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07 Summer Newsletter
Calendar
July 21 Co-Hosting GMCG’s Lake Celebration
Aug 19 CLA Annual Meeting, Runnells Hall, 2-4
Aug 25 Family Day, Wheelers Field, 11:30-2pm
Sept 2 Festival of Lights, Grove, 6-7pm start
Upcoming Vote
At the 7/7/07 CLA directors meeting, we voted unanimously to offer the
Voting Members at the Annual Meeting to vote on changing the bylaws as
follows. The current bylaws say that “Directors shall be voting
members of the corporation.” Our proposed amendment is to eliminate
this requirement (by striking out the above sentence). Our reason for
this proposed change is to provide for Directors to be from outside the
Basin and to provide the opportunity for town officers and others as Directors
without requiring them to be CLA members. This proposed amendment is broader
than the one proposed in the Spring Newsletter. The Annual Meeting is
August 19, from 2-4pm.
Co-Hosting GMCG’s Celebration
Are you curious about the Green Mountain Conservation Group? For example:
It seems like a recent thing – when was it founded? How big is it?
What’s it done, besides its current effort to conserve the Wonalancet
field? Answers: It started in 1997; it’s purview is the Ossipee
Watershed (which includes the Chocorua Watershed), it sends out 3000 Newsletters
per issue, it has 600 active members, and a paid (full time equivalent)
staff of one and three-quarters, and its annual budget is about $100,000
(significantly more this year). It’s done lots, including its purchase
of easements to preserve Mt Katherine and its current campaign to preserve
the Wonalancet field and Chapel view.
Still curious? This year the GMCG invited the CLA to co-host its 2007
Lake Celebration. I was delighted to accept, because this is a chance
to learn more about the GMCG and its secrets of success. The duties of
co-hosting are not onerous: I am supposed to advertise the event and urge
a respectable number of CLA members to come and learn and have some fun.
The date is July 21.
Activities for kids and adults
12:00-1:30 BBQ lunch on a beach of Lake Ossipee
1:00-2:00 Boat trip as an introduction to lake monitoring
2:00-3:00 Boat trip as an introduction to the special features of the
Ossipee Lake Natural Area
2:00-4:30 Project WET kids’ activities for children (adult staffed)
Presentations
1:30-2:00 “A History of NH Lakes” (Jody Connor, NH DES Limnology
Center Director)
2:00-3:00 “Low Impact Development & Shoreline Protection”
(Bob Craycraft, UNH Lakes Lay Monitoring); also “Involving Youth
in Lake Stewardship” (Linda Schier, President Acton Wakefield Watersheds
Alliance Staff)
3:00-4:00 “Managing Lakes for Milfoil & Other Invasive Species”
(Amy Smagula, NH DES Exotic Species Program Director”); also “NH
Lakes Association & the Lake Host Program” (Andrea LaMoreaux,
NHLA Education Director)
4:00-4:30 Lake Forum on lake issues
If it is raining, what is a better way of spending a rainy day, under the tent or in a sheltered auditorium, learning about lakeconservation and about GMCG? It’s only 6 miles away.
Directions: Go south on Rt 16 to West Ossipee; turn left onto Rt 41 (there is a Pizza place on the corner, and the Whittier House Restaurant across the St.). Go ½ mile and turn right onto Ossipee Lake Rd. Go 2.7 miles to the Calumet Conference Center on the left. Contact phone 539-4773.
Genesis of a Joint Meeting
At the CLA and CLCF board meetings in May, the two organizations agreed
to a joint meeting on July 7 to discuss and vote on a proposed procedure
for making disbursements from the Fund for Chocorua Lake. Of course we
already had a procedure and we have already spend money, but after 8 years
it was clear that we needed to streamline and clarify the procedure, while
maintaining consistency with the representations we made to donors in
the original fund raising.
Happily we were able to do the final wordsmithing and achieve agreement by majority vote in both boards by email weeks before July 7. We agreed to keep the joint meeting and now had the opportunity to talk about “matters of substance” rather then “matters of procedure.” The quotes are because lawyers and political scientists know that “procedure is substance.”
The Joint CLA-CLCF Meeting
Pat Miller very ably moderated the meeting. Present were Toby Page, Jim
Bowditch, Tish McIlwraith, Donna Veilleux, Bob Griffin, and Ellen Keith
from the CLA and Neely Lanou, Peg Wheeler, Steve Weld, Dwight Baldwin,
Don Johnson, Crosby Kennett, Pat Miller, Sandy Rubel, John Watkins, and
Betsy Watt from the CLCF.
After the meeting, Pat sent me his thoughts on the meeting and the past
and future as follows:
Both the CLA and CLCF were incorporated in 1968. Nearly forty years have
gone by and much has occured since our founding organizers began the task
of protecting this special place. There are more than 700 acres under
CLCF direct ownership and nearly 3,000 total acres under easement or covenant.
The berms and swales project on the Rt 16 side of the lake has reduced
phosphorus loading. A design for the replacement of the Narrows bridge
is under way. CLA membership has grown. The vision our founders had is
being realized but there is still much to do.
On July 7, 2007, both the CLA and the CLCF boards met to discuss the future
of the Chocorua Lake Watershed. In the second meeting of the two boards
in nearly a decade, the two groups agreed to develop a joint, strategic
plan for the watershed. Increasing economic pressures to develop land
north of the lake are elevating the threats to the watershed's water quality.
Additionally, over the past few decades there has been a demographic shift
whereby our core volunteer base is spending less time in Chocorua -- many
people who used to spend whole summers here no longer do so. Both boards
agreed that there is a need to use our limited resources more efficiently
to ensure that future generations can experience Chocorua the way we have
been able to do so. There is also interest to provide more public access
to our owned lands, beyond the Grove and the east side of the Lake.
The meeting opened with each person present being asked to recall a favorite
or earliest memory of Chocorua. It reminded me of a Quaker meeting whereby
people say something as the spirit moves them. The stories that unfolded
were very personal and very similar -- they were about the lake, the mountain,
the trails, the peace and solitude, the special people of our past, the
blessing of the place we all know and love, and a hope that the future
of Chocorua can be protected for future generations.
There is much to do. We need to increase our volunteer base. We need to
consider hiring full time staff. We need to increase our outreach to partnering
organizations and the larger community we are a part of. We need to ensure
adequate financial resources.
All of these items, and more, will be part of the strategic plan to be
developed later this year and into 2008. We will be seeking input and
comment from each of you during this process. Meanwhile, take a deep breath,
enjoy what Chocorua and our community has to offer, and get ready to roll
up your sleeves!
The CLA July Picnic
The
evening before the picnic, Jim Bowditch heard the “severe thunderstorm
watch for tomorrow afternoon” warning and suggested that we move
the picnic from the Wheelers’ field to the Bowditchs back garden.
We did. Many thanks to the cooks, Rachel Bowditch, John Tzelepis, and
Bruce Bowditch, who did the setup and cooking with a skilled sense of
space and efficiency. (Photo by Theo)
The picnickers enjoyed GIII potato salad (best in the neighborhood), Schartner
strawberries (height of the season) and Costco premium hamburgers, vegetable
burgers, various German and Polish sausages, and surprisingly good cookies
(for Costco), chips and salsa and the usual condiments and sodas. We sat
at two picnic tables and enough chairs and walked by the granite rocks,
from the sun light to the shade of the nearby white pines. As we began
to leave and clean up a gentle rain began to fall.
And a special thanks to Ken Smith for the loan of his family grill, which
made the cooking twice as fast.
7/7/07 was a busy day – formalizing and making more transparent the procedure to disburse funds from the FCL, beginning a process of joint strategic planning, the CLA with the CLCF, modifying the proposed change to the CLA bylaws, and not all business, a splendid picnic at the Bowditchs. And on the same day activities around the world, Live Earth Day. The health of the world is of course a much bigger thing than the health of the lake, but the health of both is worth the effort. Some think that 7/7/07 is a lucky day.
Wildlife Notes
by Harriet Hofheinz
We are blessed once again. Mrs. Loon (Lucinda) found herself a new mate and together on July 5th produced one chick. By this writing, the Family should be in the big lake. Please take care not to disturb their domesticity, as the new Mr. Loon is quite shy. [editor’s comment: a little after Harriet’s report came in Bill Fripp told me he saw two chicks, and shortly after that Nelly reported the same thing.]
Other news includes a number of deer and fawn sightings, along with a bear and a moose mid-June on our Thrush survey, and a red fox up near the Welds. Toby saw two Horned Pike (catfish) caught by night fishermen on the Sandy Beach. Watch for our Great Blue Heron, usually near the inlet area, try to swallow one of those! Always head first so the “horns” don’t catch in his long, slender throat. Otherwise, he’d have a pretty sore throat!
The Thrush survey went well this year; no rain and the weather was not too hot. More on the survey at the annual meeting. Many thanks go to David Farley, Jim Bowditch, John Watkins, and Bob Bradford for their help.
Throughout the summer and fall, please let me know of other sightings you might see. Come August, keep an eye out for Bald Eagles and Ospreys. I can be reached at 323-8673 and always by email: Hhofheinz@erols.com