HomeMy WebLinkAboutLacapra, D; Pedersen, J DEIS.pdf December 10, 2010
Comments on the Cayuga Heights Deer Management Plan (DEIS)
Much of my research and teaching has been devoted to the issue of violent,
traumatic events and experiences, both in my thirteen individually authored
books, my two edited or co-edited volumes, and numerous articles. (References
are available through Google.) I would make specific mention of four books in
this respect: Representing the Holocaust: History, Theory, Trauma (Cornell U.P.,
1994); History and Memory after Auschwitz (Cornell U.P., 1998); Writing History,
Writing Trauma (Johns Hopkins U.P., 2001); and History and Its Limits: Human,
Animal, Violence (Cornell U.P., 2009). These studies have made me particularly
alert to the at times unacknowledged consequences of violent or traumatizing
behavior, both on individuals and on communities.
I am writing today both from the standpoint of my professional expertise on this
subject matter and as a concerned citizen who is opposed
for many reasons to
the mayor and current
the controversial deer killing plan now being proposed
board of trustees of Cayuga Heights to "cull" a large percentage of the deer in the
village and to sterilize a relatively small number of others that would come to
form, for a time, a sort of ambulatory zoo.
In the state-required environmental review process (SEQR) the trustees of the
village were required to consider whether or not their proposed action would
have a significant negative impact on the "aesthetic, agricultural, archaeological,
historic, or other natural or cultural resources; or community or neighborhood
character." They were also required to weigh the significance of negative impacts
on human health, including mental health. In their evaluation of the culling/killing
plan, the trustees do not provide cogent and specific reasons why it is needed,
and they summarily determine that the impact with respect to the factors
enumerated above would not be significant. I could not more strongly disagree.
ORIGINS OF THE DEER KILLING PLAN
The current proposals had their origins in the frustration of a number of
gardeners (and others concerned with protecting their landscaping)
opinion,b aan in
the late '90s. In 2002-2003, after years of study and gauging p
deer sterilization program was implemented, with some signs of success, but was
replaced by a contraceptive vaccine that failed, and was later found to be
defective. The Cornell researcher carrying out the program thereafter terminated
it. By 2007, proposals were put forth to loosen the tight restrictions on fencing
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height and placement that were put in place decades ago to maintain open,
"park-like" character of the Village, a characteristic that largely slipped away over
the years through the effects of increasing development. In 2008, following the
introduction of proposals to allow more and higher fencing to keep out the deer,
the mayor was challenged in a three-way election in which he was defeated by
only 1 vote.
Within a few months of taking office, the new mayor and several new trustees
announced their intention to implement a plan to kill many of the deer in the
c safety
village, based on claims that the deer posed an imminent threat to publi
and therefore could be killed by village police on the order of the trustees
without public input. When this came to light, and the claims of imminent danger
were challenged as being unsubstantiated, citizens demanded more
transparency, leading to the withdrawal of this pre-emptive killing plan, and the
initiation of a more public process. However, the Deer Remediation Advisory
Committee (DRAC) that was put in charge of this process was the same one that
had conceived of the initial plan behind closed doors and was still admittedly
biased in favor of a kill program. This bias was never corrected by adding
sufficient additional committee members to represent the true diversity of
opinion in the village. As this committee began to hold public meetings, the
dismissive approach taken with respect to proposed information about safe,
practical and cost effective alternatives to a killing program contributed to a
climate of cynicism and acrimony. This ushered in a new era of controversy in a
community previously known for being open and trusting and, with respect to
the Village government, quite apolitical.
Since protecting gardens and landscaping may not seem to rise to the level of
seriousness required for such an extreme course of action as a backyard mass
slaughter program, the largely discredited argument based on the deer posing an
imminent threat to public safety was expanded and reformulated multiple times
as one justification after another was put forth and then disputed from the fall of
2008 to the following spring, during which the DRAC committee held meetings
and public forums. The various justifications, nearly all of which have been called
into question on the basis of the trustees failing to substantiate them with
verifiable Cayuga Heights-specific data or convincing scientific rationales, have
included the idea that the population of our local herd is rising to a level that
threatens the well being of the local ecosystem; that the deer are devastating
biodiversity; that deer-vehicle collisions pose a substantial risk of life-threatening
injury to village drivers; that deer are causing an alarming increase in the rate of
Lyme disease infection; that deer are growing more aggressive and now are
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attacking companion animals and perhaps soon will be attacking humans; that
deer feces are vectors for disease and are causing a significant level of water
pollution.'
Often absent from the presentation of these dramatic justifications for a mass
killing program is the far more prosaic one those familiar with the community
believe has provided the principal motivation for the trustees who advocate most
strongly for mass killing of deer: that deer need to be killed because they are
eating flowers, shrubs and garden vegetables. This idea is most often
accompanied by a significant subtext: the kinds of fences that successfully
address these problems in other municipalities are simply unacceptable in
Cayuga Heights.
IMPACT ON COMMUNITY AND NEIGHBORHOOD CHARACTER
A blatant effect of the killing plan has to be taken with the utmost seriousness: it
adversely changes the character of the community in undeniably significant ways.
It is already provoking tension among neighbors and pitting them against one
another in a fashion that is far from neighborly. This tension and even animosity
can only grow if the plan is implemented. We have here a major cost in the social
environment and well-being of the community. Neighbors who formerly made a
point of greeting one another or even stopping for a chat
may
l live now not only a even
notice one another or pass by with a perfunctory greeting.
few
houses from the mayor, Kate Supron, and she herself remarked to me that our
encounters, when they occur, do not have the quality of cordiality or
neighborliness, even when there is no manifest sign of the hostility that one may
nonetheless, at some level and however subconsciously, feel. The basic point is
that a deep-seated controversy poisons the atmosphere of a community and
permeates its daily life. When something like this occurs, the only option is to
table the issue that is causing the divisiveness and animosity, and in the case of
"culling" there is no pressing community need that warrants moving forward with
a plan to annually carry out the mass slaughter of deer in our neighborhood
backyards.
There has been no recent poll of residents although the current mayor was
reported in the press as stating that 75% of residents support the culling/killing
plan -- a number which seems to have no basis in recent elections (where her
margin of victory against a last-minute write-in protest candidate was much
slimmer) or in any other indicators so far as I have been able to determine.
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There has also been no estimation of the actual number of deer in the village
based on a scientifically credible field study since 2006. And to my knowledge,
s never been a similarly credible study carried out to assess the impact of
there has se inconvenient t a been
in the village. The notwithstanding,
deer on never
n and the scope of their
references to the purported scale of the deer populatio
give the mistaken impression that Cayuga
impact on the environment at times
Heights resembles stereotypes of the streets of old Calcutta. The various
impressionistic if not biased statements about the condition in Cayuga Heights,
which seem to be accepted as fact by the mayor and at least some of the current
board, but which seem fantastical to many of us, do not provide a solid basis on
which to establish a lethal program. This is one more instance of a deleterious
change in the structure and practice of governance which is undermining trust in
the community. Our longstanding tradition of rational discussion and fact-based
public policy is eroding before our eyes.
Costs— opposed and
The fact that there are a number of people who e stropgly demonstrated by the
extremely upset by the proposed killing program i Ian,
comments in public meetings and the media. For many critics of the killing p
the primary issues concern values and the effects of the plan on the village of
Cayuga Heights as well as on Ithaca as a whole. But another negative impact
both in itself and in its implications for alternative uses of funds is the very high
cost of the plan — upwards of a million dollars in a rough estimate that can only
err in the direction of being too low, perhaps much too low. At a time when
taxes are increasing at all levels of local government and important programs
which support the families and children of the region are being cut, this use of tax
dollars seems not only nonsensical but offensively out of touch with the current
economic realities. Many in the community believe these funds could well be put
to other uses, and the village government could return to concentrating on issues
that are not so inherently divisive and more supportive of the community as a
whole.
Not all residents of Cayuga Heights are well off economically, and the overly
conservative estimate of a 5% increase in taxes would cause hardship to some
residents who may be struggling to pay their bills. Some who can afford the
increase might leave because of the nature of the
plan
betterment itself. somof the critics of the
plan who have devoted much time and energy
to thecommunity (for example, Karen Kaufmann and Sandip Tiwari) have indicated in
public an intention to move out of the village if the plan is implemented. Others
of us, for the first time, find ourselves uncomfortable and ashamed to be in a
community that we have, until now, considered one of the most idyllic,
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beautifully natural, open and relaxed that we have known. It should be obvious
that a plan that may drive away some of the most civic-minded and hard-working
members of a community clearly does significant damage to that community and
undermines the character for which it has been noted.
As many commentators have observed, the program is short-sighted since it
applies to a community that has no way of preventing deer from other areas
entering it to replace the deer that are to be killed. Cayuga Heights is not a
bounded ecosystem like the Galapagos Islands. It is surrounded by municipalities
and open land that have significant (larger) deer populations. Even some
advocates of the kill program admit that any annual killing operation will have at
best short-term effects and would have to be repeated endlessly into an
indefinite future, with mounting costs as well as mounting acrimony. Indeed,
residents from communities in other states who have tried such solutions have
written to the local paper to testify that this has been the experience in their
communities.
These points indicate the inflexible, perhaps dogmatic nature of a commitment to
a project that seems destined to fail, to divide the community, and to cost much
money in the process.
impact of Introducing Systematic Culling/Killing— apparently in
statement made by a woman resident at a public meeting, app y
defense of the killing of deer, remains in my mind, for it actually served to
demonstrate the danger and misguided nature of such action. She said, in
response to her child's question about how one could possibly bring oneself to
kill animals like deer, that she answered: one can kill and cry at the same time.
What she apparently did not realize is that the crying and related responses can
continue much longer than the killing, even when the killing is done at a self-
protective distance by hired hands. Children may well experience very negative
effects with respect to their sense of what a parent or authority figure feels
willing and able to do. We may simply be too self-centered in our dealings with
animals with whom we should see ourselves as sharing a world. But
anthropocentrism itself may prove to be not a hard enough shield to safeguard
oneself and, even more so, one's vulnerable loved ones from the lasting effects
of violent and callous behavior. I think the child asked the right question, but the
parent's response to it did not meet its demands. Indeed, if the "culling"
program is implemented, it is difficult to estimate the impact of dead or dying
deer on vulnerable witnesses, notably children, and it is utterly unrealistic to
think that any such program will not be fallible and allow for injured deer to be
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seen, heard, or even encountered by unwitting passers-by. (Apparently, the plan
is for the killing actions to take place in undisclosed places at unannounced times,
which might also harm unknowing passers-by.) Even frangible bullets would be
dangerous in a highly populated area. And the net-and-bolt option, which is
apparently and rather incredibly being seriously considered, would result in
utterly panicked deer in nets being assaulted with captive-bolt guns that are
difficult enough to manage with accuracy in a slaughterhouse where the animal is
fixed securely in place. (A trustee actually told one of us at the Dec. 6 public
hearing that someone would be on either side holding a deer about to be shot, as
if this procedure could be in the least effective with a large animal that is
panicked and struggling for its life!) One could adduce other reasons why it is
highly contestable and even facile to conclude that there would not be significant
impact on a community or neighborhood from such activities, and the restrictions
and policing that would be necessary to contain risk as well as the likelihood of
protesters are an added cost of the plan that is very difficult to estimate in both
financial and human terms.
A related point is that the introduction and normalization of systematized mass
killing itself is likely to produce a significant and manifestly negative change in the
character of a community. In this case it also raises a question about a
community's structure of governance. It is well known that a portion of the
community find the proposed plan both morally objectionable and extremely
upsetting, even potentially traumatic, but elected officials are choosing to go
forward with little apparent consideration of visible and vocal opposition. This
itself is a very important change in the character of the community in terms of its
culture of governance. Only a few short years ago, the mayor and the trustees
would not implement a plan that had blatantly divisive effects and that
contravened the basic values of a significant portion of the community. To "blow
off" that portion of the residents both marks a failure of practical wisdom and
means that a community threatens no longer to be a community but instead
becomes a house divided against itself in which one group temporarily holding
power rides roughshod over another group in a matter of major significance.
Distrust and Division —
ent suspicion and mistrust, one impact on
Besides the general effect of preval
critics of the plan is disillusionment and the sense that there is no real democratic
exchange, respect for the views of others, and a willingness to compromise on
issues that are for some very basic. The mayor and trustees periodically allow
residents to put forth very short sound bites" of public comment at meetings
and then proceed without willingness
an other effort w s made this fall to bring forward
other solutions. Indeed, when
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a change in the fencing regulations that would address gardeners' concerns, one
of the village trustees opposed it explicitly because he felt that if it passed the
support for the deer-killing proposal would dissolve. Another trustee, who later
obtained a variance for her own non-compliant fence, gave what I found to be
utterly incoherent reasons why a more flexible fencing policy should not be
democratically made available to the entire community.
In the case of certain board members and supporters of the killing plan, a sense
of malaise may be one reason for the euphemisms to which they apparently feel
constrained to resort. Such euphemisms cover reality in a rose-colored veil and
block the recognition of what one is actually doing. Culling is killing. The plan is
not a "remediation" proposal unless one believes there was some golden age to
which the village can now magically return. (What calls for remediation at this
point are damaged relations between neighbors.) Netting and bolting are not
normal livestock slaughter procedures for euthanizing deer"," since animals in
slaughterhouses are not caught in nets, raised up with other animals flailing
wildly about, and shot at with bolts when not securely fixed in place.
"Euthanizing" is entirely inappropriate for the kinds of action envisioned, and
references to a decisive "solution" are both jarring in their historical resonances
and misleading in their contemporary import. The only viable "solution" is to
come up with ideas that do not set neighbors against one another and create an
atmosphere of hostility and mistrust, including mistrust of those one is supposed
to see as one's trustees. History provides many examples, some of them very
recent, of the adverse political and social effects of resorting to misleading
language and even of framing as facts what are mere surmises or even
departures from the truth.
The lack of hard data and clear outcomes in this plan, indeed its seemingly
inevitable failure as well as its exorbitant cost, cannot diminish suspicion or
create good will. This is especially the case when there are obvious, less costly,
and viable alternatives to the plan, one of them being flexibility with respect to
the fencing policy that allows those who want to protect certain plants or areas
to be able to do so. Mayor Supron and some of the trustees have attempted to
denigrate the significance of opposition or protest in the community through a
vague generality about the inevitability of oppositional voices, as if a backyard
mass slaughter program were on the same level as any other "controversial'"
project, for example, painting one's mailbox a bizarre or off-beat color. But as
the effect of the mere proposal of this program on our community has
demonstrated, the life or death of other beings may well touch on basic values
ghbors and the overall character of the
that affect one's relations with nei
community in profoundly significant ways.
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Sincerely,
Dominick LaCapra Co-signed by Jane Pedersen
624 Highland Rd, Cayuga Heights 502 Cayuga Heights Rd, Cayuga Heights
Bowmar Professor and Prof. of History
Cornell University
Cayuga Heights Deer Management Plan DEIS Executive Summary, page 1-2
Cayuga Heights Deer Management Plan DEIS Existing Conditions, page 3- 3A based
As reported in an article in The Ithaca Journal of December 3, 2010, page
predominantly on material provided by Mayor Kate Supron and also stated in the DEIS,
Appendix H
'" Cayuga Heights Deer Management Plan DEIS, Executive Summary: page 1-5
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