Q3/2012

This issue is jam-packed with information about ADkAction.org projects with interesting web links, all of which demonstrate the value of your support. Members make our work possible. If you are not yet a member and would like to support projects like those below, you may join online here.

AdkAction.org Sponsoring Think-Tank Advice on School Shared Services The Rochester-based Center for Governmental Research will make a presentation to a joint meeting of the Lake Placid and Saranac Lake school boards at 7 p.m., Nov. 1, to provide input to the boards on shared services studies now underway between the two districts. AdkAction.org is sponsoring the $3,500 cost of the global-view advice from CGR as a public service.

The AdkAction.org board voted unanimously in September at a board retreat to get CGR involved after seeing local press coverage about discussions between the two school boards on ways to share services to cut costs. Chair Dave Wolff took the proposal before each school board at recent meetings and got unanimous agreement from both boards to accept AdkAction.org’s offer to hire CGR. Tupper Lake schools are not participating at this time.

“Given the short time and resource parameters, CGR is preparing a presentation of the concepts and process of shared services studies only, Dave said. “This will not be one of the in-depth studies CGR has done around the state and nation (review some of their studies on shared services and consolidations here), but we believe it will provide useful input to the local joint shared services committees. Even though CGR will not make specific recommendations, they will be sharing what has been learned in other communities that might be applicable to the Tri-Lakes as well as a high-level analysis of data received from the two school systems,” Dave said. “It is possible that the two districts might decide an in-depth study would be worthwhile. There is state grant money available for such a study.”

AdkAction.org board members who live in the Adirondacks or who will be in the area Nov. 1 are encouraged to attend this presentation.

First AdkAction.org Board Retreat AdkAction.org board members held their first-ever board strategy session Sept. 10. Since many of our board meetings have jam-packed agendas and often use tele-conferencing, the board decided it was time to take a deeper look at where we have been since our founding five years ago. The board discussion included an assessment of our strengths and weaknesses, an overview of our current programs, committee structure, finances, nominating process, communications, governance, membership and fundraising. We discussed the past three years of experience using summer interns, which has been effective but has limitations. We concluded that we could expand our efforts if we hired a part-time employee rather than seeking another summer intern. A job description is being prepared and the position will be advertised. AdkAction.org E-Newsletter One of the most important parts of the strategy session was a discussion of future project ideas, which members were asked to bring to the meeting. One was the proposal mentioned above to hire CGR to report on school shared services. Several other exciting ideas emerged, which AdkAction.org will be working on next year and in the future, including:

 Launching a monarch butterfly advocacy program, centered on efforts to convince local and state road crews to delay roadside mowing until the “Methuselah” generation of butterflies hatch as well as encouraging conservation and additional planting of milkweed, the Monarch’s essential host plant. Public awareness of the winter nesting sites of Monarchs in Mexico is high. However, knowledge that the Methuselah generation, which hatches here, is essential to the insects’ life cycle is not well known. Incredibly, Methuselah Monarchs fly all the way to forests near Mexico City, overwinter, and return to the southern US to breed, beginning the cycle all over again. Enjoy the story of Monarchs here with many delightful pictures.

 Printing and widely distributing a guide for summer renters. Escalating property taxes in recent years have lead to a large increase in the number of owners renting in order to help pay the tax bill. The brochure would educate renters on such issues as boat courtesy, septic system use, emergency contacts, shoreline erosion and other issues.

 Seeking funding for an important study of groundwater contamination by road salt. Such a study has been proposed by Paul Smith’s College Adirondack Watershed Institute and is ready to go, but grant funding has not been secured. AdkAction.org will try to help secure funding.

 Printing tri-fold educational brochures on new methods to eradicate invasive species.

Water Quality Committee Report

E. coli Testing In Q3 AdkAction.org began an E. coli water sampling program. Our summer intern, Rebekah White, in conjunction with the Paul Smith’s Adirondack Watershed Institute (PSAWI), collected samples from lake associations who signed up as an extension of the Adirondack Lake Assessment Program (ALAP). Until now, ALAP testing was for non-biological elements. With the addition of E. coli testing, samples had to be rushed to the lab to be processed in less than six hours. Lake volunteers met Rebekah at pre-arranged times and she transported the collected samples to Paul Smith’s.

Samples were obtained from 19 lakes and analyzed at PSAWI for E. coli. Significant “positive” readings were obtained from some samples on six lakes. The positive readings indicate the importance of annual testing in future years using rigorous collection techniques. PSAWI has applied for state certification of its lab and expects to have that in place by next summer, which will make the testing more valuable. We learned that many more lake associations are interested in participating in this program, so we will continue and expand the program in 2013, . In 2012 we tested only volunteer lakes from the ALAP program. We are working to add CSLAP lakes in 2013 while we increase the number of participating ALAP lakes.

Eurasian Water Milfoil (EWM) We participated in the “Milfoil Summit” that was held in the Town of Horicon on August 16th along with 100 other representatives of lake associations and environmental organizations, an amazing turnout for a beautiful summer day. Case studies from many lakes were discussed, including techniques not commonly used in the Adirondacks yet:

 Biological management with moths and weevils, notably Acentria which deposits its larvae in the stems. The emerging insects eat the plant. This has been effective in a number of lakes but has failed in others, probably due to Acentria’s predators (notably sunfish). If successful in the future this would be AdkAction.org E-Newsletter a long-term solution to weed management, as Acentria only eats EWM and then its population dies back as the food source is reduced.

 The use of Renovate, a very specific herbicide that targets dicots (including Milfoil) and that has finally been approved for use in Adirondack lakes subject to very stringent rules (curtains, Stage III testing before application, a long program of hand harvesting that did not succeed, etc.). The APA and DEC representatives were surprisingly positive after reducing barriers to this chemical’s use.

 Weed management districts. It turns out that a town board can on its own, upon petition, create an “aquatic plant growth control district” under Article 12 of NY State law. This is a tax district that can apply an ad valorum rate to district properties that can then fund weed management.

We are continuing to monitor these new techniques and will publish data on each as we learn more.

Boater Education Our educational program for boaters is off to a great start. This involves AdkAction.org supplying signs and brochure-distribution boxes (see illustration) that hold tri-fold brochures instructing boaters how to treat their boats after they come out of EWM infested waters. This is the inverse of most control approaches that try to inspect and wash boats on entry to lakes and rivers. While the latter is useful, knowing that you have just exited a lake with this invasive species provides an added incentive to check and clean your boat, especially if you plan to re-launch it in a week or less in uninfected waters.

The signage, brochures, and distribution boxes are available to any lake association willing to mount the signs and boxes and volunteer to keep them stocked. To sign up for next year, contact Lee Keet at [email protected]

Road Salt Pollution The peer-reviewed article that Dan Kelting, head of the PSAWI, and his colleagues produced is finally available in reprint. Copies were distributed to all members. This is the document that finally caused New York State to accept the magnitude of the problem and its overwhelming responsibility for our increasing lake salinity. We will meet again with NYSDOT before the first snow falls to review the program in process and the testing that we will be doing on the four subject roads in the coming season.

While we are on track to reduce salt loading of our surface waters further, the groundwater pollution issue looms large. Wells all over the area are coming up with chloride levels way over 100ppm and many have had to be abandoned. We are working with the State and other funding sources to try to extend the study done for surface waters to aquifers.

Broadband Update Installation of the middle-mile fiber for high speed broadband from Ogdensburg thru the Tri-Lakes to Westport will be completed and operational by the end of October. This line will offer internet speeds as fast as those in South Korea, the fastest in the world at this time. AdkAction.org is working with the schools in the Tri-Lakes to make sure they are connected to the new fiber network. Access to true high-speed Broadband will enable the schools to embrace all the benefits of distance learning and to take advantage of the many instructional tools available via the Internet. AdkAction.org E-Newsletter

A $25 million “Connect NY” Broadband Program was announced to support rural Broadband expansion in the state. AdkAction.org has been working with a number of North Country last- mile broadband providers helping them prepare their requests for funding to support expansion of high speed broadband to un-served and under- served areas of the Park. The deadline for the submission of all funding requests was Friday, October 5. There will be a 3-4 week review period during which the Connect NY Broadband Evaluation team, made up of broadband experts from the private and public sector, will score each application (score A). In parallel, the Regional Economic Development Councils will prioritize the applications from their regions (score B). The applications will then be ranked by cumulative score (A+B) and sent to the Governor's office for the final decision, which hopefully will be made by mid-November.

For those scratching their heads wondering what’s the big deal about faster connections to the web and why they are so important to businesses, schools and residents in the Adirondacks, see the chart below. It compares the available broadband speeds in the Park, including those about to be possible by the completion of the DANC lines when connected by last-mile providers, using practical examples of how long each takes to download movies, etc.  Example #1: To download the contents of one CD full of data (about 700 megabytes of data), it would take about 1.6 hours via DSL and only 19 seconds using the highest fiber speed potentially available. (See the orange colored cells in the following chart.)  Example #2: To download the contents of a 2 hour high definition movie (about 5 gigabytes of data), it would take about 3.7 hours via basic or standard cable speeds and only 2.2 minutes using the highest fiber speed potentially available. (See the green colored cells in the following chart.) The 300 Mbps fiber speed is a reality in urban areas and is being advertised for “families with 5 or more Internet- connected users on multiple devices streaming HD movies to the TV, downloading and uploading video files and participating in multiplayer gaming.” And fiber speed is limited only by the technologies employed at the ends of the fiber.

Some of you may be thinking, who needs all that speed, “I get along fine with DSL or cable speeds.” However, hospitals, research institutes like Trudeau and, schools -- with multiple classrooms of students online at once and office and phone systems using the internet – need high speeds. And as more and more services switch to “cloud” computing, such users will need even higher speeds.

Amount of Data to Download * C urrent MB Maximum C oming 700 MB (megabyte) 1,500 5,000 MB (megabyte) S peed to Tri- B roadband S peed (megabyte) Available in L akes 2 hour standard C D ROM 2 hour high definition movie Tri-L akes definition movie Time to Download Time to Download Time to Download

Advertised C onverted as Mbps to MBps DS L C able F iber S econds Minutes Hours S econds Minutes S econds Minutes Hours (megabits (megabytes per second) per second

X 300 37.5 19 0.3 0.01 40 0.7 133 2.2 0.04 150 18.8 37 0.6 0.01 80 1.3 267 4.4 0.07 100 12.5 56 0.9 0.02 120 2.0 400 6.7 0.11 50 6.3 112 1.9 0.03 240 4.0 800 13.3 0.22 X 20 2.5 280 4.7 0.08 600 10.0 2,000 33.3 0.56 10 1.3 560 9.3 0.16 1,200 20.0 4,000 66.7 1.1 3 0.4 1,867 31.1 0.52 4,000 66.7 13,333 222.2 3.7 X 1 0.13 5,600 93.3 1.56 12,000 200.0 40,000 666.7 11.1

* Does not include any "overhead data (roughly 1% ) that would accompany the download.

Annual Membership Meeting The annual membership meeting was held on August 11, 2012, at the Barrett’s camp on Upper Saranac Lake. This is the site of the Rustic Lodge established by Jesse Corey, one of the earliest settlers in this area. It is also the site of AdkAction.org E-Newsletter the carry between Raquette River and the Saranac Lakes, a historically important landmark. The weather was partly rainy and partly sunny but this did not deter about 90 members from attending. Dave Wolff gave a short presentation regarding the status of the organization and the projects currently underway.

#