Our next meeting will be on March 20, 7 pm. We will meet at the Polk Twp. Municipal Building

An excellent and unique oppurtunity has opened up- the Council of Trustees for the Palmerton Zinc Superfund Site is contemplating the purchase of the Alpine Motorsports property in Eldred Township, Monroe County. This purchase would be to offset some of the damage done by New Jersey Zinc in the 1900s.
The Alpine property is currently undevelpoed. The owners are planning to start construction of a private, high performance track. This would be an environmental disaster for the watershed. The property is on the side of Blue Mountain. It is bounded by the Appalachian Trail at the top, and by the Aquashicola Creek at the bottom. Exceptional Value Wetlands are found here.
The Trustees are accepting public comment up until December 16. The purchase of this property would be a huge step in protecting the watershed. APWC has written letters , sent emails, and phoned the legislators urging the purchase of the alpine property. Time is extremely short on this matter. Please help out on this very important opportunity!
To write a letter a letter of support please contact:
Dr. Kathleen Patnode
US Fish and Wildlife Service
Pennsylvania Field Office
315 South Allen Street, Suite 322
State College, Pa. 16801

Governor Tom Corbett www.governor.state.pa.us
717 787 2500

Lt. Governor Jim Cawley www.ltgovernor.state.pa.us
717 787 3300

Senator David Argall 570 402 1499
http://senator argall.com

Rep. Michael Carroll 610 681 2940
mcarroll@pahouse.net

Rep. Lou Barletta 570 751 0050

Please contact us if you would like a sample letter.

We have changed our meeting day- meetings will be on the third Tuesday of every other month. This new schedule will start on January 17, 2012.

On September 17, APWC set up a booth at Ross Township Day. We displayed maps of the two watersheds, handed out information on what a watershed is, identification of macroinvertebrates, and brochures on what APWC does. We also spoke to the public about our Petition To redesignate the Aquashicola Creek to Exceptional Value, directing any one interested to our website to view the document.
I had the pleasure of meeting our State Represetative for Ross Township, Rosemary Brown. We had a brief but pleasent chat, and I was able to hand deliver a copy of our Petition to redesignate Aquashicola Creek to Exceptional Value. A CD was included that contained the Petition in its’ entirety. We hope Representative Brown will review the Petition and join Representative Carroll, Ross Township Board of Supervisors, Monroe County Commissioners and Monroe County Conservation District ( to name a few) in supporting us.
Beth Sheckler was the star of the show, giving demonstations on water testing with the meters we use. She was able to draw quite a crowd! It was good to see young people watching and asking questions.
Thanks to the board members that gave their time on a Saturday-

We attended the December 21,2010 Environmental Quality Board hearing in Harrisburg. One of the items on the agenda was to continue the Petition process for redesignation of the Aquashicola to Exceptional Value (click on Petition on this page). DEP made a short and well done presentation, and the matter was put to a vote. The result was nearly unanimous in favor of further research. One step further along!

DEP has received our Petition to redesignate the Aquashicola Creek (from source to confluence with Buckwha Creek) to Exceptional Value.

In the November 1, 2010 Pa Environment Digest, a section gave notice that the Aquashicola will be evaluated by DEP. The link is: http://www.paenvironmentdigest.com/newsletter/default.asp?NewsletterArticleID=17184.

Please comment if you have anything to add via contact number on our site.