Since the last Cambridge City Council meeting, we have delivered the following letter to the Cambridge City Manager / City Council through the City Clerk for their next meeting.
The most important part is the transmittal as an attachment of a copy of our letter of June 6, 2017, spelling out the details of trees in the Magazine Beach recreation area and comparing them to plans for the destruction voted by the Cambridge City Council on April 24, 2017. That vote immediately followed a rally by councilors on the steps of City Hall praising themselves for environmental sainthood.
The attachment is posted on the Charles River White Geese web page at http://focrwg.com/agenda1.html.
The letter follows. It provides links to other key communications to the Cambridge City Council of their ongoing work for environmental destruction at Magazine Beach..
The Cambridge City Council seems to have given up on their blaming me for the imminent outrage on grounds that I have failed in my duty to get them to behave responsibility.
Instead, at the last meeting, Councilor Devereux, with the silent consent of her fellow members, designated an absolute dictator with regard to the Charles River to the Cambridge City Council. Under this bizarre version of reality, nine elected members of the Cambridge City Council contend that they are forced to commit massive destruction on the Charles River by ONE environmentally destructive person.
The poor dears are hoping that their constituents will swallow this nonsense after the Cambridge City Council commits the next and apparently imminent outrage.
The letter:
* * * *
RE: Charles River: The very terrible plans being implemented on Magazine Beach, matched with photos.
1. General.
A. Omissions from the record.
B. Terrible plans.
C. Terrible planners.
2. What the Cambridge City Council should do.
3. Additional relevant communications.
A. Destruction at MicroCenter.
B. Impact on Bees and other resident animals in Cambridge.
C. Destruction of valuable vegetation, relocation of poisons into the Charles River.
D. Destruction as it proceeds, more poisons, algae accumulation, planting of extremely invasive vegetation.
4. Summary.
Gentlemen / Ladies:
1. General.
A. Omissions from the record.
During City Council debate of Order 13 on June 25, 2018, Councilor Devereux rather clearly communicated one person as the Absolute Dictator to the City Council on matters regarding Magazine Beach and related government destruction actions.
Treating this one person as Absolute Dictator has many major problems, not the least of which is that this very clearly is a declaration to the voters that all nine members of the Cambridge City Council abdicate major responsibilities.
This gets truly outrageous with the realization that the Absolute Dictator’s declarations on Magazine Beach and related Charles River destruction are silly to consider other than fraud because she constantly praises them AND refuses to communicate in any way the outrageous destruction she is fighting for. She even refuses to publicly present her destruction plans to the “neighborhood association” which she leads and which is designated as some sort of protective entity by the destructive Cambridge Development Department.
Here are just four photos of targets of the irresponsible actions of the Cambridge City Council, rubber stamping this Absolute Dictator. For exact details, please see the attachment. Similar tactics were used in the successful fight of the CDD’s designated “protectors” to destroy hundreds of trees between the BU and the Longfellow Bridges on the Charles River, rubber stamping, of course, irresponsible plans of the Cambridge Development Department and the Department of Conservation and Recreation.
In attempting to respond to this abdication of responsibility by the Cambridge City Council, I reviewed the key document on file with the City Council, our letter of June 6, 2017, made part of the record of the June 12, 2017 City Council Meeting. It was decidedly shocking to realize that the published document omits pages 6 to 10, 24 and 51 of our file copy.
Enclosed to correct the record is a true copy of our file copy including the omitted pages. The original posting, unfortunately is clearer. For the greater detail, minus the 7 pages, it is posted at http://cambridgema.iqm2.com/Citizens/FileOpen.aspx?Type=1&ID=1815&Inline=True, pages 198 plus. Friends of the White Geese have posted electronic masters for the attachment at http://focrwg.com/agenda1.html.
If the Devereux position of total abdication of responsibility to this Absolute Dictator is true, that means that the City Council has totally ignored the massive destruction which the City Council voted for in Order 1 of April 24, 2017, and which has been repeatedly reaffirmed in my many communications.
B. Terrible plans.
BUT THE CITY COUNCIL IGNORED THE DCR’S OWN PUBLISHED PLANS, and thus ignored the horrible irresponsibility the City Council voted for.
Our letter of June 6, 2017, gives a tree by tree analysis of all trees at Magazine Beach, IN CONTEXT WITH THE TWO FILED DCR PLANS with the Cambridge Conservation Commission. It is structured on an area by area basis, with the relevant portions of each of the two plans matched to photos of the trees.
The black and white version of the plan is the official filing, and it is slightly dated. The color plans provide slight destruction updates but also include fraudulent word games by which the DCR claims a right to destroy any and all trees no matter how excellent if they are one day older than the midlife date of their estimated existence.
Notwithstanding these fraudulent word games, even the fraudulent version admits to deliberate destruction of excellent trees as part of the DCR’s ongoing love for tree destruction. Contractors love to be paid to destroy trees, and contractors love to be paid to “replace” trees which should not have been destroyed.
The con game is such that, in addition to the many admittedly excellent trees, the word game allows the destruction of trees with a 100 year life span if they “only” have a projected 50 years minus one day left.
Order 1 of April 24, 2017, converted this skillful fraud into the flat out lie, “dead or dying.” The possible explanation of “dying” would be that, once a hundred year projected tree has passed it 50th year, it is now “dying” no matter how excellent.
We beg the City Council to act in consonance with its many lofty stated goals. At minimum, the imminent destruction of 56 mostly excellent trees is highly inconsistent with those stated goals.
Note, however, that the enclosure refers to the destruction of 54 trees. The number of 56 includes the two which were lovingly cared for by the owner of the MicroCenter shopping center before Cambridge and the DCR destroyed them, after the April 24, 2017 vote. This is pointed out in Section 3A below and in more detail in the linked letter.
DO YOUR DUTY. REVIEW THE DCR plans as we have fully presented them and recognize the fraud which underlies those plans.
C. Terrible planners.
Please do not forget the record of the very terrible “planners” for the DCR. The legislature destroyed the Metropolitan District Commission, among other reasons, because of the destructiveness of their “planners.” Those “planners” migrated to the DCR with their terrible plans. They, with Cambridge, and Company Union machinations, have just destroyed hundreds of trees on the Charles River based on those plans, and are working, with Cambridge, for much more irresponsible destruction coming at Magazine Beach.
The City Council has declared obeisance to a Absolute Dictator who belligerently keeps the outrages secret, and who was part of the Company Union machinations which already help destroy hundreds of excellent trees.
Together with this terrible record, the Cambridge City Council, according to Councilor Devereux, is basing this declaration of Absolute Dictatorship on a person praised by the Cambridge Development Department, an entity with a truly terrible record itself.
The City of Cambridge is spending millions of dollars on outside consultants whose first action has been to rewrite “planning” at Fresh Pond done by this irresponsible department within the last ten years. The consultants in their recent presentation to the City Council declared top priority to housing and open space, two items which the “plans” of the department have repeatedly rejected in favor of retail, retail, retail.
Based on a public comment by a City Councilor, the retail mndset is apparently based on a situation in New Jersey in which people have to drive miles to get to retail, as opposed to Cambridge with its massive amounts of retail areas already existing. The developers spending the money reject the goals of Cambridge “planners” and have rejected the destruction of first floor housing and open space in fine print in CDD zoning.
This mentality corresponds to the massive destruction of trees and animal habitat by the City Council, the CDD, the DCR and designated “protectors” on the Charles River.
An excellent example of the difference between responsible planning and CDD is to compare (1) pretty much any of the CDD zoning “improvements” of this millenium which would destroy first floor residential uses and open space in favor of retail, retail, by them, and (2) by me, the dense but responsible residential C2B zoning on Massachusetts Avenue between Central and Harvard Squares, especially footnote K to dimensional requirements.
Note, however, yet another outrage by which a City Council on initiative by the CDD recently massively increased building size on Massachusetts Avenue facing residential Green Street by legalizing UNLIMITED apartment creation as long as it is below the grade of Massachusetts Avenue, i.e. facing the residential Green Street neighborhood.
Note also the former parking lot at Alewife which is being returned to nature as a result of the Cook zoning petition of 2000 on which I did the drafting.
This terrible department BY VOTE OF THE CAMBRIDGE CITY COUNCIL destroyed the excellent grove on the Cambridge Common because it “blocked the view” of a monument which, even now, next to nobody can identify. This outrage was so bad that the City of Cambridge has quietly planted saplings in the location where the City Council and the CDD irresponsibly destroyed mature trees.
The Cambridge City Council, over the years put out many declarations of the sanctity of the Silver Maple Forest at Alewife. 3.4 + acres of this “irreplaceable” woods (to quote multiple City Council orders) were destroyed by the Cambridge City Council and the DCR, with help from other Company Union tactics.
The CDD destroyed every tree on Harvard Square’s Palmer Street because they were “blocking light.”
And there are many other examples.
The terrible record of Cambridge and the DCR is being expanded by many other things, but particularly is being expanded in spades by their record of destruction on the Charles River and the very irresponsible plans at Magazine Beach. The terrible parts are kept as secret as possible by the Absolute Dictator to whom the Cambridge City Council claims fealty apparently based on the recommendations of Cambridge’s proven destructive CDD.
2. What the Cambridge City Council should do.
The Cambridge City Council should give us honesty in government.
Stop lying that the City Council is pro environment, or change sides to the side it claims to be on.
To be specific, we request that, consistent with repeated expression of environmental concerns by THE CAMBRIDGE CITY COUNCIL, the following actions be taken:
A Retract and rescind the City Council’s action on April 24, 2017, in order 1, supporting the destruction of 56 mostly excellent trees and related outrages in the Magazine Beach recreation area.
B. Trash the Department of Conservation and Recreation as manager of all properties under its jurisdiction in Cambridge in favor of replacement by the Department of Transportation.
C. End the environmental outrages planned by the DCR and Cambridge and reverse, insofar as feasible, the many outrages accomplished by the DCR, Cambridge and related entities from November 1, 1999, to the current date.
3. Additional relevant communications.
A. Destruction at MicroCenter.
As with the bizarre situation in which the CDD’s “planning” calls for retail, retail, retail, with destruction of first floor housing and open space, the owner of the MicroCenter Shopping Center lavished love on trees abutting its shopping center, trees which were destroyed by the DCR in implementation of City Council Order 1 of April 24, 2017, even though these trees are not even included on the destruction plans.
Please see our report to the City Council presented at the August 7, 2017 meeting, and published at http://cambridgema.iqm2.com/Citizens/FileOpen.aspx?Type=1&ID=1825&Inline=True, pages 151 to 157.
Here is what the Cambridge City Council and the DCR did to those trees which were so lovingly cared for.
Notice the healthy stumps. Notice the mulch lovingly placed around these excellent trees before they were callously and wastefully destroyed by the DCR and the Cambridge City Council’s order. The Cambridge City Council obeys its Absolute Dictator and declares full obeisance to her determination to keep destructive reality as secret as possible.
B. Impact on Bees and other resident animals in Cambridge.
Dying bees with telling symptoms have been spotted on Magazine Beach.
On December 4, 2017, published at the December 11, 2017 meeting, we responded to City Manager Agenda Item 6, December 4, 2017, government impact on bees and other resident animals in Cambridge. This is posted at: http://cambridgema.iqm2.com/Citizens/FileOpen.aspx?Type=1&ID=1871&Inline=True, pages 103 to 107.
The DCR and the City Council’s Absolute Dictator want to expand Cambridge and the DCR’s failed poisoning of the Magazine Beach environment by expanding the failed poison drinking grasses which were installed in place of responsible grasses which survived responsibly throughout the 20th Century
[Above] from this letter, bare ground which was formerly poison drinking grass is an example of yet more failures which the DCR and the City Council’s Absolute Dictator, and the City Council by the April 24 2017 vote, want to expand. Of course, maximum secrecy is maintained with regard the irresponsible policies involved, and the failures thereof.
C. Destruction of valuable vegetation, relocation of poisons into the Charles River.
Please see our letter “Charles River: Destruction on Magazine Beach gets Worse, DPW Involvement.” Dated 12/11/17, 12/18/17 meeting, communication 4, http://cambridgema.iqm2.com/Citizens/FileOpen.aspx?Type=1&ID=1874&Inline=True, page 146 to 155. This goes into the reasons by which Cambridge and the DCR created two poison drainage facilities to go along with the reintroduction of poisons into the Magazine Beach environment, in direct violation of so many fine supposed goals of the Cambridge City Council.
A group headed by the City Council’s declared Absolute Dictator is blocking the poison drainage facilities as part of a farcical fight against beautiful vegetation cherished by responsible entities.
More recently, the Absolute Dictator has apparently turned for help to well meaning people who volunteer to the DCR and related entities hoping to behave responsibly. Instead, they destroy, destroy, and destroy, and reroute the beloved poisons of Cambridge and the DCR from the drainage which was expensively installed to protect the Charles River, and place those poisons in the Charles River and into the watershed of its banks.
The City Council’s Absolute Dictator is ramping up the use of these well meaning people and may be blocking the second drainage facility as well. But people who helped the last Company Union destruction are walking away from her while the Cambridge City Council publicly, through Devereux, declares fealty to her.
Once again, as is very much too common in entities blessed by the destructive CDD, well meaning people are duped into damage for the cause for which they want to fight.
D. Destruction as it proceeds, more poisons, algae accumulation, planting of extremely invasive vegetation.
Our May 9, 2018 letter, entitled: “Charles River: More GOVERNMENT Destruction at Magazine Beach,” presented at the May 14, 2018, meeting as communication 2, and is recorded at cambridgema.iqm2.com/Citizens/FileOpen.aspx?Type=1&ID=1926&Inline=True, pages 61 to 68, gave you a tour of the ongoing and accelerating outrage at Magazine Beach by the Cambridge City Council, the DCR, and the Absolute Dictator. This includes the planting of mint, a very extreme piece of invasive vegetation, and by the accumulation of algae resulting from the rerouting of poisons which should not be used at Magazine Beach in the first place.
These are Phil Barber photos with my blow up of the marker.
4. Summary.
But please do not ignore the massive documentation I gave you in my June 6, 2017 letter, attached hereto with the omitted 7 pages.
This, more than anything else, is what the Absolute Dictator is fighting for and hiding, with the obeisance of the Cambridge City Council. Interestingly, there are people separating themselves this time who were part of the Company Union fraud the first time, with its massive destruction KEPT SECRET BY THOSE WHO FOUGHT FOR IT.
Truly horrible.
Truly in violation of so many lovely proclamations of environmental “concern” by the Cambridge City Council.
The exemption of this outrage raises very real question with regard to so many interlocked and current “environmental initiatives” and the segretation of the public members working on those initiatives from the outrages on the Charles River.
Sincerely,
Robert J. La Trémouille
Chair, Friends of the White Geese
P.S. The January 2016 destruction by Cambridge, the DCR, the Absolute Dictator and her friends are documented, with only a taste of the current outrages, in our video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTplCCEJP7o.
P.P.S. An abridged summary of my record did not fully make into the City Council records a week or so ago. It should be in the communications prior to this communication.
P.P.P.S. We note a photo of Councilor Devereux on line bragging about a project on Magazine Beach whose details are still secret. Will comparable photos be posted of her and her friends’ destroying the rest of the 56 trees being destroyed in this project? Here are stills from our video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTplCCEJP7o concerning the outrages achieved so far.
Attachment: Our June 6, 2017 letter including the omitted pages 6 through 10, 24, and 51. PLANS CONTINUALLY KEPT SECRET BY THE CITY COUNCIL’S DECLARED ABSOLUTE DICTATOR, while she brags of the much smaller destruction..
