{"database": "openregs", "table": "congressional_record", "rows": [["CREC-1994-12-20-pt1-PgS15", "1994-12-20", 103, 2, null, null, "BLACKSTONE HERITAGE AREA'S NEW PRESERVATION APPROACH", "SENATE", "SENATE", "FRONTMATTER", "S", "S", "[{\"name\": \"Claiborne Pell\", \"role\": \"speaking\"}]", null, "140 Cong. Rec. S", "Congressional Record, Volume 140 Issue 150 (Tuesday, December 20, 1994)\n\n[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 150 (Tuesday, December 20, 1994)]\n[Senate]\n[Page S]\nFrom the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]\n\n[Congressional Record: December 20, 1994]\nFrom the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]\n\n          BLACKSTONE HERITAGE AREA'S NEW PRESERVATION APPROACH\n\n Mr. PELL. Mr. President, I would like to share with my\ncolleagues an excellent cover story from the Christian Science Monitor\nof December 5, 1994, that examines the vision of the Blackstone River\nValley National Heritage Corridor.\n  This story is particularly timely because we will be seeking to\nreauthorize this corridor during the 104th Congress. As the Senate\nauthor of the current authorization, I am proud of the work that\nalready has been done and the community pride that has grown with the\ncorridor.\n  I anticipate the reauthorization proposal will encompass the entire\nwatershed of the Blackstone River Valley, which runs from Woonsocket,\nMA to Providence, RI. We want to highlight the role of the valley as\nthe cradle of the American Industrial Revolution.\n  This story also highlights the role of Jim Pepper, the executive\ndirector of the corridor commission. Jim has proven to be an able\ndiplomat and an indefatigable advocate of both the corridor and the\ncommunity involvement that has become its signature.\n  As we start to reconsider the corridor authorization and the goals\nthat it has developed, this story presents an excellent portrait of the\ncorridor's accomplishments and potential. I hope my colleagues will\njoin in supporting its plans for the future.\n  I ask that the story, ``New Preservation Approach Aims To Save\nCultural Landscape,'' from the December 5, 1994, Christian Science\nMonitor, be printed in the Record.\n  The material follows:\n\n       New Preservation Approach Aims To Save Cultural Landscape\n\n                           (By James Andrews)\n\n       Jim Pepper pushes aside brambles, strides across spongy\n     bottom land, and scrambles up a rocky embankment. About 50\n     yards from the road, he stops and looks around at what\n     appears to be nothing but a patch of Rhode Island woods.\n       ``We're standing in the mill,'' he says. ``The water ran\n     down this trough,'' he explains, gesturing to stone walls and\n     arches under the overgrowth.\n       Mr. Pepper is a visionary with a twist. Not only can he\n     peer into the future to see what might be, he also can gaze\n     into the past to see what has been. Now he is seeing Mammoth\n     Mill, once a bustling woolen factory on the Blackstone River\n     in Northern Smithfield, R.I. These neglected ruins are all\n     that remain of the 1836 mill, which was torn down in 1930--\n     but to Pepper, they are the substance of things hoped for.\n       Pepper is the executive director of the Blackstone River\n     Valley National Heritage Corridor Commission. He has guided a\n     pair of journalists to this obscure spot to make a point\n     about his job and the work of the commission.\n       ``Mammoth Mill is symbolic of so many places in this valley\n     that are unknown and unseen. Our job is to make them known,''\n     he says. Although Pepper has no plans for the site yet, his\n     imagination already is leaping ahead to a day when the plot,\n     tidied up and properly ``interpreted'' through signs and\n     diagrams, may inform tourists about America's early\n     industrialization.\n       The Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor is\n     one of five regions that have been designated ``American\n     Heritage Areas'' by Congress. Besides the Blackstone River\n     Valley in Rhode Island and Massachusetts, there are the\n     Illinois and Michigan Canal National Heritage Corridor in\n     Illinois, the Delaware and Lehigh Canal National Heritage\n     Corridor in eastern Pennsylvania, the America's Industrial\n     Heritage Project in southwestern Pennsylvania, and the\n     Quinebaug and Shetucket Rivers Valley National Heritage\n     Corridor in Connecticut, which Congress approved just this\n     fall.\n       If a bill in Congress that passed the House of\n     Representatives is reintroduced and enacted by the 104th\n     Congress, 10 more zones from Georgia to Washington State will\n     be designated national-heritage areas and become eligible for\n     federal matching funds. The legislation would establish a\n     mechanism whereby additional regions could obtain heritage\n     recognition by Congress in the future.\n       As important as they are, however, federally sanctioned\n     heritage areas are just the crown jewels of a burgeoning\n     movement to revitalize distinctive but underrecognized parts\n     of the American landscape. Scores of places in nearly every\n     state have acquired or are seeking a degree of official or\n     unofficial classification as heritage sites.\n       It is primarily a grass-roots movement, explains Shelley\n     Mastran, a program director at the National Trust for\n     Historic Preservation in Washington and the executive\n     director of the recently formed National Coalition for\n     Heritage Areas (NCHA). Referring to a long list of putative\n     heritage areas compiled by the National Trust, Ms. Mastran\n     says, ``These are initiatives that are or have the potential\n     to become heritage areas. Some of them are just self-\n     anointed.''\n       But many other heritage areas have progressed beyond the\n     gleam-in-the-eye stage, Mastran says. Their proponents are\n     working with state governments and the National Park Service\n     to create programs through which a heightened ``sense of\n     place'' can help achieve environmental, economic-development,\n     and historic-preservation goals.\n       Massachusetts, New York, and Pennsylvania have their own\n     programs for recognizing heritage areas, though sometimes by\n     other names. New York, for instance, has established the\n     Hudson River Valley Greenway Council, a regional-planning\n     compact among 240 cities and towns in 10 counties from Albany\n     to New York City. Despite its name, the members of the\n     compact are cooperating on a much broader array of\n     initiatives than are implied by the term green way, says\n     David Sampson, director of the Hudson River Valley Greenway\n     Council.\n       Asked if he thinks that interest in heritage areas and\n     other forms of regional planning is growing, Mr. Sampson says\n     he responds to speaking invitations all around the country,\n     and he has traveled to the Czech Republic twice to consult on\n     green ways.\n       What, exactly, is a heritage area? ``This question has as\n     many definitions as there are heritage areas,'' the NCHA\n     observed last January in the first edition of its quarterly\n     newsletter, Heritage Links, because ``no two heritage areas\n     are exactly the same. * * *'' But the organization says the\n     ``basic components'' of heritage areas include:\n       A sense of place and identity.\n       Regional scope and management.\n       Large-scale natural or manmade resources that unify the\n     region.\n       A variety of land uses.\n       Predominantly private ownership of land and resources.\n       Local, regional, state, or national significance.\n       A common goal or ``big idea.''\n       One could almost say (although it would make many\n     proponents of the concept wince) that heritage areas are\n     theme parks--except that the theme in each area is not\n     imposed by a Disneyesque developer, but rather grows out of\n     the unique geography, history, and living culture of the\n     region.\n       In contrast to national or state parks, heritage areas--\n     where most property remains in private hands--are an approach\n     to resource conservation and management that emphasizes\n     partnerships among all levels of government,\n     environmentalists, business people, and citizen groups.\n       Pepper says that, in the Blackstone River Valley, he has\n     seen the regional cooperation that is fostered by the\n     national-heritage concept start to bridge divides between\n     environmentalists, historic preservationists, and community\n     planners on one side and business people and property owners\n     on the other side.\n       ``If you push the time horizon out a distance, most people\n     all want basically the same things--livable communities, good\n     places for their kids to grow up, places with a mixture of\n     jobs and green spaces and recreation facilities,'' Pepper\n     says. ``Once you have identified common goals, then it\n     becomes a question of, `How do we achieve it?' That's when\n     meaningful planning really begins.''\n       According to Pepper, planning for community development and\n     resource management is often misunderstood. ``Too many towns\n     just have a permitting process, not a true planning\n     process,'' he says. ``When communities and regions develop\n     real, long-term plans, there are fewer fights over specific\n     permitting issues. And people feel empowered when they have\n     effective planning tools in their hands.''\n       Pepper was hired by the Blackstone River Valley National\n     Heritage Corridor Commission in 1989. A career employee of\n     the National Park Service who previously worked in Alaska, he\n     cheerfully calls himself a ``pro-government liberal'' and\n     says he came to the job with a wilderness lover's distrust of\n     business people.\n       But Pepper says he has learned a lot about planning from\n     corporate executives. ``Business types often are more skilled\n     than bureaucrats and yuppie environmentalists at establishing\n     long-range goals and setting up implementation schedules,''\n     he admits.\n       As Pepper wheels a van along the highways and byways of the\n     Blackstone River Valley, the words rush out as quickly as\n     parts of the waterway that once was called the ``hardest\n     working river in America.'' In nearly every town and village\n     he passes through, indeed, around almost every bend of the\n     road, Pepper points to a historic site, a distinctive piece\n     of architecture or Americana, a scenic vista or significant\n     landmark, a restoration project, new heritage-area signage,\n     or--and there are still many of these--evidences of neglect,\n     disrepair, and pollution.\n       ``The Blackstone River Valley, like many regions that are\n     candidates for recognition as heritage areas, had been\n     largely forgotten, Pepper says. ``There are many places in\n     America that have become anonymous, that we don't see, and\n     that have lost a lot of their own self-consciousness as an\n     identifiable place with a history and heritage that are worth\n     preserving.''\n       The Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor\n     extends 46 miles from the outskirts of Worcester, Mass.,\n     south to Providence, R.I., where the Blackstone River empties\n     into Narragansett Bay. The 250,000-acre zone encompasses some\n     40 cities, towns, and villages, together with forest and\n     farmland.\n       While the corridor includes wilderness areas like the\n     rugged Purgatory Chasm State Park, its distinctiveness as a\n     heritage area stems from what Pepper calls the ``cultural\n     landscape'' more than from its natural features.\n       A National Park Service publication calls the Blackstone\n     River Valley the ``birthplace of the American Industrial\n     Revolution.'' In 1790 Samuel Slater, an English mill boss,\n     engineered America's first successful watered-powered cotton-\n     spinning mill on the river at Pawtucket, R.I. Over the\n     following decades, manufacturing spread along the swift\n     stream and its tributaries, dotting their banks with textile\n     mills and other factories, each surrounded by clusters of\n     worker housing. These company-owned mill towns are the\n     valley's most distinguishing feature.\n       Based on a National Park Service inventory of the region's\n     natural and historical assets, Congress voted to help\n     preserve the Blackstone River Valley's cultural landscape in\n     1986. It established the boundaries of the national-heritage\n     corridor, created the commission to be a funding and planning\n     catalyst (but without zoning, eminent domain, or other powers\n     to regulate land use), and provided $250,000 a year--raised\n     to $350,000 in 1991--for the commission's operations and as\n     matching funds for a variety of conservation, historic-\n     preservation, and economic-development uses. Congress also\n     has given the commission about $4.2 million over the years\n     for bricks-and-mortar projects.\n       The annual authorization pays for, among other things,\n     Pepper's five-person staff, which includes a National Park\n     Service ranger and community planner. The staff works out of\n     a refurbished former depot of the Providence & Worcester\n     Railroad in Woonsocket that was donated by the state of Rhode\n     Island.\n       But the real development money for heritage-area projects\n     comes from state, local, and private sources. Pepper\n     estimates that he has leveraged federal dollars with other\n     funds on a scale of 15 to 1.\n       While the commission provides funds for historic\n     preservation, Pepper emphasizes that is not interested simply\n     in saving isolated structures or ``little vest-pocket\n     displays of historic sites.'' For instance, he says, when the\n     town of Blackstone asked the commission for funds to restore\n     an old church that had been condemned, the commission refused\n     to help unless the town developed a more comprehensive\n     heritage-protection plan, as it subsequently did.\n       As another example of how the commission tries to spread\n     ripples, Pepper takes his visitors to small, attractive\n     riverside park where a mill once stood in Valley Falls, R.I.\n     Pointing to signs of refurbishment around the park, Pepper\n     says residents in the run-down neighborhood have become\n     convinced that their community has value.\n       ``We're constantly on the lookout for these little `gene\n     pools' of potential revitalization, where we can make a\n     difference,'' he says.\n       Pepper says he is heartened by the extent to which many\n     local companies have caught the spirit of the corridor's\n     purpose. For instance, he says, in Slatersville, R.I.\n     (founded by Samuel Slate's brother, John), Polytop\n     Corporation, a maker of container lids and other plastic\n     products, has spent more than $1 million to purchase and\n     rehabilitate a vacated mill and surrounding worker\n     housing. The company is collecting the stories of former\n     factory workers in an oral-history project.\n       Despite such evidence of success, national-heritage areas\n     have encountered opposition from two directions: some\n     factions within the National Park Service, and the property-\n     rights or so-called ``wise use'' movement.\n       Skeptics in the park service voice doubts about heritage\n     areas primarily because they fear that money for such areas\n     will detract from funding for national parks. Moreover,\n     Pepper says, many of his colleagues in the park service have\n     what he suggests is a hidebound approach to safeguarding\n     precious national assets.\n       ``They believe that to protect a resource, the government\n     has to own it,'' Pepper says. ``For them, Yellowstone is the\n     model: You put land behind red-velvet ropes and keep people\n     away except under tightly controlled conditions.''\n       Pepper and other heritage-area supporters like A. Elizabeth\n     Watson, a conservationist and the chair of the NCHA, believe\n     that critics within the National Park Service are\n     shortsighted and are missing an important wave in the future\n     of conservation and environmentalism.\n       ``Americans need more places to go to experience their\n     heritage,'' Ms. Watson says. ``We need to build partnerships\n     to preserve the American landscape, not just lock up land in\n     national parks.''\n       Both Pepper and Watson see signs that some critics in the\n     park service are softening their attitudes toward heritage\n     areas.\n       Resistance to heritage areas from the property-rights\n     movement is predictable, since some ``wise use'' activists\n     oppose government involvement in decisions affecting private\n     property.\n       Heritage-area advocates like Mastran and Watson of the\n     National Coalition for Heritage Areas wonder if property-\n     rights groups understand heritage areas and know that\n     management authorities in the areas lack coercive powers over\n     land use. ``I don't think they have a clue,'' Mastran says.\n     ``They just used the bill as another vehicle for raising\n     their favorite issues.''\n       Sampson of the Hudson river Valley Greenway Council also is\n     puzzled by right-wing opposition to heritage areas. ``They\n     seem like a very Republican idea: Using private planning and\n     investment to improve the quality of life and to revitalize\n     communitys,'' Sampson says. ``It's a market economy that\n     makes heritage areas and green ways work.''\n\n                          ____________________"]], "columns": ["granule_id", "date", "congress", "session", "volume", "issue", "title", "chamber", "granule_class", "sub_granule_class", "page_start", "page_end", "speakers", "bills", "citation", "full_text"], "primary_keys": ["granule_id"], "primary_key_values": ["CREC-1994-12-20-pt1-PgS15"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 7.5084371492266655, "source": "Federal Register API & Regulations.gov API", "source_url": "https://www.federalregister.gov/developers/api/v1", "license": "Public Domain (U.S. Government data)", "license_url": "https://www.regulations.gov/faq"}