SUFFOLK CLOSEUP: Sharks They're Out There And Have Always Been There

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP

By Karl Grossman

“People swim with sharks all the time, they just don’t know it,” Hans Walters, a shark expert at the New York Aquarium, told WCBS 880 news amid the recent series of sharks biting people in this area.

I saw this quite clearly—and surprisingly—a number of years ago from our sailboat heading from Long Island to the Elizabeth Islands off Massachusetts.

We were sailing along the coast of Rhode Island and, passing a busy beach, I steered closer to shore to see what a Rhode Island beach might be like. Holding the tiller with my left hand, I looked out at the folks frolicking in the water—and between me and them, 10 feet from our boat, the fin of a shark appeared. I doubt any of those swimmers knew a shark was off shore.

Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone says of the shark situation here, “there may be a new reality that we’re in.” It’s a scary “new reality” for those who like to swim in the ocean.

Governor Kathy Hochul in Suffolk last week announced stepped-up shark surveillance efforts. “Whether it’s land, sea or air, we are going to be having more robust patrols on the shorelines,” she said. Drones and state police helicopters will be utilized, and there’ll be more lifeguards at state beaches.  

A website named “Xplore Our Planet” which describes itself “as a resource for wildlife enthusiasts and those who love to explore the world” declares: “Swimming with sharks sounds dangerous, but it isn’t—relatively speaking anyway. All things in life carry risk, but swimming with sharks is very low on the list. Only five people [worldwide] are killed each year—that’s 100 times less than by elephants—and these attacks are often either accidental as a case of mistaken identity or provoked by humans.” OK, but to be considered, too, are injuries, such as in Florida this month requiring the amputation of part of a young woman’s leg.

“It is safe to swim with sharks if you do it properly,” says the website. But “how do you swim with sharks safely?” First, it advises “Be Careful Around the Big Three.” It says: “Almost every serious or fatal incident is caused by a collection of just three animals: great white sharks, bull sharks, and tiger sharks.” OK, but how can an average person identify those among the more than 500 shark species said to be in the seas of the world?

Then, it says, “A floundering fish or a panicking seal tells them it’s meal time, and they’ll charge in for an easy kill. If you get into difficulties and start flapping about, or jump in and out of the water with too much enthusiasm, you’ll mimic the sensations of injured prey and invite the opportunity for confusion and an accidental attack.” But not “flapping about” or being enthusiastic in the water, is that always possible?

Then there’s “Consider Water Conditions.” “Xplore Our Planet” says: “Despite popular misconceptions, sharks have excellent eyesight. But, that eyesight doesn’t work in murky waters….Good visibility is essential for safe shark swimming, if only to let the sharks know you aren’t on the dinner menu.” OK, but the ocean off Long Island isn’t so clear usually, not like the Caribbean, for example. Murkiness is common. 

And then there’s “Dive in Groups.” The website says: “A lone target, by nature, is less of a threat and more vulnerable. By swimming in groups, you present what you might call a united front against aggression.” OK, but not so easy if there is scant attendance on a beach.

A big question for this area: why suddenly so many shark attacks?

Explanations being given focus on climate change and warmer ocean temperatures luring sharks to Long Island’s ocean waters—and that, I think, is indeed the main issue. Another explanation: an increase in bunker fish on which sharks like to feed. A further explanation: ocean waters are cleaner these days off Long Island and this encourages sharks to come here. 

Newsday just ran an editorial titled, “Now our woes include sharks.” It began noting that to “the pressurized fire hose of catastrophic problems shot into our lives daily, let us add sharks.” But, it stressed, “There are an average of five shark deaths annually worldwide, and about 236,000 drowning deaths. And the shark-centric resources being thrown at Long Island beaches—including drones and patrols—can only serve the big question in the affirmative: Yes, there absolutely are sharks out there. But in many ways shark attacks are the danger best fixated on, because sharks likely won’t get us.” OK people, stop fixating.

I learned to swim mostly in the Long Island Sound, off Wading River. Shark-wise, it’s not the Atlantic. But still, a 10-foot great white shark was spotted in the sound off Connecticut in 2019. It was tagged in 2018 so later in 2019, CNN reported, “was detected…in the New York Bight, south of Long Island.”

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP: Carbon Emissions The EPA And The Supreme Court

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP

By Karl Grossman

The word “resilience” is a word being used and acted upon in Suffolk—indeed all over the United States—these days to try to deal with results of climate change: for us a rising Atlantic Ocean.

But unless the cause of the problem—primarily the burning of fossil fuels warming the atmosphere causing climate change—is fully challenged and dealt with, efforts at seeking to react to the effect, resilience, will not work in the long run or even the medium run.  

The recent 6-to-3 ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court in the West Virginia v. EPA case that will limit the Environmental Protection Agency’s power to regulate carbon emissions from power plants substantially weakens dealing with the main cause.

And environmentalists here—and across the nation—have good reason to be highly disapproving.

The EPA has been tackling carbon emissions under the Clean Air Act. 

Notes Kevin McAllister, founder and president of Suffolk-based Defend H20—which has a major focus on the impacts of climate change on our shorelines, “the effectiveness of the Clean Air Act is because the EPA has had the regulatory authority to impose tough restrictions on carbon emissions.”

“The Supreme Court ruling limiting EPA’s ability to regulate greenhouse gases from power plant plants is a setback with protecting air quality and mitigating climate change,” says McAllister.

“Subordinating science-based climate policy to a gridlocked Congress will surely stall momentum on climate action.” McAllister told me last week.

This, he stated will be reflected “in terms of reducing emissions from a major source of greenhouse gases—power plants—and a dampened enthusiasm of the international community watching the United States back off its commitment to slash CO2 emissions.”

As Coral Davenport, who covers energy and environmental policy for the climate desk of The New York Times, wrote the day after the Supreme Court ruling, “The Clean Air Act, which some legal experts call the most powerful environmental law in the world, was enacted in 1970, at the birth of the environmental movement.”

“Since then, it has been the source of scores of landmark regulations on air pollution, including soot, smog, mercury, and the toxic chemicals that cause acid rain,” she noted. The ruling by the six-member arch-conservative majority on the Supreme Court “is part of a larger legal fight over whether and how far the Clean Air Act can be used to combat climate change. The outcome could handcuff President Biden’s plans to lower the United States’ planet-warming pollution.”

The vote in 1970 in the U.S. Senate for the Clean Air Act was 73-0. The House of Representatives earlier passed its version 374-1. The final bill was signed by President Nixon. 

“As we sign this bill in this room,” Nixon said, “we can look back and say, in the Roosevelt Room…we signed a historic piece of legislation that puts us far down the road toward a goal that Theodore Roosevelt, 70 years ago, spoke eloquently about: a goal of clean air, clean water, and open spaces for the future generations of America.”

The Roosevelt link has special meaning to we on Long Island considering TR’s residence in Sagamore Hill on Long Island from 1885 until his death in 1919.

Bob DeLuca, president of the Suffolk-based Group for the East End, said the ruling “flies in the face of sound science and effective environmental policy. The decision essentially ties the EPA’s hands from developing a nationwide regulatory strategy for carbon emissions on a theory that Congress could not have intended to empower the EPA to address matters of substantial national consequence without further action by Congress. By arguing that Congress could have never intended the EPA to actually do its job comprehensively—an odd view given the existence of a national Clean Air Act—the court significantly diminished the authority of the EPA when it comes to one of the most consequential environmental issues of our time,” he said. 

“Moreover, by dropping the matter back in the lap of a Congress mired in conflict and endless stalemates over substantive legislation, the court assured its decision would hold indefinitely,” he continued. “These are very smart people and they surely knew what the outcome would be.”

“For those of us in the conservation community and I assume many concerned citizens in general, the weakening of government’s authority to address climate change comprehensively is a blow to important progress that needs to be made immediately, and places substantial new pressure on state and local governments to fill the void,” DeLuca told me. 

In the current issue of The New Yorker, Jeannie Suk Gersen pointed to former President Trump, whose three appointments of Supreme Court justices turned the court radically conservative. She wrote “in addition to an attempted coup, we have him to thank for 2022’s becoming the turning point of the Supreme Court’s conservative revolution. In a single week in late June, the conservative justices asserted their recently consolidated power by expanding gun rights, demolishing the right to abortion, blowing a hole in the wall between the church and state and curtailing the ability to combat climate change.” (Through his candidacy and presidency, Trump routinely dismissed climate change as a “hoax.”)

Karl Grossman is a veteran investigative reporter and columnist, the winner of numerous awards for his work and a member of the L.I. Journalism Hall of Fame. He is a professor of journalism at SUNY/College at Old Westbury and the author of six books. 

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP - 9/11, Commack's Rob Vasiluth And EEL Grass

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP

By Karl Grossman

For Robert (Rob) Vasiluth, it began on 9/11.

The operating engineer from Suffolk County was in Manhattan hoisting a section of a sign high up on the Renaissance Times Square Hotel when just a few miles to the south he saw the World Trade Center being struck. 

“I saw the second plane hit,” recounted Vasiluth last week.

“I went home to my family” in Commack, he said, feeling “so terrible.” And the next day he was at Ground Zero, part of a “bucket brigade” that hand-to-hand was moving debris. Soon his task was “cutting steel” so corpses could be found in the pile.

“This was the city I love,” said Vasiluth. And he was “seeing what the world destroyed looks like.” From that experience, he committed himself to “saving life.”

Several weeks later, he was at Sunken Meadow State Park, and an alewife, a species of herring which returns to where it was born to lay eggs, had jumped out of the water and “was wriggling on the ground.” It had been blocked from getting to where it was born by a dam. He picked up the alewife “so it could get back on its way.” It “swam away. I couldn’t get it out of my head. This fish needed help.”

Since, Vasiluth has been pushing for pathways so alewives can get around the dams which, he said, exist now on Long Island in virtually all waterways in which alewives seek to return to spawn. 

Then he joined with the organization Save the Sound to plant spartina grass to restore wetlands. And, he began thinking about the vegetation beyond wetlands: notably eel grass.

He asked himself: how could eel grass beds best be restored?

Eel grass “is the foundation in the shallow sea,” notes Rob. “It’s a nursery ground for juvenile fish. It’s where scallops can thrive. Eel grass produces oxygen. It slows down erosion. It’s a natural buffer. It neutralizes acidification. It absorbs carbon.” 

But “95 percent of eel grass in New York waters is gone,” he said.

There have been attempts to plant eel grass seeds but they have largely been unsuccessful. He studied the issue for months.

And then he came up with an idea: using a glue to affix eel grass seeds to clams. The clams with the seeds would, he figured, bury themselves in the sea bottom and this way the seeds could far better germinate rather than just being scattered in the water as was being tried. 

Chris Pickerell, marine program director at Cornell Cooperative Extension of Suffolk County, opened its laboratory in Southold to Rob for experimentation of the concept. And it worked.

The glue used? Cyanoacrylate.

That’s the stuff that is the basis for Crazy Glue.

The germination rate of gluing eel grass seeds to clams—five to 10 per clam—to produce eel grass has turned out to be “phenomenal,” said Vasiluth. Eel grass seeds, he explains, “are very similar to caraway seeds on the everything bagel.”

He has been involved—with Cornell Cooperative Extension, Save the Sound, The Nature Conservancy, Seatuck Environmental Association and the Stony Brook University School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences—in the planting of eel grass seeds on clams widely in waters off Long Island. These include waters of the Long Island Sound off Stony Brook, in Sterling Harbor off Greenport, in the Great South Bay off Fire Island, and in Shinnecock Bay, assisted by the Science Club of Hampton Bays Schools. 

Last year, a major eelgrass seed collection initiative furthering Rob’s concept began off Fishers Island, the little island two miles off Connecticut that’s part of Suffolk County. Save The Sound, in an online article on the project—which includes a photo of Rob in a mask and scuba gear in the water holding up a bag of eelgrass seeds—notes that it is aimed at increasing “eelgrass propagation…by using clams as an alternative to traditional planting methods.” Fisher’s Island, the piece says, “is the home of the last best eelgrass habitat in the Long Island Sound due to the work of the Fisher’s Island Conservancy Eelgrass Management Program.” 

An operating engineer skilled with working heavy equipment, age 53, the father of three, Rob has invented a hugely important process for bringing back that vital aquatic vegetation: eel grass. 

From the devastation at Ground Zero, he is bringing back life to the sea. 

Karl Grossman is a veteran investigative reporter and columnist, the winner of numerous awards for his work and a member of the L.I. Journalism Hall of Fame. He is a professor of journalism at SUNY/College at Old Westbury and the author of six books. 

Library Board Of Trustees Rescinds Policy On Pride Month Displays

By Stacy Altherr

After mounting pressure from community members and groups, as well as a possible investigation by a state human rights department, the Smithtown Library board of trustees rescinded its decision to remove Pride Month displays from all four of the town library’s children’s rooms.

The library board of trustees held an emergency meeting 6:30 p.m. Thursday evening via Zoom to retract the decision. More than 1,000 people attended the virtual event.

Library board president Brianna Baker-Stines, who voted against the measure Tuesday night, when a 4-2 vote approved the policy removing the displays from Smithtown Library District’s four libraries, said that the board needed to trust the highly skilled and educated librarians to know what books should be included in displays and noted the board should stick to its work of managing budgets and other trustee responsibilities.

After the decision Tuesday to pull the display, New York State Governor Kathy Hochul quickly issued a news release stating that New York will not become the next “Don’t Say Gay” state. “Public places are prohibited by law from engaging in discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity,” she said via the statement.

In addition to the governor’s office, local and national LGBTQ organizations have reprimanded the library board of trustees for their decision and applaud the quick reversal. 

“The entire community made this happen,” said David Kilmnick, President of the LGBT Network. “It woke up a sleeping giant majority that believes in safety, equity, fairness and love for our children. There is a lot more to do to create and provide safer schools, and LGBT instruction and this victory tonight shows what we can do when we lift our voices and act together.

Tonight’s  vote to rescind Tuesday’s decision was 4-2 with one abstention.

Vice President Thomas Maher said he voted to remove the displays, thinking it would only be until the next meeting when a policy would be made. 

“I will reverse my decision,” he said at the meeting, saying he wants the Smithtown library system to be an “open, safe, and accepting place for everyone.”

Library trustees Marie Gergenti and Theresa Grisalfi voted against the reinstating the display. Both said they were concerned about the content in some of the books. Trustee Marilyn LoPresti, who abstained from the vote, said she spent time reading the books and was also concerned about some of the content.

None of the books were removed from the library shelves when the displays were removed.

Statement from the Board of Trustees of The Smithtown Library:

Earlier this evening the Board of Trustees of The Smithtown Library rescinded our earlier decision to remove Pride displays from our Library’s Children’s Departments. The majority of the Board recognizes that our earlier decision was made without the time, care and due diligence that a decision of this type deserves and that it was the wrong decision. Moving forward we will commit our collective energies toward ensuring that we get the advice and guidance needed from our Library Administrators, staff, outside experts, legal counsel and most importantly from Smithtown residents before we make important decisions regarding our Library.

The Board’s goal for The Smithtown Library is to be a place that welcomes openly all Smithtown residents. We recognize that we have our differences but we believe that what we have in common outweighs those differences. We know that a good library will contain things that may trouble each of us but understand that our primary role involves representing many different viewpoints and opposing ideas. We do this by giving voice - and space - to each.

The Board looks forward to reviewing our decision-making processes and our policies related to our Library’s collections, displays, programs and services to ensure that they are helping us fulfill our mission of “providing access to diverse information, lifelong learning and entertainment resources through outstanding service for all residents of the Library District.”

We will report back to the community regularly on our progress.

The Smithtown Library Board has posted a link to tonight’s emergency board meeting. Click here to listen to the audio recording of the June 23 Emergency Board Meeting. 

"I Didn't Speak Out For Fear Of Offending" A History Lesson

History Lesson

June Capossela Kempf

Sitting on the front porch waiting for the school bus with my granddaughter, G G. (Gorgeous Granddaughter). My attention is split between the time and the street corner; hoping the bus would come before she drives me crazier than I already am for signing up for this detail in the first place – really?  I cherish these precious moments, sharing and bonding with her

Today, she started off by asking; “How old are you?  When I answered, she swung into gear with a slew of questions.

“Do you remember Martin Luther King?” 

 ‘Sure do.”

“When he was alive? You remember his march in Washington. You were living – then? 

“Yeah, I watched it from a distance. I had a dream,” I quoted. Then, reflected how I wished I did more to support the dream - how I admired the people who marched for freedom back then.  As she struggled with the idea that her grandma witnessed her recent history lesson, I heard the words to Aretha’s ‘ R_E_S_P_E_C_T’  tumble around my brain , mixing it up with freedom songs of the sixties. I softly sang, ‘If I Had a Hammer’. 

“How did you feel when he got killed?”

“So scared. I thought his dream for freedom would be lost forever and there would be rioting - everywhere.”

“.. But that didn’t happen, right?”

“His message got through. Laws were passed that not only inspired racial tolerance but protected the poor and disabled throughout the country.”

 G G carefully studied me like I was a talking relic dug up from an archeological dig. 

“Did you go to Woodstock?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

I explained that I was a little older than most of the people who went.  I was married with a child, a house; and I didn’t approve the drugs and the wild crowds, but was there in spirit.”  Blah. Blah, Blah. 

 “Were you a Dove or a Hawk?” she said. 

Luckily, the bus arrived which enabled me to dodge the question. “I’ll tell you later,” I said.  

“Never mind, Grandma… You were no Hawk. “

How could she know? Especially since in the beginning I thought we were fighting the good war in Vietnam. Once I saw the destruction and realized the privileged could avoid the draft and we were losing, at a terrible cost, I leaned towards the bird of peace. But, I stayed on the fence. Did I get out and march - face the fire hoses or write one letter of protest? 

I decided to talk to her tomorrow and tell her how during those days; I didn’t speak out for fear of offending my friends and neighbors - that the bird I was most closely associated with was a chicken?

Perhaps tomorrow, I’ll tell GG that it is never too late to take a stand for your values.  We see now, as history repeats itself; that freedom can’t be taken for granted or expected to endure if we don’t fight like our forefathers to preserve liberty and justice “ – all over this land.”

Thank you Dr. King – Peter,Paul and Mary, Aretha . And thank Heaven for G.G.

June Capossela Kempf: Essayist and  Author of : Yo God! Jay’s Story, a memoir  and Lady of the Dollhouse, a YA mystery