As alternatives, Lane and others proposed a series of smaller initiatives, such as cleaning trunk lines, installing a small storage tank and separating some storm sewers from sanitary sewers. Those “gray” projects would be combined with “green” initiatives such as vegetation-covered roofs, porous parking lots and tree boxes, they proposed.

That is now the county’s approach.

It’s not yet clear whether the new plan will save money. County officials say new gray projects targeted for the Midland area could cost between $24 million and $70 million, depending on whether all the projects get done. They have tentatively allocated $9 million for green projects, but many of the specifics for green infrastructure are still under review.

All told, the county estimates it could spend as much as $223 million to complete gray and green projects in the Midland, Armory Square and Harbor Brook areas, said Patricia Pastella, commissioner of water environment protection. That’s roughly the estimate for the previous plan.

By 2018, green initiatives are expected to keep 250 million gallons of storm water out of sewers throughout the urban area that drains into Onondaga Creek and Harbor Brook. Another 160 million gallons will be captured with gray infrastructure, such as storage tanks and sewer improvements, according to the county’s new plan.

The costs and benefits of green initiatives can be tricky to estimate, because they rely on many small projects across a wide area. They also require widespread public participation, said Samuel Sage, president of Atlantic States Legal Foundation, one of the activists who pushed for the green plan.

“Green is faith-based technology — faith in the public,” Sage said. “When you have to plant 10,000 trees, and you need 10,000 people to take care of 10,000 trees, engineers panic.”

In the fall of 2007, when Joanie Mahoney was campaigning for county executive, she bumped into Lane at an event on the South Side.

“We need to talk,” Mahoney told her.

Lane, 64, is a former engineer who retired early from Carrier Corp., in 1995. Her concern about racism and the way it divides the community prompted her to move in 1992 from Fayetteville to Midland Avenue, one of the poorest neighborhoods in Syracuse.

In 2000, she joined the Partnership for Onondaga Creek, a community group organized to fight against the Midland sewage plant and to advocate for alternative strategies. That fight became a new occupation for Lane, who lives two blocks from the plant.

“It was a full-time job,” she said.

Mahoney first heard Lane speak out when Mahoney was a city councilor in the early 2000s. Mahoney was persuaded that the Midland plant was a bad idea. She said she sympathized with neighborhood residents who complained that the county would never build a similar facility in a wealthy, white community.

Lane, who keeps boxes of records and sewer maps at home, impressed Mahoney with her knowledge.

As the election approached, Mahoney told Lane that if she won the county executive job, she would be interested in changing the sewer policies of the outgoing executive, Pirro. She asked Lane to organize a meeting of environmental and neighborhood activists who could bring Mahoney up to speed.

The meeting took place Oct. 29, eight days before the election. Mahoney and her campaign manager, Ben Dublin, met with Lane, Heath and several others who would become key suppliers of information and advice.

As soon as Mahoney took office, she turned to them for help. In January 2008, she faced a critical decision.

Plans for a second regional treatment facility — in Armory Square, similar to the Midland plant — had been started months before Mahoney took office. Site work had begun. Bids had been submitted for the construction.

Most of the staff from the county Department of Water Environment Conservation recommended that Mahoney award a contract and move ahead with the project, she said.

When she told department employees she wanted to abandon the project and look at other alternatives, she was met with incredulous looks, Mahoney recalled.

“I don’t believe anybody in those initial meetings thought we were going to do anything other than build a sewage treatment plant,” she said.

During those first weeks, Mahoney met and traded e-mail with Heath and Lane — both to seek their opinions and to check the facts her staff was giving her.

“I could trust, I could bounce things off (Joe) and Aggie,” Mahoney said.

She decided to postpone the construction bids, and later to abandon the sewage plant project.

Meanwhile, Sage, of Atlantic States, and Heath teamed to persuade the state Department of Environmental Conservation that it was time for a change in Onondaga County’s plan.

Sage can take credit for spurring much of Onondaga County’s progress in cleaning local waterways. His organization, a small nonprofit, sued the county in 1988 to force it to comply with federal clean water laws.

In the past decade, Onondaga County has spent $350 million to fix wastewater problems. Scientists agree that Onondaga Lake is much healthier because of it.

But that doesn’t mean Sage is happy with all the projects undertaken by the county. He has consistently opposed regional treatment facilities like the one at Midland Avenue.

Sage and Heath met twice in late 2007 and early 2008 with Alexander “Pete” Grannis, the DEC commissioner, to enlist his support for a new strategy.

During at least one of those meetings, they were accompanied by water scientist Ed Michalenko, of Onondaga Environmental Institute. Michalenko presented data showing that bacteria levels in Onondaga Creek are heavily affected by leaks in the sanitary sewers — a problem that would not be solved by building regional treatment facilities. Michalenko argued that Onondaga County should devote its resources to repairing sanitary sewers and separating them from storm sewers.

Heath said he also persuaded representatives of the DEC’s environmental justice staff to Syracuse to visit the neighborhood near the Midland plant and to walk the route of the planned pipeline. Their visits helped convince DEC officials that the South Side had borne an unfair burden and should not get a pipeline, as well, Heath said.

To sell a green solution, Heath and Sage helped coordinate visits by experts in green infrastructure.

They brought in Nancy Stoner, a former EPA official who co-directs water programs for the Natural Resources Defense Council. Stoner, co-author of “Rooftops to Rivers,” the council’s influential guide to green infrastructure, gave a lecture attended by county officials.

They also brought in Franco Montalto, a Drexel University hydrologist and engineer who runs a company specializing in green infrastructure. Montalto toured local sites and met with county officials.

When the county finally had to hire an engineering company to evaluate and refine its new program, Mahoney put out a request for proposals but refused to hire any local company, because most had invested many years of work on the old programs.
She wanted a fresh set of eyes, she said, and selected CH2M Hill Cos. Ltd., an international company based in Englewood, Colo.

“You can’t get that from people who have been immersed in it for 15 years,” Mahoney said. “You can’t get that fresh look.”

DEC officials have said they hope to make Onondaga County’s green infrastructure program a model for other cities to follow. Mahoney said the county’s groundbreaking approach would not have been possible without the help of activists from the community.

“A lot of the reason I knew what I was talking about was because I had listened to people like Aggie Lane and Joe Heath and the neighbors,” she said.

Contact Tim Knauss at tknauss@syracuse.com or 470-3023.

best news for the new year

2010-01-01T23:32:00.000-05:00

December 31, 2009
E.P.A., Concerned Over Gas Drilling, Questions New York State’s Plans
By MIREYA NAVARRO, New York Times
See original article here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/31/science/earth/31drill.html?_r=4&ref=nyregion#

The federal Environmental Protection Agency told New York State on Wednesday that it had major concerns about how proposed hydraulic drilling for natural gas would affect public health and the environment, and urged it to undertake a broader study of the potential impact.

In formal comments on the state’s proposed regulations governing new natural gas drilling, the E.P.A. said it was particularly concerned about the regional water supply, air quality, wastewater treatment and radioactive materials that could be disturbed during drilling.

It recommended that “essential environmental protection measures” be taken before the state begins to review permit applications for the drilling, which is envisaged in the Marcellus Shale region.

The region includes New York City’s watershed in the Catskills. The Chesapeake Energy Corporation, which owns the lease to drill in the watershed, has backed off from plans to drill there specifically, but opponents of drilling have argued that the promise means little and could be reversed.

The draft regulations apply to a technology known as hydraulic fracturing, which involves blasting huge volumes of water mixed with chemicals into rock to extract gas. The process results in significant amounts of wastewater and has stirred concern about the risk of contamination and about water disposal issues.

In a statement, Yancey Roy, a spokesman for the State Department of Environmental Conservation, said it “appreciated” the federal agency’s comments but had no detailed response.

“At this time we are still taking input from the public and it would not be appropriate to respond to specific comments,” he said.

The federal agency was not required to weigh in as a regulator in what amounts to a state process to assess the environmental impact of drilling. But the agency’s involvement was welcomed by those who share similar concerns in what has become a highly polarizing issue in New York.

New York City officials, who oppose drilling in the watershed that supplies the city’s drinking water, views the E.P.A.’s comments as corroboration of their view that the state’s environmental impact statement is “flawed and should be rescinded,” said Marc La Vorgna, a spokesman for Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg.

“It does not adequately address the risks to the city’s drinking water,” he said.

Katherine Nadeau, water and natural resources program associate with Environmental Advocates of New York, a nonprofit group, described the federal agency’s letter as “nothing short of awesome.”

“The E.P.A. rightly echoes the concerns of tens of thousands of New Yorkers,” she said. “The D.E.C. needs to ditch the draft natural gas guidelines.”

E.P.A. officials did not specifically call for a ban on drilling in watershed areas. But they said the agency had “serious reservations about whether gas drilling in the New York City watershed is consistent with the vision of long-term maintenance of a high-quality unfiltered water supply.”

They recommended “a very cautious approach in all watershed areas.”

The agency also suggested that state regulators join forces with the New York State Department of Health, which enforces rules on safe drinking water, and with the New York State Public Service Commission, which regulates the construction and operation of the pipes that gather the natural gas.

They should work jointly, the E.P.A. said, to produce a more complete final document that addresses all issues of concern.

good news!

2009-11-17T09:43:00.002-05:00

Federal judge approves Onondaga County using green technology to reduce Onondaga Lake pollution
By Tim Knauss / The Post-Standard (Syracuse)
November 16, 2009, 7:32PM

Onondaga County's plan to use trees, vegetated roofs, rain gardens, permeable pavement and rain barrels - instead of three new sewage treatment plants - to reduce sewer overflows polluting tributaries of Onondaga Lake was approved Monday by U.S. District Judge Frederick Scullin. In this file photo from August 2009, the sun rises over the lake. Syracuse, NY - Onondaga County got the final go-ahead Monday to scrap plans for three new sewage plants — including one in Armory Square — and instead reduce sewer overflows with trees, vegetated roofs, rain gardens, permeable pavement and rain barrels.

U.S. District Judge Frederick Scullin on Monday signed a new consent order between U.S. District Judge Frederick Scullin the county, the state Department of Environmental Conservation and Atlantic States Legal Foundation, a nonprofit group that sued the county in 1988 to stop its pollution of Onondaga Lake.

The new agreement replaces a court order that required the county to build a series of sewage plants along tributaries of the lake. The parties to the lawsuit — along with environmentalists and neighborhood activists who opposed building sewage plants — hailed the new consent order as a breakthrough that could change the face of Syracuse.

“Just imagine half a million more trees in our city,” said Joseph Heath, an attorney representing the Onondaga Nation, who helped hammer out the agreement.

DEC officials have said Onondaga County will likely set an example for other New York communities in how to use “green infrastructure” to handle urban runoff.

County Executive Joanie Mahoney laid the groundwork in 2008 when, just three weeks after taking office, she halted plans for a controversial $128 million sewage plant in Armory Square, where site work had already begun. Mahoney, the DEC and Atlantic States then sought permission from Scullin to hammer out a deal that would emphasize green measures.

Mahoney said she hopes the new plan will revitalize the community by cleaning its waterways in environmentally friendly ways.

“This is truly changing the prospects for Syracuse and Central New York,’’ Mahoney said. “And it’s probably going to be among the biggest accomplishments that I’ll have in this job, to get the federal court to change the direction we’re in.’’

Instead of a sewage plant along Onondaga Creek in Armory Square, the county will build a 3.7 million-gallon underground storage tank there to hold sewer overflows until they can be processed at the county’s Metro sewage treatment plant. The Armory Square tank will be installed by December 2013. Two additional storage tanks will be built along Harbor Brook, also by 2013.

Through a combination of storage tanks, new sewers and green infrastructure, the county is expected to prevent at least 95 percent of storm runoff from reaching waterways by 2018. The sewage system now captures about 85 percent each year, or 400 million gallons less.

The new court order gives the county until 2011 — roughly three extra years — to demonstrate its ability to restrict phosphorous emissions into Onondaga Lake. The order also calls for new scientific studies examining phosphorous in the lake.

Tim Knauss can be reached at tknauss@syracuse.com or 470-3023.

© 2009 syracuse.com. All rights reserved.

8th Annual Onondaga Creek Clean Up

2009-09-08T20:54:00.000-04:00

Saturday, September 12th & 19th
and this year it will be COMPLETELY COMMUNITY RUN!
That mean it’s up to us to get the job done!

We need volunteers to:
- clear trash/debris on the Creek banks and in the water.
- bring canoes to haul our "treasures"

We'll get dirty, we'll get wet, and we'll make our city a better place to live!

SIGN UP TODAY!

Bob Graham 396-2944 or bob153g@msn.com
Steve Seleway 345-2727 or selent@msn.com

Readers' Page for August 19, 2009

2009-08-23T13:45:00.004-04:00

Trees, rain gardens key to controlling sewage overflow

Posted by Readers' Page August 19, 2009, Categories: Letters
Angela Madonia/The Post-Standard

CORNELL COOPERATIVE Extension workers and volunteers work on a rain garden in Skaneateles last summer.

To the Editor:

The Partnership for Onondaga Creek fully supports the county's efforts to use green infrastructure, sewer separation and storage to avoid having to build any more swirler plants. In response to Peter E. Moffa's Aug. 12 letter, Mr. Moffa is missing the point.

First, it is important that everyone understand that green infrastructure is not going to solve the combined sewer overflow problems single-handedly, nor has that been proposed. Green infrastructure will, however, delay and reduce the volume of "peak flow" -- the point that overwhelms our current system. It makes it possible to design further "gray" capacity -- such as underground storage -- to capture the increased volume of water in our sewers and send it to the Metro treatment plant after the peak has passed.

We taxpayers have invested a lot of money in Metro's upgrades over the past decade. The reduction in ammonia and phosphorous that was formerly getting into Onondaga Lake and mucking up the ecosystem is applauded. It is important to understand that Mr. Moffa's swirler only treats for bacteria, and poorly at that. All of the phosphorous and ammonia pollution continues to go into Onondaga Creek.

Thankfully, the Midland sewage plant is at "50 percent capacity" as Mr. Moffa says, so it doesn't overflow very often, and most of the sewage goes on to Metro for full treatment.

The 12-foot-in-diameter pipe -- big enough to drive a bus through -- that he wanted to put alongside Onondaga Creek to "complete" the project, resulting in the disruption of 60 more homes, is currently on hold, in favor of green infrastructure.

Rain gardens, street trees, green roofs and other green infrastructure designs not only reduce runoff and pollution, they help beautify our community. Their simple presence helps educate people about how we can care for the watersheds we live in. As shown by Sustainable South Bronx's projects, installing green infrastructure can provide good jobs and pride in our community, both of which are badly needed in Syracuse.

Swirlers cost more than $120 million apiece. There are three more planned, according to the Amended Consent Judgment: one in Armory Square and two on Harbor Brook in Environmental Justice communities. Let's invest that money in ways that are of benefit to a community, instead of a stigma.

So, we must say, Mr. Moffa, that your design and the placement of the Midland plant in a residential community stink. We should know; you built it in our neighborhood.

Lindsay Speer, Richard Vallejo, Vernell Bentley, Elmore Davis, Tarki Heath, Louise Poindexter, Joanne Stevens and Aggie Lane

hydrofracturing drilling for natural gas in Central NY

2009-08-10T10:52:00.002-04:00

This is an important water issue that a lot of people don't know about. You can listen to a radio piece about it on WRVO:
http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/wrvo/news.newsmain?action=article&ARTICLE_ID=1535101

green jobs for Syracuse

2009-07-21T10:54:00.001-04:00

On May 20 at the Spa at 500, with help from Hanah Ehrenreich of CNY Works, the Partnership for Onondaga Creek held a city-wide meeting on green jobs and green job training. Thirty-seven people, representing educators, agencies, organizations, and contractors attended the meeting.

Check out the updates at the website for the Partnership here:
http://onondagacreek.org/

Partnership for Onondaga Creek Celebration

2008-10-16T15:49:00.006-04:00

In August, several Armory Square business owners sponsored a party for the Partnership for Onondaga Creek and their allies for the work they have done to prevent a sewage plant from being built in downtown Syracuse.
Lula Donald speaks about the accomplishments of the Partnership for Onondgaga Creek in the Southside.

Coming soon

2008-08-21T22:15:00.004-04:00

I'll be presenting UP THE CREEK! twice this fall, please mark your calendars to hear about progress on this project.

Saturday October 4, Public Memories | Visible Memories Conference, Syracuse University
http://publicmemories.syr.edu/

Thursday October 16, Oral History Association Conference, Pittsburgh, PA
http://alpha.dickinson.edu/oha/org_am_pittsburgh.html

WAER coverage

2008-07-27T16:28:00.007-04:00

58 sec MP3

Back in April, UP THE CREEK! was featured on WAER, the Syracuse NPR affiliate. I've finally gotten around to posting the tape from their interview with project participant Ralph Cady.

alternatives to the sewage plant downtown

2008-06-26T16:10:00.001-04:00

Read an update in the Syracuse Post-Standard about the new green infrastructure plans to replace the sewage facility that was planned for downtown Syracuse:
http://tinyurl.com/44kfqn

Download the student sound walks

2008-05-08T15:16:00.009-04:00

The student walks for Armory Square and the Southside are ready for listening! Download the files below or visit the venues to check out a CD player. You will be guided by a narrator on a short walk around the neighborhood. It will take around 10-15 minutes. Stand in front of the building before pressing PLAY on your MP3 player. Be careful when crossing streets and enjoy!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

COLORS OF THE CREEK

This walk starts in front of the Redhouse Art Center in Armory Square, downtown.
MAP: http://www.theredhouse.org/directions

This link will download a .zip/archived mp3 audio file to your computer:
http://fereshteh.net/creek/Downtown.mp3.zip
The artists have created a set of images for you to take on your walk. You'll need to make an appointment at the Redhouse to pick up the envelopes from the staff there.

The CD is available for check out by appointment or drop-in.

Redhouse phone: (315) 425 - 0405

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

SOUTHWEST SOUND WALK

This walk starts in front of the Southwest Community Center.
MAP: http://tinyurl.com/5p6wu6

This link will download a .zip/archived mp3 audio file to your computer:
http://fereshteh.net/creek/Southwest.mp3.zip

The CD is available for check out from the public library on the 2nd floor the community center.

SWCC Library phone: (315) 671-5814
Monday-Friday 10:00 - 5:00
closed Saturday and Sunday

No sewage plant in Armory Square

2008-05-03T13:04:00.003-04:00

Good news: The county legislature decided to stop construction on the sewage plant downtown. They will be pursuing green infrastructure options instead. Read more about it in today's Post-Standard newspaper! LINK: http://tinyurl.com/5oeers

Coming Soon!

2008-04-28T17:19:00.004-04:00

On May 9th, we will post MP3s of the sound walks created by students for Southwest and Downtown. Add us as a friend on MySpace or Facebook to get the latest updates!
http://www.facebook.com/people/Onondaga_Creek/580374815
http://www.myspace.com/315water

MayFest photo

2008-04-25T21:26:00.002-04:00

Syracuse University sophomore Eduard Tabaku and Fereshteh Toosi
at the UP THE CREEK! table in the SU Dome on MayFest.

MayFest: April 22

2008-04-19T15:55:00.006-04:00

As many of you know, Syracuse University students have been working to produce their own version of a sound walk for Onondaga Creek. SU holds an annual MayFest in April for sharing such projects, and this year it falls on Tuesday the 22nd. We invite you to come out to campus to hear student productions in progress.

The students will be available to answer your questions in the Dome from 9 AM to 3 PM, where you can hear the first version of two group projects on a boombox. Also, a short radio piece by Stef Quam and Eduard Tabaku will be featured at the The Division of Student Affairs Civic Engagement and Sustainability Council showcase from 10 AM to 4 PM in Room 304 of the Schine Student Center.

For more information and a schedule of the days activities go to:
http://mayfest.syr.edu/

swimming UP THE CREEK!

2008-04-12T18:25:00.005-04:00

Today I visited several spots along Onondaga Creek with teens who are working for Cornell Cooperative Extension's Onondaga Earth Corps. We were lucky to see some fish, maybe carp or suckers, trying to swim upstream in the current that runs under the bridge at Kelly Brothers Memorial Park. Watch the video below!

We also saw a beaver at the headwaters of the creek at Tracy Lake in Tully, sycamore trees, and found a dead deer that one of the corps members had spotted on his walk to school.
Sadly, people are still dumping along the creek. At Kirk Park, we found this collection of highly toxic electronics. Many of the teens in the corps have worked on clean-up along the creek. On the trip today, they took photos and wrote down their observations as research for a sculpture they'll be building out of found objects from the creek. Watch for the unveiling of their art work at Beauchamp Library on Earth Day, April 22.

Sizdah Bedar Potluck

2008-04-09T12:18:00.003-04:00

It was a beautiful sunny day, a perfect time for the spring potluck and listening party.

6 April Potluck Party

2008-03-31T14:24:00.003-04:00

You are cordially invited to a potluck party for UP THE CREEK! documentary arts project

Sunday 6 April 2008 at 1:00 pm
Zen Center of Syracuse
266 West Seneca Turnpike 13207

Come listen to selections from the interviews about Onondaga Creek. We will also celebrate Sizdah Bedar, “Getting Rid of 13,” a Persian ceremony for welcoming spring and saying good-bye to bad spirits from the previous year by tossing sprouts into the creek.
Please bring a vegetarian dish for this shared meal sponsored by Bread and Roses Co-op.

RSVP: 443-8796 or 315water@gmail.com

City Eagle article about the project

2008-03-30T09:36:00.002-04:00

LINK to download the PDF of the article from the 27 March issue of the City Eagle:
http://fereshteh.net/press/pdfs/city_eagle.pdf

Fabius Street

2008-03-08T17:47:00.011-05:00

1 min 43 sec MP3

Theresa M. used to live on Fabius Street (above). This house was next to the railroad bridge (below) behind the MOST building where the new sewage plant is being built.
Stay tuned for audio clips from Theresa and the many interviews I've been gathering in the past few weeks with Bruce and Barbara C., Joyce B., Kay L., Ralph C. and Chief Irving Powless of Onondaga Nation.

Plenty Magazine article

2008-02-26T21:39:00.004-05:00

Want to get some general background info about the sewage plants on the creek in Syracuse?
Read this article, out today in Plenty Magazine:
http://www.plentymag.com/features/2008/02/syracuse_community_spotlight.php

Post-Standard article about the project

2008-02-20T09:26:00.000-05:00

http://www.syracuse.com/poststandard/stories/index.ssf?/base/news-10/120350136164130.xml&coll=1

Black History Month Ceremony

2008-02-11T12:19:00.001-05:00

Literacy Volunteers of Greater Syracuse hosted today's Black History Month Ceremony at the Common Council Chambers down in city hall. Geneva Hayden, a Literacy Advocate, gave a powerful testimony about her work. She helped me connect with 2 students for the audio reporter component of the UP THE CREEK! project and I was honored that she used the opportunity to read their words:

We go to the Beauchamp branch library to work with a lady named Fereshteh Toosi. We have a recording program. We do a lot of things with literacy, like we go and talk to people who have a story and they speak and if we don't get something we ask them what it means and they explain it to us. It is so very fun. We write down things that we can ask the people that we talk to, like "How old are you?" and "What do you know about Onondaga Creek?"

Most people in Syracuse do not know much about it, that is why we are here. In one of our interviews, a woman never even heard of Onondaga Creek before! We talk to people that we know and people we don't know. When you do this you can hear a lot of thing that person has not told a lot of people. This has helped us learn more about technology. You should join, it is very fun.

Senyah and Anastajah Haynes
9 and 10 years old

map

2008-02-03T23:41:00.000-05:00

Mark K. sent in this map of the 5 Nations in central New York.

Charlie C.

2008-02-03T18:11:00.011-05:00

I spoke with Charlie about his youth along the creek and he shared stories about its significance to the Haudenosaunee people.

30 sec MP3

creekwalk comments

2008-02-02T13:59:00.001-05:00

The engineers for the city just had a deadline to take comments from the public on phase 2 of the DOT funded creekwalk. I'm going to write to request the full set of these remarks, but meanwhile, read one sample from Catherine Landis of SUNY-ESF: LINK

Sharon M.

2008-01-31T09:00:00.003-05:00

Listen to a short sample from the interview with Sharon M. who grew up in a house near Midland and Ballantyne:

1:44 min MP3

good news

2008-01-24T13:39:00.000-05:00

The Feb. 1st deadline to sign the lowest Clinton bids for the downtown sewage plant has been delayed 60 days. We've heard that the state in Albany is weighing in and looking over plans and alternatives. It is a small victory because Joanie Mahoney was being told she had to sign the Clinton bid and she resisted the demand. Read more about it here:
http://www.syracuse.com/state/index.ssf?/base/news-13/120125508363600.xml&coll=1&thispage=1

budgets for the Clinton RTF

2008-01-23T10:43:00.000-05:00

This chart shows the escalating budgets for the RTF (regional treatment facility), a sewage plant being built on Clinton Street in downtown Syracuse. Click to see larger image.

letter to Joanie Mahoney

2008-01-23T09:00:00.000-05:00

LINK HERE to read a letter from Aggie Lane of the Parternship for Onondaga Creek and Don Hughes of the Onondaga Environmental Institute to Joanie Mahoney, the recently elected Onondaga County Executive. It refers to the construction of the Clinton RTF (Regional Treatment Facility), a sewage plant being built in downtown Syracuse. Other acronyms include:
ACJ - Amended Consent Judgment - http://www.onlakepartners.org/p1302.html
WEP - Dept of Water Environment Protection - http://www.ongov.net/WEP/
CSO - combined sewer overflow - http://cfpub.epa.gov/npdes/home.cfm?program_id=5
HBIS - Harbor Brook Interceptor Sewer

Karl M.

2008-01-23T08:36:00.001-05:00

Yesterday I interviewed Karl M., a long-time resident of Nedrow, NY. Here we stop at a spot to compare the current landscape to photos he made during flooding in the 30s and 40s. Check back soon for audio clips and scans of his old photos.

The Future of Water

2008-01-13T14:47:00.000-05:00

Mark your calendars for FOCUS the NATION at Syracuse University and SUNY-ESF on Thursday January 31st. I will be on a panel about "The future of water" during this day-long teach in about responses and solutions to climate change. Hopefully some of my students will be able to participate as well. Find us at 11-12:20 in room 115 of the SU Physics building. http://enspire.syr.edu/FTN/FTNprogram.htm#breakouts

Potluck & Storytelling session

2008-01-12T21:01:00.000-05:00

Today's potluck had a great turnout, with 18 people and a visit from Time Warner News 10. Check it out tonight running after 9pm on this 24-hour news station. Also check the blog later for clips from my spot on WSTM, the Syracuse NBC affiliate and coverage in the City Eagle (Thanks Nancy!)

info session at Beauchamp Library

2008-01-10T00:56:00.000-05:00

On Thursday January 10th, I held an info session at Beauchamp Library. Here I met the first 2 volunteer audio reporters, a pair of sisters who live in the Southside.

Coming soon: a sewage treatment plant in downtown Syracuse

2008-01-08T01:00:00.000-05:00

This is a detail from the designs for the city's creekwalk from the landscape architecture/engineering firm of Barton and Loguidice.

City Creekwalk meeting

2008-01-07T21:39:00.000-05:00

On Monday January 7th, I attended the Syracuse city government's "Public Information Meeting For the Syracuse Creekwalk Phase II Feasibility Study Project" which was at 7pm at Danforth Magnet School Cafeteria on 309 W. Brighton Ave. The proposed Onondaga Creekwalk Phase II will run from Armory Square to Colvin St. Bob Graham of Creek Rats and Partnership for Onondaga Creek checks out the plans.

images for the media

2007-12-26T14:18:00.001-05:00

Click on images to access full size copy. Right click to download to your computer.

Press Release: UP THE CREEK documentary arts initiative seeks local lore about Onondaga Creek

2007-12-26T13:21:00.000-05:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: December 26, 2007
Contact: Fereshteh Toosi, phone: 315-443-8796
email: 315WATER@gmail.com

UP THE CREEK: New documentary arts initiative seeks local lore about Onondaga Creek
Drop-in Information Session: Beauchamp Library, January 10, 2008, 4-6pm
Potluck Dinner and Storytelling Session: Center for Peace and Social Justice, January 12, 2008, 4-7pm
RSVP: 315-443-8796 or 315WATER@gmail.com

A local documentary arts initiative launches a campaign to gather stories and memories about a major local tributary, Onondaga Creek. The project, titled UP THE CREEK, will host two public events in Syracuse on January 10th and January 12th. Organizers are inviting local residents to contribute their stories for the project, and are searching for six volunteers to participate in the project as audio reporters.

Just as bids are finalized for the contested multi-million dollar sewage plant along Onondaga Creek in Armory Square, UP THE CREEK aims to document the stories of people living and working along the creek through audio recordings. The goal is to produce an oral history that will result in a CD and an interactive audio tour to walk along selected portions of the creek. The audio tour will be distributed free of charge starting in April 2008.

The project will kick off the new year with a drop-in information session at Beauchamp Library from 4-6 pm on January 10th, and potluck dinner and storytelling session on Saturday January 12th from 4-7pm at the Center for Peace and Social Justice at 2013 East Genesee Street. Interested parties are invited to gather as a group to hear and share memories about the creek in a session that will be professionally recorded.

Project Coordinator and Syracuse University instructor Fereshteh Toosi plans to gather a variety of stories from residents of Onondaga County. "We're looking for tall fish tales, songs, urban legends, you name it. You might think your story is too ordinary, but we believe every story is important." Like the popular NPR feature StoryCorps, the project aims to be accessible. "We want to make it as easy as possible to participate and be interviewed, so we'll meet folks wherever it's convenient for them," Ms. Toosi says. "We're also looking for six people who want to learn the audio technology, and we'll train them as audio reporters, to keep a journal on their own time."

Ms. Toosi says of her motivations for the project: "I recently moved to Syracuse and I was surprised by the difference between recreational opportunities at Erie Canal and those at Onondaga Creek. Like the canal, Onondaga Creek has a lot of potential but there are so many fences and walls built around it. The goal for UP THE CREEK is to imagine a different way of interacting with a major waterway that runs downtown and throughout the diverse landscape of Onondaga County."

The city of Syracuse has been developing a creek walk trail, but they admit that progress has been slow due to the "logistical challenges of rediscovering a waterway in an urbanized area" ( http://www.syracuse.ny.us/creekWalk.asp). UP THE CREEK embraces the challenge to rediscover this waterway through a localized, grassroots effort that showcases the past, present, and future of work and play around Onondaga Creek.

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UP THE CREEK drop-in information session January 10, 2008 at Beauchamp Library, 2111 S. Salina Street, 4-6 pm. Potluck dinner and storytelling session January 12, 2008 at the Center for Peace and Social Justice, 2013 East Genesee Street, 4-7pm. Bring food or drink to share. To RSVP for either public event or to participate in the oral history project, please call the Project Coordinator at 315-443-8796, or email 315WATER@gmail.com

Attached images: poster for the potluck, poster for the Beauchamp Library info session, image of Onondaga Creek courtesy of the Partnership for Onondaga Creek

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