On a cold and gloomy afternoon last late November—before the sun had set and the first ice storm hit — I took one last swig from my cold coffee and got right down to work. Pulling on garden gloves, I attacked my potted geraniums. With the gardener’s adage in mind, “prune to bloom!”, I gently pulled each magnificent plant from its friable soil and began denuding both stems and roots. I shook loose any earth still clinging to the hoary roots. With spring-action snips I lopped away each plant’s leaves and flowers until only crooked elbows and long limbs remained. Poor geranium, moments ago aglow with scarlet and green, now a balding, spindly, crook-armed skeleton of a plant. And so many colliding limbs to be restructured to promote healthy growth in the spring! Finally, then, came the ultimate disgrace: confinement for each plant in a large paper bag in the cold dark basement of my home. Four months, November until March, the plants lay in total cold and darkness with only the occasional visit by me to squirt some water on each set of roots. 

Ten days ago I went down to the basement and opened up the paper bags. The remnants of my geraniums looked more miserable and mummified than ever. But the gardener knows what to do. I got out my red clay pots and stuck each mummy into fresh new soil. Today, ten days later, each plant has struck strong leaves and is spiraling upward in fans of green toward warmth and light and bloom. 

The gardener is attentive and learns many things. My simple geraniums teach me that all growing things must be lopped and chopped and controlled. Otherwise growth becomes destructive. 

You may have noticed. A lot of pruning is going on in Smallwood right now. Over on Pine Grove Road, our hamlet’s leafy “Fifth Avenue,” Town of Bethel work crews are clearing many large trees to the side of and overhanging the road. I called up Robert Bonnaci, Town Highway Superintendent. 

Robby informs: the work along Pine Grove is the first step in a 200K project to completely rejuvenate the hamlet’s main artery. The road itself will be re-surfaced and repaved (yay and away with all the irksome potholes!). Trees which in our stormy climate pelt large branches down onto the road and passing vehicles are being removed. New ditches will be dug and, where necessary, drainage pipes replaced to reduce icing or flooding on the road. Robby and his 14-member crew hope to complete the work by May, when vehicular traffic will increase substantially along the road.

Snip snip snip: chop chop chop. Exactly one year ago several local groups concerned about overly-rapid and uncoordinated large-scale development in Sullivan County and Bethel Township decided to band together. Why talk only about large-scale development in Liberty when such rapid development will also inevitably affect neighboring Thompson and Bethel? The disparate groups of concerned citizens combined forces to create a clearinghouse for neighborly discussion and citizen action. Calling themselves the “Bethel Roundtable,” the new group has been active for the past year to ensure that health, safety and quality of life remain the Township’s primary focus as developers crowd in and run over our precious County countryside. 

Two weeks ago, on March 12, the Bethel Roundtable showed up unannounced at the bi-weekly Bethel Town Board Meeting to present to the Board a petition showing the signatures of 515 Bethel residents. 515 is an astounding number, given the fact that the petition was hastily assembled and put out to the voting public by simple word of mouth. (It is worth noting that 515 signatures represent about 34 percent of the 1740 votes cast in Bethel Townships’s 2024 Presidential election.) The petition calls for a moratorium on high-density, high-impact, multi-family development and large-scale commercial development in our town. Several such large-scale projects in White Lake and Smallwood are now under consideration by the Town and Bethel Planning Boards. The citizens’ petition calls for the Town to implement a moratorium on large-scale developments until its (10 year long-overdue) Comprehensive Plan is complete and until such time as the Town and Planning Boards have digested the Plan’s conclusions and incorporated the Comp Plan’s goals into an updated zoning plan. 

It is quite certain that the 515 signatures on this petition represent a far larger group of Townspeople who are currently very concerned that uncoordinated and unregulated growth for growth’s sake will be injurious to current Bethel and Sullivan County residents. People already living and voting here want growth consistent with their lifestyles. Developers should not be allowed to undermine a Comprehensive Plan (so long overdue) that has yet to be so much as written down for future guidance. Through its attorney, the Bethel Roundtable submitted to the Town Board on March 12 a proposed Local Law which the Roundtable would like the Town and its attorney to immediately review and comment on during its next April meeting. This Local Law would establish a moratorium on such large-scale developments while explicitly exempting restrictions on home renovation work, small businesses, single family home building or minor subdivisions. 

Towns, it turns out, are like geraniums or trees growing gadfly over a roadside ditch. Left to themselves, towns, trees, and geraniums can grow in abstruse, illogical and ultimately self-destructive ways. Someone, like a gardener, a Town Board or a Planning Board, has to come in and judiciously use gleaming snips to cut away excessives and so avoid the worst. Each agent, in their own way, promotes healthy growth and strong bloom. Here’s to us, the collective citizenry of Bethel Township, let’s keep our eyes focused on these paramount concerns as Bethel begins to struggle through a challenging tourism season of 2025/26. Here’s to promoting the reality of responsible growth and extraordinary bloom for a long, long time. Meantime, Folks, see you all Saturday, March 29 at the Kauneonga Makers and Farmers Market at Duggan School, 11 a.m. – 2 p.m.!!