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5. Defiance in the Bitter Cold
- State University of New York Press
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5 Defiance in the Bitter Cold The battle between the nuclear industry and the county will now take place at the sites in the cold of an upstate NewYork winter.This will be ourValley Forge. —Sally Campbell, Media Coordinator for ACNAG, quoted in the Wellsville Daily Reporter, December 8, 1989 A FEW FARMERS GOT LETTERS informing them that the siting commission would be sending technical teams onto their land on December 13, 1989.The commission notified the sheriff that they expected his help in getting onto the site; five days earlier a delegation from the state police had informed him that he could expect no help.1 In every interview with reporters from county newspapers and radio stations , Sally Campbell encouraged ordinary folks to come to the site to protest the activities of the siting commission. If they did not want to be arrested, they could peacefully demonstrate and support those who did. Two days before the technical team would arrive to begin its “precharacterization ” study, ACNAG placed a half-page advertisement in the three daily newspapers. Forty-two prominent citizens had signed “A Statement to the People of Allegany County and Western NewYork,” asking citizens to “drop whatever you are doing, gather your friends and family, go to the site and peacefully demonstrate your opposition to this process which would sacrifice Allegany County, its citizens and children to the nuclear power industry.”People should “take inspiration from the recent example of the East Germans, who have courageously taken possession of their destiny” and “walk across the site, giving witness to your identification with this land and its people.”Among 111 1. The encounter between the state police from Albany and the sheriff is recounted in the Prologue. SUNY_Pet_ch05.qxd 9/13/01 2:07 PM Page 111 the signatories were eleven medical doctors, twenty-one religious leaders, the president and provost of Houghton College, the provost of Alfred University and the dean of its Liberal Arts College. The ACNAG leaders were not entirely sure how they would stop the siting commission from doing their walkovers. The basic plan was simple. Protesters would link arms and surround the technical team before it got on the site to prevent it from conducting its precharacterization study. If this proved impossible, they would surround the team on the site. Privately, leaders of ACNAG were worried. They were not sure that there were more than one hundred people actually willing to be arrested, and they had to defend three sites, not just one. The site in West Almond, close to the two colleges in Alfred , was about twenty-five miles southwest of the Caneadea site, which was near Houghton College.The Allen site was about halfway between the two. The protesters had no clue about the siting commission’s destination. In planning their strategy they relied on the recent court order, which allowed the technical teams to enter the properties of the resisting landowners, but also mandated the siting commission to inform them in advance. Jay Dunkleberger , executive director of the siting commission, had sent landowners a six-page letter on December 2 that explained what the technical team hoped to accomplish. It would “spend several days at each site,” though “the exact amount of time will depend on the weather.”The purpose of these walkovers was to study the geology and hydrology of the area, to take shallow soil samples , and to map the bedrock.They would study the surface flow of water and observe erosion features and slope stability. They would evaluate the habitats of both terrestrial and aquatic species. They would also determine whether any land was culturally important to Native Americans. In the same letter Dunkleberger promised to inform the landowners in advance “what days we plan to be on your property.” Five days before the arrival of the technical team, the siting commission reiterated to the press its desire for good relations with the landowners. On December 8 Dunkleberger told a newspaper reporter that they would“like to have landowners walk over the land with us to identify their concerns.” ACNAG knew of only two farmers who had received letters from the siting commission, informing them that they were coming on December 13 to begin the precharacterization studies of their land—William and Lois Clouse at the Caneadea site and Donald and Gloria Miller at the Allen site. ACNAG strategists thought it likely that the three farmers at Caneadea who had already accepted two hundred dollars from the siting...