Folks,

It's been very long time since I've written you all about protecting the Mt. Nimham area from logging and now I have good news for you.

From all accounts, the proposed project is dead.

Several months ago I took a hike on the mountain with a member of the forestry team and explained to him what the specific objections were to the project. It turns out there was only one real sticking point and that was the widening of the old Cole's Mills road as most of our other objections had been mitigated and the project had been considerably downsized.

This ancient road, which connected the farms on the Smalley and Townsend properties with the mill on the west branch of the Croton River (now deep under the West Branch reservoir,) was to be widened (they call it "improved") to accommodate modern logging trucks and attendant vehicular traffic. That road serves now as a 4-wheel drive road for campers, hunters and hikers and provides a wonderful country walk from the parking area at the end of Nimham Court down to Route 301. Along the way it passes through a beautiful wetland and to cliffs at the southern end from whose top one can look back over the Mt. Nimham forest.

Once all was understood by the team at DEC, the project now down-sized rather significantly, could be brought to fruition.

Within DEC, letters were sent and phone calls made by the group leading the effort to move the project forward but at the very top of that organization they ran into a dead-end and no final approvals ever came back down.

Word from contacts within the DEC are that the project has been abandoned by powers beyond even their reach

I appreciate the efforts made by the forestry team to honor their commitments to this community which would have resulted in less impact upon the recreational use of that forest. I can only think that our fight to downsize the project has made it politically impossible for them to move forward at this time.

We cannot rest believing this is the end. With a new governor taking power in January changes can take place in the upper echelons of the organization and the bulldozers can roll - with or without these agreements and with or without a scaled down project.

In the meantime, the reforestation areas on the east side of Gipsy Trail road are in need of repair and I urge the DEC to move rapidly to remove the pure stands of invasive species they planted there back in the 1970's.

Constant vigilance is always warranted but for now, hats off and a hearty Mazel Tov to all who stood fast to protect this jewel of Putnam County.

See you on the trails,

Jeff