Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation

This is Week Three in our guest series by the Center for Urban and Environmental Sustainability and their County Extension Agents. If you haven’t already, read Week One (“Urban Solutions are Just a Call Away”) and Week Two (“Transforming Newark Lot by Lot”).

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Teaneck Creek Conservancy

Like many successful non-profit organizations, the Teaneck Creek Conservancy was formed in response to a perceived threat. One morning the founders of the Puffin Foundation, Perry and Gladys Rosenstein, looked out their office window and saw surveyor flagging tape that was mysteriously adorning trees in the forest behind the building’s parking lot. Alarmed by the thought that the trees were selected to be cut down, the Rosensteins mobilized local community environmentalists, educators, artists, and scientists to save the 46 acre forest that they found out was owned by Bergen County and designated as “Area 1” of Overpeck County Park. Twelve years later the non-profit Teaneck Creek Conservancy (TCC) is the premier EcoArt organization in Bergen County. TCC now has a unique long-term lease with Bergen County and manages the 46 acre Park’s programming, trail maintenance, and fund raising activities.

The original wetlands of the Teaneck Creek portion of the Hackensack Meadowlands have a sad history. They were once the dumping ground for private companies and the NJ Department of Transportation, which used the site in the 1960’s as a staging and disposal area for dredge and construction debris materials during the building of the New Jersey Turnpike and Route 80 – huge interstate highways that are the Park’s neighbors. Materials illegally dumped and buried on the site in the 1960’s include domestic waste filled with cans, bottles, clothing, and plastic, and construction debris containing bricks, glass, concrete, roofing materials, lumber, automotive parts, and appliances. The original intentions for the property were to fill the wetland area with garbage and then cap the landfilled site and convert it into community park space. The first conservancy volunteers vowed that the Park would reflect these misguided origins while preserving the ecological integrity of the site and having art works created here that would reuse only materials found on the site – a living testament to the power of recycling!

Since TCC was incorporated in 2001, community volunteers using only hand tools have removed literally tons of debris from the Park, including automotive parts, construction debris, and household appliances. The earliest EcoArt projects relied upon the “Jersey RubbleStone” – large pieces of concrete left over from the road construction. Concrete slabs were extracted from the soil and moved by volunteers into new positions – to be reused as signs, bird Migration MilePost Markers, and the seating area in the Peace Labyrinth. Local artists led the volunteers – Lynn Hull worked to create the migration markers that detail flight patterns of transient Park residents who use the Atlantic Flyway. Arianna Burgess designed and led the building of the labyrinth, a naturally peaceful setting for mediation that is located only ten miles “as the crow flies” from mid-town Manhattan!

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Wendy Liscow,  Program Officer

The conversation with Dodge Foundation grantees about our new guideline themes Creativity and Sustainability has stimulated a wonderful investigative journey, but the real satisfaction has come from experiencing the two concepts coming together in action. As my colleagues and I travel the state visiting current and potential grantees, we have the honor of witnessing passionate leaders making these connections. Recently, I met some board members of Teaneck Creek Conservancy, a group of environmentalists, artists, educators and community advocates who shared a vision to save 46 acres of land, but in a manner that utilized eco-art to strengthen the community’s connection to and experience of  the park.  This marriage of sustainability and creativity was brought to life during a January walk in the woods.

The hike into Teaneck Creek Park was not long, but the path was still covered with splotches of ice and snow and the air was brutally cold, so it felt like we would never reach our destination. Just as I was longing for my scarf  left back in the car, we turned the bend and five bright patches of color emerged from the bleak winter landscape to grab my attention. There sat five beautifully painted massive cement storm water pipes: spherical murals  in nature, telling the story of nature.

If you had ventured down the same path this past spring you would have been distraught to discover five graffiti-covered storm pipes that had been littering this otherwise pristine slice of nature since the 1960’s.

Strolling later in the buggy heat of summer you would have found lead artist Eduardo Alexander Rabel, students from a variety of Teaneck schools, and community volunteers sketching, then painting, the visual stories of the vibrant local flora and fauna, and the impact of humankind on nature over time.

The artistry took my breath away, but the depth of the community art process was what impressed me most, and it is all captured in this wonderful video that I urge you to take the time to watch.

This is not Teaneck Creek Conservancy’s first marriage of art and nature. In April 2009 members of the Puffin Photo club led by professional photographer Rachel Banai put together an unique outdoor art exhibition called “Windows on the Park” that utilized old sash windows to frame photographic works that told the story of the seven year transformation of this brownfields-to-greenfields track of land.

Many people would agree that nurturing creativity, supporting public art projects and protecting our environment are worthy endeavors, but they approach each task separately. But when they combine these laudable goals, something larger than the sum of the parts occurs, as Dodge Program Director Michelle Knapik noted in her recent post about The Voices From the Land project.

We are interested in knowing if you have participated in or seen creativity and sustainability in action, experienced the flow of these two forces coming together, and if so, what was it that made this connection meaningful?

photos courtesy of Eduardo Alexander Rabel

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The Dodge Poetry Festival dates have been announced! We hope you join us for the Poetry Festival in Newark October 7 – 10, 2010. For more information, and to become a Friend of the Festival, please visit the Poetry website.

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