Save The River! Thousand Islands - Clayton NY on the St. Lawrence River

Save The River! is a non-profit, member-based environmental organization whose mission is to preserve and protect the ecological integrity of the Upper St. Lawrence River through advocacy, education and research.

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On Monday, March 7th Save The River sent this secondary letter to John Petrilla, Acting Environmental Branch Chief, at U.S. Customs and Border Protection stating our opposition to the application to build the US Customs and Border Protection Facility in the Blind Bay area at Fisher’s Landing, Town of Orleans, NY.

From the letter: “The Draft Environmental Assessment (DEA) prepared for the project is deficient in many ways. As a result, the project should be scrapped entirely. In reviewing this DEA, the U.S. Customs and Border Protections (CBP) has failed to take a hard look at several extremely significant environmental impacts that can be expected, and thus a Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) is in error. If the CBP does decide to continue with evaluating this project, it will need to conduct a full Environmental Impact Statement and open the project to complete public review. At the very beginning, there has been no outreach to the local and state agencies that know more about this site than the CBP and its contractors. An elementary look would have revealed that the proposed project violates local zoning ordinances, is proposed in a New York State designated wetlands area, would impact critical habitat for multiple aquatic and land-based species (some of which are endangered or threatened under federal and state law), and is within direct eyeline of Thousand Island Park, which is on the National Register of Historic Places. Failure to use the scoping process available, 43 CFR 46.235, resulted in these most obvious errors.”

 

Your Voice Is Needed!

We encourage you to contact U.S. Customs and Border Protections to share your objection to this proposed facility. See below for a sample script. All public comments must be sent by March 10, 2022. All letters can be emailed to BPAMNEPA@cbp.dhs.gov 

 

Click here to send a letter right now!

Sample Script for Contacting U.S. Customs and Border Protections on  their proposed facility in the Blind Bay

 

Dear Mr. Petrilla,

 

I am writing to share my objection to the application to build the US Customs and Border Protection Facility in the Blind Bay area at Fisher’s Landing, Town of Orleans, NY.

 

Please review this letter sent by Save The River/Upper St. Lawrence Riverkeeper.

 

I respectfully urge you to protect our fisheries and environment by not building this facility in Blind Bay as is it a key spawning area for muskellunge and many other fish species in the St. Lawrence River.

 

Sincerely,

 

(Your Name)
Member of Save The River