Warwick Conservancy will hold water forum on Oct. 11

Warwick - The Warwick Conservancy Inc., Orange County’s only local non-profit land trust and non-governmental conservator of natural resources, will hold a forum on Warwick’s water resources on Wednesday, Oct. 11, from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. at the Florida Senior Citizen Center. The program will cover the sourcing, management and protection of the quality and quantity of drinking water currently available and projections for the future. All are welcome to attend free of charge, although donations are welcome. The forum will be moderated by historian Dr. Richard Hull. Speakers will include Jay Beaumont, former Executive director of the Orange County Water Authority, and Eric Hince, chief technology officer and president of Geovation Consultants, Inc., which offers groundwater conservation and bioremediation services and technologies to private industry and government agencies. Both are board members of the Groundwater Foundation, a national non-profit dedicated to educating the public about protecting and conserving groundwater resources. Beaumont was responsible for the County’s groundwater and wellhead protection studies and established the County’s Geographic Information System (GIS), which maps the water resources and other information and is now available on the Internet (go to www.ocwagis.org). Joining the forum team is Warwick resident Dr. Bill Olsen, who has served on the Warwick Village Board and is now an assistant professor of Biology at Ramapo College, after serving for many years in the private sector as head of Biotechnology Research for International Paper. Olsen also is a member of the Greenwood Lake Commission, the bi-state NY-NJ group charged with restoring the water of Greenwood Lake, and executive director of the Greenwood Lake Watershed Management District, an environmental watch-dog organization. “I’ve already been getting calls asking for information about the forum,” Hull is quoted as saying in the Conservancy’s press release. “It’s eminently clear that, if you pardon the pun, the people of Warwick are truly thirsty for this information and discussion.” “Education is the first line of defense against environmental degradation which, with a rapidly increasing population, can be around the corner for us if we don’t fully understand and protect our watersheds, aquifers, water corridors, streams, lakes and ponds,” he added. The water forum is one of a planned series of Warwick Conservancy forums that will explore the importance of open space as a tool for community preservation and the preservation of essential natural resources. For more information about the Conservancy, write to WCI, PO Box 1277, Warwick, NY 10990 or call 845-988-5299.