As you may know, I have served as BayWatcher and Director of Strategy & Communications for Save the Harbor/Save the Bay for more than 30 years.
When I first joined the organization in 1990, Boston Harbor was a sewer, as waste from 43 cities and towns washed up on the beach and shore from Cape Cod to Cape Ann from a broken pipe at the mouth of the harbor.
Today, as the organization celebrates their 35th Anniversary year, I am proud to say that Boston Harbor is among the cleanest urban harbors in the world and South Boston is home to the cleanest urban beaches in the nation.
Much of the credit for that success goes to United States District Court Judge A. David Mazzone, who oversaw the case for more than 20 years. It also goes to the men, women and ratepayers of the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority and the thousands of people who all believed in the power of clean water to transform communities and improve peoples lives.
Credit for the success of the clean-up also belongs to Save the Harbor/Save the Bay and their founders; Globe Columnist Ian Menzies, retired Judge Paul Garrity, Quincy City Solicitor Bill Golden and Save the Harbor's first volunteer and Founding Chair Beth Nicholson.
- In 1986, Beth Nicholson joined Save the Harbor as
its first volunteer, and then served as Save the Harbor/Save the Bay''s Board Chair for nearly
20 years.
- I was at the first public meeting of Save the Harbor/Save the Bay at the Kennedy Library in 1986 doing advance work for two political campaigns and a ballot initiative. In 1988, I worked with them to focus attention on the lack of federal funds to help pay for the cost of the Boston Harbor cleanup, which had become an issue in the presidential campaign.
- I joined Save the Harbor/Save the Bay's leadership team in 1990, first as their BayWatcher and then as Director of Strategy & Communications after being briefly detained for trespassing while fishing at the Edison plant in Southie - but that's a story for another day...
- In 1999, after a spirited strategic review, rather than
declare victory and go out of business, Save the Harbor's board revised it's
mission to "Restore, Protect and Share" Boston Harbor,
and hired Patricia Foley, who served as Save the Harbor/Save the
Bay's President for nearly 20 years. (Patty and I were
married in 2000)
- In 2015, Chis Mancini joined Save the Harbor/Save the Bay as
Vice President, and now serves as Executive Director as the
organization continues to focus on improving water quality and
public access to our spectacular harbor, the waterfront, islands
and the region's public beaches.
I recently came across this article by the late Ian Menzies from THE JOHN F. KENNEDY LIBRARY NEWSLETTER from the Summer/Autumn of 1987 that I think you will enjoy and know you will find instructive.
Save The Harbor/Save The Bay
by Ian Menzies
The note from the Kennedy Library was quite explicit. Tell us
something about Save the Harbor/Save the Bay. What is it? Why was
it formed? Who formed it? What are its goals? And do it in 500
words or less.
It's a little awkward writing about an organization one assisted
in founding; on the other hand, as the Library reminded me, who
better.
The story goes back to October 1983 when William Golden, city
solicitor for Quincy, disgusted at the sight of the city's
beaches, brought suit against the Metropolitan District Commission
(MOC), enjoining chem to cease and desist polluting the harbor.
The suit came before Judge Paul Garrity in superior court, a
jurist who had a way of making people sit up and take notice,
which is precisely the impact he had on the Massachusetts
Legislature.
Under hardball pressure from Garrity in superior court, strong
support from Governor Dukakis, plus critical contributions by the
court-appointeded special master, Harvard law professor Charles
Haar, on December 19, 1984, the Legislature established the
Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA) with independent
fundraising powers. Senate President William Bulger worked hard
for the bill as did House Speaker Tom McGee and Representative
John Cusack.
My own role in this Story developed, as is the case with most
newspapers stories, from the sidelines. I had, beginning way back
in 1975, written 32 columns for the Boston Globe calling in
various ways for a cleanup of the harbor and for an independent1
authority to do the job.
It was now October, 1985. William Golden had become a state
senator. Paul Garrity had left the bench to return to law
practice and, retired from the Globe, I was now a senior fellow
at UMass Boston's McCormack Institute.
As a panelist of a public meeting on the harbor, at the New
England Aquarium that October, I pointed out that even though we
now had the MWRA to clean up the harbor, what we still needed was
a noisy, vociferous, enthusiastic, demanding constituency, sort of
a barely restrained intelligent mob, to ensure that the job was
done. And, with considerable temerity, I publicly proposed that
Garrity head it.
Hearing that call, Gerardd Bertrand, president of the
Massachusetts Audubon Society, pledged $10,000 to get such a group
started. Golden called Garrity and myself and said: "what about
jt?" And the founding meeting, most appropriately, and with
thanks, was held January 16, 1986, at the Kennedy Library.
Our little triumvirate couldn't have got going, how ever, without
two other critical helping hands -a grant of $50,000 from The
Boston Foundation and S50.000 from the Cox Foundation.
Today, Save the Harbor/Save the Day is a one-purpose grassroots
organization committed to a cleanup of the Harbor before the
century ends, has well over 2000 members, a number it hopes to
double within two years. It conducts sewer tours, helps monitor
harbor waters, sponsors''town meetings on the harbor," works with
teachers and schools and presents films on harbor pollution.
While supportive of the MWRA it will call the shots as it sees
them. It has only one goal: To be out of business in the shortest
possible time and anyone sharing that goal is invited to join by
calling 742-SAVE.
Here's a copy of the original from the archive.
