Fred Grimsey wasn’t looking for a government medal in 2001 when he founded Save the River-Save the Hills, Inc., a grassroots environmental organization dedicated to water quality improvements in the Niantic River Estuary in Waterford and East Lyme.
Instead, he’d decided it was high time for an avid sailor of 15 years up and down the East Coast to give back. A passionate editorial about the Oswegatchie Hills by Greg Stone, the associate editor of The Day’s editorial page, motivated him to do something.
“I did a lot of cruising in the summertime,” Grimsey said. “I’d always been a passive observer, but I’d never been an activist. Just cruising around, once I retired, wasn’t for me. Greg called a meeting of interested citizens, and when I asked him what I needed to do, he said to start an organization.”
Grimsey was one of six honorees awarded the President’s Volunteer Service Award on Earth Day, April 22, at historic Faneuil Hall in Boston, for his environmental activism. He was nominated for the award by the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), with which he has worked closely over the years to mitigate pollution in the Niantic River.
“Dedicated volunteers like Fred are inspiring others to join them in delivering America a brighter, healthier future,” EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson said at the award ceremony. Several STR-STH members and fans of Fred made the trip to watch him get the award.
“Fred has been a great inspiration to me both personally and professionally,” said Deb Moshier-Dunn, vice president of Save the River-Save the Hills. “This award is a wonderful national acknowledgement of the incredible amount of work he has done locally to clean up the Niantic River and to save the Oswegatchie Hills.”
The most concrete ongoing accomplishment of STR-STH, Grimsey said, has been setting up a recreational boat pump-out station program in the Niantic River harbor area.
“We were participants in the EPA designating all of Long Island Sound as a no-discharge zone for raw sewage,” he said. For five years he volunteered to run a sewage pump-out facility for boats on the river. The program now is funded 75 percent by the state and 25 percent by the towns of East Lyme and Waterford, he said.
Looking forward, Grimsey is focused on three water quality efforts.
One is monitoring the Niantic River in cooperation with the Millstone Environmental Lab. This is the second round of water quality monitoring for STR-STH, which ran out of funds on an earlier effort several years ago.
For this most recent effort, the organization has purchased almost $2,000 worth of water quality equipment, Grimsey said, thanks to a $1,000 volunteer grant from Pfizer and other monies raised by STR-STH. The environmental lab provides a boat. Grimsey said the group is looking to set up a laboratory where the analysis can be done.
“We’re also very proud of the Niantic River Watershed Protection Plan,” he said. “We were instrumental in getting that program started.”
The watershed-wide plan outlines strategies to prevent non-source point pollution going into the Niantic River, either directly or through tributaries. It was developed with the cooperation of the towns of East Lyme, Montville, Salem, and Waterford.
The plan, published in September 2006, was the first watershed protection plan in the state to get EPA approval, according to CT DEP. A full copy of the report is available on the CT DEP Web site at www.ct.gov/dep/cwp/view.asp?A=2719&Q=379296.
Pat Young, natural resources specialist in the Eastern Connecticut Conservation District office in Norwich, recently was named coordinator for implementation of the plan. Although her appointment is part time, only one day per week, Grimsey sees it as an important step in moving implementation forward.
“That was a great coup for us to finally get a professional to oversee the watershed plan,” Grimsey said.
The next big push by STR-STH is a grassroots education program that Moshier-Dunn is spearheading, working with the watershed plan and Young.
“We’re looking to put on grassroots educational programs to help people understand how what they do every day affects the river,” Moshier-Dunn explained.
“People may not realize that whatever they do on their lawns or driveways, from applying either synthetic or too much of organic lawn care products or washing their cars with detergents, these actions put pollutants directly into the storm sewers, which end up, untreated, in the river,” she said.
Moshier-Dunn encouraged individuals, businesses, and organizations that would like to hear about how they can change their practices to improve the water quality in the watershed, the river and the Sound to contact her and STR-STH for more information.
Another example of STR-STH volunteer activities was a cleanup along Latimer Brook with environmental club students from East Lyme High School on Sunday, May 18. Moshier-Dunn thanked the Town of East Lyme for trash collection bags and Illiano’s Grill in Niantic for donated pizza.
Upcoming STR-STH events open to the public and volunteers include the annual Niantic River Appreciation Day & Kayak Regatta on Aug. 23. More information is available on the organization’s Web site.
Go to www.savetheriver-savethehills.org or contact the Niantic River pump-out boat by cell phone at 1-860-287-2774, or contact the Niantic River pump-out boat on Marine Channel 68.