APRIL 2019 FREE
COMMUNITYNEWS.ORG
Quarry officially on the market
Could DEP proposal forestall pipeline? Water quality safeguard initiative would include Jacobs Creek
By PhiLiP sean cuRRan
By RoB anThes
ranthes@communitynews.org
A March 4 announcement by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection has given local officials and environmentalists more than just a reason to celebrate. The proposal, they say, might also give them another tool to challenge the controversial PennEast natural gas pipeline. The DEP proposal would bestow 749 river miles, including a 16-mile stretch of Jacobs Creek in Hopewell Township, with protections meant to preserve water quality. This status—Category One in DEP lingo—includes preventing development within 300 feet of the stream and limiting what can be discharged into the water. The protected portion of Jacobs Creek would run from the creek’s source in northern Hopewell Township more than 16 river miles southwest until its confluence with Woolsey Brook, on Jacobs Creek Road close to the township municipal building. The Category 1 designation also applies to all of the creek’s tributaries in that See CREEK, Page 7
Beechtree Farm on Crusher Road in Hopewell, in a recent oil painting by Beechtree’s farmer-owner, Lucia Stout.
At home on the farm For some, the pull of agriculture is a force too strong to ignore By maya eashWaRan Stuck above Tessa Lowinske Desmond’s desk in Princeton University is a yellow post-it note with a quote. “Eating is an agricultural act,” it reads. For some, where the food in grocery stores or in restaurants comes from is something of little significance. But for Lowinske Desmond, 38, and
a number of local farmers in Hopewell, New Jersey, what we eat and where we get it from is of great importance. A faculty member of Princeton’s Department of American Studies, Lowinske Desmond has been a long-time academic and agriculturalist. Her love of the land is something that goes back to her roots in rural Minnesota. “All the stories growing up were about farming,” she said. “I did what I could to scratch the itch,” she said. “I just wanted to be farming.” Raised by a single mother,
Lowinske Desmond moved 17 times during her 18 years at home. One memory that stuck with her throughout is one of her grandmother’s root cellar, packed full of canned vegetables and goods from her grandparents’ garden. “I used to go down there and just stare at the cans,” she said. “I have, over time, come to think about why those memories hold such sway for me. And I think it was the idea that there was a thoughtfulness and attention to provision and stability that was embodied in the garSee FARM, Page 8
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The upcoming swimming season at the Quarry Swim Club is due to begin at the end of May, in what is expected to be the last year of ownership by Jim and Nancy Gypton. The 7.5-acre-property located on Crusher Road has been listed for sale, with an asking price of $950,000. For the past few years, the Gyptons have talked publicly of wanting to sell a property they bought in 1988, a decision that Jim Gypton elaborated on in an interview on March 8. “It’s been … very interesting, fun, tiring at times. And we’ve enjoyed it,” he said of owning the Quarry. “But I’m 83. How many more summers can I do this?” He said he and his wife want to see more of their grandchildren, with family living in different parts of the country. “And besides, 31 years is probably long enough,” he said. “And the Quarry could use the infusion of younger people and maybe different ideas. You get a little stale. You get fixed in the way you’ve been doing things and you’re maybe unwilling to change or you realize it’s a little bit more work than you’re willing to invest at this stage.” Last fall, the couple started talking to a real estate broker, See QUARRY, Page 14
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