by Ellen Mass, President of Friends of Alewife Reservtion

Silver Maple Forest conservation protests and climate change politics continue making headlines locally in Belmont and Cambridge with reference recently in the Globe to arrestee and attorney, Danny Foster of the Green Party, who spoke out strongly against the silver maple cutting with 13 others briefly incarcerated in Belmont and Medford. The response was to a massive clear cut of nearly 7 acres on Acorn Park Drive, protesters and arrestees loudly claimed that climate change "adaptation" measures are urgently needed in New England's Upper Basin of the Mystic river watershed at the Alewife woodlands which converges at three municipalities.

By removing significant pervious vegetated surfaces with a large 300 unit building on the Atlantic Eastern Seaboard of a 100 year floodplain around 5-8 feet above sea level, packed with homes, schools, stores and a major metropolitan transportation artery, "we are courting disaster", say opponents of the woodland clear cut. Army Corps of Engineers maps indicates inundating waters within a mile circumference of the area with an 8 foot surge and much greater rainfall predicted. Maps indicate much of the region under water with no place for the storm water to go because of a high clayish soil and high Alewife water table. President Obama's recent October 2014 edict on Natural Resources conservation requirements also calls for preservation with the same warnings.

We protesters believe massive private development and municipal complicity of the Alewife forest removal is endangering thousands of residents along the watershed and dispersing even more animals and birds in the formerly well-protected forested and rare urban wild region as part of the Alewife Reservation, and ecosystem to Arlington's Mugar properties as well.

Hundreds of trees came crashing down with branches, sounding like bones breaking during the week of October 4th off of Route 2 and Acorn Park Drive. Cambridge, Belmont and Arlington will be impacted and the full studies were never done to indicate future flooding impact to this hydrologically sensitive are named by scientists as the "Upper Alewife Basin". In 2009, The Belmont Conservation Commission showed a rise in Little Pond and Little River for the public and to the town, and to DEP Adjudicatory Hearing, but this did not stop AP Cambridge Partners LLC II from Pennsylvania (O'Neill Properties). Cutting day, Large digging equipment towered dangerously over protesters as photos showed. Chief engineer of Belmont was called by an Officer to perform oversight monitoring against wetlands digging, but protestors did not see him, nor is communication public.

Citizens that live in low lying floodplain vicinities are up against municipal and state decision makers who have legally ruled through Superior Court that pervious floodplains and rare 21 assessed species of Alewife wildlife in a refuge with rich habitat, are not valued natural resources to local New England communities in "one of the densest states in the country". Over the last 10 years, Cambridge has passed many resolutions in favor of perserving the silver maple forest with 3 acres in Cambridge, and protecting the floodplain to no avail this year. Belmont, however, has not issued a building permit to the Firm which attacked anyway, and a building cannot go up until one is issued.

Alewife area residents of north west Cambridge, with grand history of flooding have witnessed gigantic residential buildings permitted this last year non-stop without federally required 'cumulative' review, and too quickly for communities to respond. Nearly 2500 apartments are remaining and will likely remain, mostly vacant. Now, in Belmont, another 300 are to take the place of the floodplain forest that protesters and neighbors in Arlington and Belmont seriously lament.

The Silver Maple Forest Alliance made up of 8 group representatives with two from Belmont have declared it a "disaster for their towns" and "city of Cambridge". Seven acres of rare silver maple forest have been ripped out on Saturday, October 10th, "in contempt of court", say members, in order to avoid a state injunction submitted by the Coalition to Preserve Belmont Uplands a few days before in Superior Court. Thirteen Cambridge and Somerville citizens were arrested for trespassing that week when confronted with unsightly tree carnage in rallies and vigils called by Friends of Alewife Reservation and the Alliance and Green Cambridge. The National Lawyer's Guild responded with workshops for the participants concerning civil disobedience. Protesters screamed while trees were crashing to the ground, and chanted Dr. Seuss Lorax cries, " We are the Lorax who stand for the trees. You seem to be chopping as fast as you please." "Stop the chopping!"

Felling the 7 acres of forest off of Route 2 which will impact other properties and downstream communities is beyond anyone's imagination say advocates for "conservation" of the land. The October 7 Chronicle article of Sara Feijo and Spenser Buell coverage was full and covered the environmental side; however they leave absent conservation hydrology science noted by Bruce Jacobs in recent Hydro Analysis Inc. Report to Belmont Selectmen, and City Council Environmental Committee meeting commissioned by Friends of Alewife Reservation. The Chronicle has published the science of the climate-floodplain forest matter in the past. Over- development in North West Cambridge includes almost 3000 units built and planned which will likely remain empty for a long time (during an unstable economic period) while many of 20 species of mammals and over 90 bird species will disappear or enter another part of the 130 acre reservation, which is absent of thick woodlands. No ounce of consideration was given to wildlife by the Firm to bring them to safety or protect any of the rare species. Before construction, FAR located endangered species in the area and entered it for the 4th year for state records.

The brutality of massively chopping the trees while Company secretly contrived to beat a pending state injunction is unknown in recent development memory, resulting in violent blows to sense of community, its needed open space, and its sense of justice and protection of its standard of living. The Belmont Conservation Commission, which for 5 years legally appealed the case for the town with the 10 citizens, will need to be responsive to the needs for oversight as the Firm continues to grind the roots so the trees will never grow again.

Animals were fleeing the woods reported watchers, both buck and doe and coyote, and a buck was reported killed from the highway. The special isolation of the silver maple forest Belmont Uplands (lowest spot in Belmont) has given rise to a rare wildlife refuge which conservationists say must be kept as open space for reasons of survival for the 20 thousand living along the watershed in Cambridge, East Arlington, East Belmont, Somerville and as far away as Medford and Watertown, which also receives water in the Alewife Basin.

It was a 'war-like' scene against the beautiful silver maples all aglow in yellow. After years of proving to the world (state and municipalities from 5 forums and 4 city hearings) the importance of the floodplain for adaptation measures for climate change, and flood mitigation, the publication of many professional reports from our local universities, the city and town ignored the grounded evidence and chose to accept Cambridge urban wild land to be used for a significant discharge of pollutants from the development, and Belmont's Winn Brook will receive more floodwaters according to additional science reports commissioned by citizens over the years.

After the cutting, on October 28, another Environment and Health Committee Hearing (the 4th in Cambridge), heard 4 scientific testimonies which documented the high essential values for preserving the "Belmont Uplands" silver maple forest land of 15 acres to a full house of 60 with standing room only. An impassioned audience asked the Councilors Carlone, McGovern, Mazen and Chair Cheung to protect the land with 'courage', to stand up for it against the Firm which took matters into their own hands before the state could rule. The group formally asked for "conservation" protection and a 'taking' or purchase, and to protect Cambridge's section of the land planned for a pollution discharge area. See presentations of the official city hearing at: www.friendsofalewifereservation.org and summary. Conservation advocacy continues with the request to Belmont that "grubbing" of the root systems and removing understory be forbidden, and that now circulating "save the silver maple forest" petitions are submitted to the Board of Selectmen in Belmont requesting no building permit granted.

Ellen Mass
Friends of Alewife Reservation
10-31-14