Personal Connections to Onondaga Creek: Part I

From time to time we will post about members of the community and their personal experience and perception of Onondaga Creek. This will serve to bring the large and sometimes overwhelming concept of conservation to a more intimate and visual level:

"I have lived on both urban and rural stretches of Onondaga Creek. I have walked miles by its waters in early spring and heard the peepers croaking their robust songs. I have watched, time after time, awed by the beauty of circling marsh hawks and gliding blue herons. I have smiled at new born calves sneaking out of their pastures. I have been soothed and renewed by the creek's gurgling flow.

I am especially committed to protecting the Tully Valley Onondaga Creek watershed. Tully Valley is a place of incredible beauty, quiet and wildlife. It is an absolute gem... a place of working family farms, wetlands and forested hillsides. Vast amounts of farmland and wetlands have been destroyed by suburban sprawl. I am trying, with OCCC, to prevent this from happening to the Tully Valley.

Also, as a Syracuse, low-income, single parent, I would like to bring children to the urban stretches of Onondaga Creek and have it be safe, green and serene. It can be. Cities all across the world have worked cooperatively to reclaim channelized, polluted creeks.

Over 40% of Syracuse residents do not own cars. This number will increase with the current economic crisis and global warming. Wouldn't it be lovely if we could walk and bike along Onondaga Creek right in the city? We don't have to drive for miles. Nature is right here."

-Stacey Smith, OCCC participant