Folder_0047

NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document

. . . Th EREPffiER .. .Tr Gi .a •~.i ...', r' / :' - .- d J' .i,C, I [s?'tLLt H F. /t".:'l'v Q Yi 1 ' - , '3~-~FT 1~'R-k

profits toenvronmen as his fundratsingtshelP9gtia In fact Fry cilityintheworldthere.The proposed pm- posed donating all study in 1999 to see what life vitihbut tal causes, some objected that aventure like did a ject was a model of total desecration Kennedy would be like, and shared his re-. that would only confuse the public. "River- through building. blasting and the string- protect the Hud- salts with the group's executive committee. keeper was designed to ing of wire. In addition, the plant's steady, River," says then-board member "We came to the conclusion," says Fry, "that gargantuan inhalations of water would son water his leaving would result in a diminution of Fletcher Hodges. "To create a bottled slaughter untold millions of fish. capitalize on there $450,000 to $520,000 out of next year's bud- company seemed to Boyle led the fight that stopped the whole of $1.3 million to $1.4 million" According dirty water. It's a basic conflict of in- get thing. Brandishing a report stating that dose being out pot- to Fry, some board members were willing terest." Boyle agreed: "If we point to 90 percent of the Hudson's striped bass loss They said.'Okay, leers down- lution, people will just say it's to make them:.; to take the laid their eggs near the mountain, he and - size. Were paying too steepa puce here our. water." Cronin too opposed the his supporters went to court. It took. 15 buy Riverkeeper's ex. But, then as now, Kennedyhad his pas project, according to rears, but they prevailed. And theyestab- '. defenders. Around this time Alec precedent we now take for treasurer John Fry. (Cronin declined to be sionate lished the legal interviewed for this article.) Kennedy, buck- Baldwin, a member of Riverkeeper's advi- granted: that citizens have the right to sue showered the board members sory board, wrote a blistering letter to Boyle corporations over threats to natural sir- ing Boyle, and Fry: have kept tabs through other "I his proposal, and the fight was on. roundings. The Riverkeepers. the 1997 book with that re- people on the personality-related clashes Kennedy coauthored, calls the Storm King It was the bottled water episode various individuals in the orga- the fault line in Riverkeeper, espe- between fight "the most important lawsuit in the vealed nization and I want all of you to under- its board of directors. When Ken- history of environmental jurisprudence." cially on application to use the Riverkeeper stand clearly that I don't believe Kennedy But Boyle was just beginning. His next nedy's responsible for any of this. In fact. I think name failed in the fall of 1998, those loyal is idea was to put citizen patrols on the river some people to whom I'm sending this him were outraged. "We based it on the to search out polluters in every bend and to money," says letter may be re sponsible for this and want Paul Newman way of making inlet. In 1983 Boyle offered the job of"river- (him).... if you allow whatever Bracco, a Riverkeeper board mem- to pin it on keeper" to John Cronin, a sandy-haired Lorraine fund- valid disagreements people have with each "Here we are killing ourselves with young man from Yonkers, at a salary of $50 bet. million a year to other to become the fodder for driving We need over $1 a week. Cronin took his boat out, spied. raisers. organization. It's not easy. Do you Kennedy out of the organization, you are Exxon tankers dumping oil and stealing run this irreversible mistake." water, and nailed his first fine, want us to go to Mobil Oil? Do you want making an tobacco companies?" Boyle himself thought the situation past Robert Kennedy Jr. joined Boyles orga- us to ask saving. In October he scribbled a note to Fry nization (now called Riverkeeper) the fol- The issue engendered so much acri- attacking, attacking, Boyle his letter about Kennedy "He's that Kennedy sent lowing year. It wasn't entirely by choice. A many and he will come forth with one resignation that fall "Bob Boyle accepted attacking, graduate, like his father, of Harvard and the of didn't false issue after another. He's a head case." says. "Then Kennedy said he University of Virginia law school, Kennedy it." Fry seriously." In any case, expect it to be taken had been arrested for possession of heroin member Brenda Boozer referred in 1983. He wound up doing community Kennedy stayed. He founded awater corn- Board cockatoos as "vermin": Below, the own, calling it Keeper Springs. to service work with the Natural Resources pany on his resented the bottled water endangered sulphur-txested cockatoo. . . . bitterly Defense Council, which had represented But "he Hodges, and after that things Riverkeeper in court. Before long Kennedy decision," says `J Riverkeeper's were never the same. was on his way to becoming ' also con- Over the next year or so there were in- chief prosecuting attorney. He disputes between creasingly rancorous tinued working for the NRDC and went on Kennedy and what he'd come to regard as 1 ) to found the Environmental Litigation Clinic network of Boyle, Fry, ji ' ' University, a legal boot camp for Riverkeeper's old-boy at Pace memos, Kennedy kept de- and others. In new soldiers in the environmental move- more "democracy and openness" , ment. As Boyle says, "Kennedy said to me, manding "bullying." Boyle's (ac- 'Riverkeeper has saved my life. It's given and an end to Boyle's me something to live for.'" tion was ever more irate over Kennedy's re- .r come to staff meetings, his insistence j ✓rr For a decade and a half these three fusal to _ Iç ,r men—Boyle, Kennedy, and Cronin—were on being, in Hodges's words,Hodges, "a one-man then / / .~e - Holy Ghost. band." In fact Kennedy and Riverkeeper's Father. Son, and executive director, carne to regard [' .. They presided over the comeback of the interim undiluted loathing. They / each other with blue crab. the sturgeon, and the two hun- the choice of ' r _ dred varieties of shad, and they did it with fought over fund-raising, over * :A,~ ' J style. "They were enchanting." Tonetti says, next year's dinner dance honoree. (Hodges philanthropist Arthur Ross; "these three spirited Irishmen, bantering had chosen with each other." Kennedy backed Rolling Stone publisher R. 1 Jann Wenner.) At last, in a letter to Boyle t About two years ago, the bantering ended. dated September 24, 1999, Hodges wrote, we should get rid of Kennedy im- In 1998 Kennedy announced that he wanted "1 think mediately... This will cost us some money j to found a bottled water company and use maybe some bad publicity, but as a the Riverkeeper name. Boyle and others and member he is hurting us as much opposed him. Even though Kennedy pro- rogue staff

NYC-WTC 000137657