Forty years ago, folk singer Pete Seeger founded an environmental organization to watch over one of the world”™s best-known rivers, the Hudson. Sloop Clearwater was built as a floating reminder for people to work to keep “The River that Flows Both Ways” a gem for generations of explorers to come.
To that end, Sloop Clearwater has created its “Next Generation Legacy Project,” designed to introduce the adults of the future to a world the organization hopes will be embraced with fervor: a cleaner world with green jobs.
Educational programs designed with sustainable technology in mind for the next generation is imperative, says Clearwater”™s iconic founder. “The time is now or we will not, I fear, have a future for the human race,” said Seeger.Â
The Clearwater Center for Environmental leadership will open in May at the former University Settlement Camp in Beacon. In June, Camp Clearwater will open its doors and host more than 100 middle and high school students in two three-week sessions, as well as provide 20 “classroom of the waves” sail programs for 1,000 low-income school children. The organization will create a “Clearwater moment” radio spot in conjunction with WAMC”™s public radio program as part of the education experience that will help make the center a living, learning laboratory.
The Clearwater Center will keep engaging young adults with the wonders of the environment through its multiday programs and encourage young people to become environmentally responsible citizens. Open to the public, the “Next Generation” project will partner with local environmental groups in eight targeted communities: Harlem, Yonkers, Peekskill, Newburgh, Beacon, Poughkeepsie, Kingston and Albany.
The organization also hopes to create a fully operational, zero-carbon working waterfront facility, in either Beacon or Saugerties, offering space for a harbor master, boat maintenance crew facilities and a permanent home for Sloop Clearwater, where major repairs and restoration can be undertaken and it can be berthed each winter.Â
Funding for the project will come from a mix of public and private grants, corporate contributions, individual donors and special events. The first phase is expected to cost approximately $600,000, and the group is already two-thirds of the way toward that goal. When completed, the “Next Generation” investment will amount to nearly $20 million.Â
The Clearwater is not expecting this to happen overnight. After all, it has been 40 years since Seeger”™s dream of building an authentic sailing vessel to teach people about the wonders of the Hudson was hatched. Patience, as nearly 90-year-old Seeger reminds us, is a virtue. Clearwater”™s annual fundraiser in Beacon on March 28, “Spring Splash,” hopes to add to the nonprofit”™s coffers.Â
For more information, visit www.clearwater.org