Calling on the Trust to face the mud in Booth Canal - Alcyonenews

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Posted January 14, 2022

Calling on the Trust to face the mud in Booth Canal

In the December 03, 2021 column, I referred to four consultants “working” for the Trust. Ostensibly “working”, because we know they were hired by the Trust but they they have not shown up anywhere for sometime now.

A troop of Trust mercenaries are working on the “Islands 2050". This aims at creating the impression that we consent to the Trust “governing” us for another 30 years.

Another firm of Trust consultants is labouring to make the Trust more “efficient” in doing to us the things we do not wish done. In reality their task is to pre-empt the “2017 Consensus” to change the governance of SSI.

A third troop of Trust consultants are re-designing Ganges Village. They are to recommend the extension of the BoardWalk, among the other things that Trust feels we would love to have but we are shy to ask. This in anticipation of the post-Pandemic revival of our swinging downtown nightlife. But why can’t the plethora of Trust Planner update the plan of Ganges?

The last consultant contract “budgeted” at $100G, is to enlighten us, the populace, by dispensing our “mistaken” resentment of the Trust’s benevolent efforts to boost its “Policy Statement”. They publicized their hunt for this consultant and promised to let us know the winner by the end of November 2021. This was done to douche the flames of dissent which were getting too hot for the Trust to handle. Now, almost mid-January, 2022, the Trust keeps us in the dark as to who the lucky consultants are. If one was indeed hired.

Habitually, the Trust seeks solace in secrecy. Nowhere is this better illuminated than the more than a dozen-years long saga of fending off my attempts to get the Trust to reverse the demise of Booth Canal. Let’s glance at that.

Although known as “canal”, it is a beautiful tidal inlet, a small estuary of a creek. It is a scenic asset of our island, forever photographed by locals and tourists, especially for its beautiful sunsets. A now defunct Motel-Restaurant enterprise built an intrusion, a wide “groyne” blocking out some three quarters of the mouth of the Canal, This affected seriously the delicate tidal regime of the Canal resulting in bank erosion and continuous silting of the Canal. Other small factors contributed and together set the Canal on the slippery slope of its demise.

My professional education and P.Eng career qualify me as an expert in the issues of the Canal. I have been trying since 2009 to get the Trust to honour its mandate to preserve and protect the Canal. I have made countless written and oral submissions on that to the Trust. They reacted by deploying “dirty tricks” that Richard Nixon’s Watergate crew would envy. I will mention one that is unethical, stupid and amusing.

Because of my professional standing, the Trustees and Staff cannot challenge my assessment and recommendations for amelioration of the Canal situation. Some clever Trustista(s) came up with a scheme to line up against me two “Phantom Scientists” – two should prevail over one, this being democracy ... No?

The then Trustees, faked being helpless on the Canal, because they said, “two scientists” had told them that my assessment was wrong and assured them that there is no problem with the Canal, and the Canal is hunky dory. Subsequent Trustees embraced the trick for the shake of “Hidden Science”. I have challenged them to produce the “scientists” but they strenuously refused – phantoms are not to be seen...

The Trust’ deliberate neglect of the Canal is unpalatable and the way the Trust has done this is intolerable. These combine to make the Canal a millstone around the neck of the Trust.

I am calling on the Trust to come out and tell society why they refuse to reverse the demise of Booth Canal. Which is in the tap-root of their mandate. I call on them to produce the phantom “scientists” they say have advise them and if they cannot do that to stand up and apologize for lying to society.

If they continue with their past callous attitude, that is to say if they carry on denying the Canal, I will keep on asking them for an answer till Hell freezes over, like Adlai Stevenson famously warned the Soviet Ambassador at the UN. It is my citizen’s and Professional’s duty to expose them; and it is their obligation to come to terms with the Media, the Fourth Estate of our Democracy.

The Trust may put in abeyance all else and proceed to remedied the Canal now, for it has been on the lineup since at least 2009. They better do, because for as long as they do not attend to the Canal, the Trust has no credibility vis-a-vis the populace. How can anyone believe those who fail today when they promise to deliver Paradise in 2050?

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#3. THE Mararathroner ...

The Battle of Marathon (= Dill-field) was fought 2,500 years before the age of cellphones. When he set out to fight the Persians, General Miltiades took along Pheidippides, a runner like no other. When the Greeks won that crucial battle for Western Civilization, Pheidippides ran to Athens with the news. On arriving at the Agora, he hooted “Nenikecamen” (= We won) and collapsed.

He embedded Marathon the word in all languages of the world. As for is last word, His word, “Ne[nike]camen”, it is around too – it treads the Earth in Nike running shoes.

Pheidippides did not pass away, he rests in the Sports Hall of fame.