August 25, 2025, Planning Board Special Meeting Transcript - WEHI

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 102 wetland buffers, but not -- but forest, upland forest like this have virtually no protection. And that's another reason why it's so important to target property for preservation. Here's -- this shows the dark green forest in the middle surrounded by light green. Those are preserved lands with the exception of the golf course, which, as mentioned, it's nice to have now but those are not permanently preserved lands either. So there's an opportunity here to preserve the last remaining forest in Essex County and provide some connectivity to other surrounding lands. I just want to mention that New Jersey got a huge amount of open space funding right now and I am not going to go into the details of that, but there is not a problem finding funding for this property. So permanent preservation. This forest will prevent increased flooding. We all know it floods but by preserving it you're making sure it doesn't flood more. Protecting clean drinking water supplies. Make sure Essex Fells doesn't have degraded water to deal with increased open space and recreation in an area where it doesn't have enough already sequestered carbon in a time when we need to do everything we can to