News

July 2023

Save The Bay awards the 2023 Environmental Achievement Award to
The Committee for the Great Salt Pond

Below, please read the presentation given by Topher Hamblett, interim Director of Save The Bay.

In the mid-1980s, the Great Salt Pond – a spectacular place in the heart of Block Island – was threatened with sewage pollution and overdevelopment. It was on the brink.

Fortunately, a group of concerned Block Islanders took action by forming the Committee for the Great Salt Pond, with a mission to “protect and enhance the environmental quality of the Pond and its watershed, including its shoreline and wetlands, and to promote appropriate and productive uses of the Pond’s resources by residents, visitors and local businesses.”

For 26 years the Committee has been THE voice for the Great Salt Pond, pulling the Pond back from the brink and leading the way to its cleanup, restoration and ongoing protection. 

They have monitored its waters and successfully advocated for marine pump out facilities and better septic systems to improve water quality.

They have championed protection and restoration of fragile coastal buffers and dunes systems, and inspired community stewardship through its awareness and education programs. 

Last, but not least, the Committee – along with the Block Island Conservancy, the Block Island Land Trust and the Town of New Shoreham – waged the ultimate defense of the Great Salt Pond by winning, a nearly 20-year battle against the proposed expansion of Champlain’s Marina.  

They overcame years of procedural hurdles at CRMC, and then, the infamous “back-room deal” among CRMC Council members and the marina that was, ultimately, struck down by the RI Supreme Court.

It's no surprise, then, that the CGSP is, today, among the strongest voices for reforming the Coastal Resources Management Council. 

To celebrate its two and half decades of accomplishments and persistent advocacy, Save The Bay is pleased to present its 2023 Environmental Achievement Award to the Committee for the Great Salt Pond.

April 2023

Champlin’s – Final Supreme Court Decision

October 14, 2022

The Rhode Supreme Court finally publishes its opinion affirming, in its entirety, the 2020 “Decision” of the Superior Court denying the Champlin’s application to expand its marina.

Chief Justice Suttell, writing for a unanimous Supreme Court (one justice did not participate), in 54 pages of fact finding and conclusions of law, sets forth the Supreme Court’s finding that the CRMC and Champlin’s did not have legal authority to “mediate” and that Champlin’s would not be allowed to expand its marina further into the Great Salt Pond.

The Committee for the Great Salt Pond is very pleased to learn that the RI Supreme Court has ruled in favor of The Committee, the Town, the Block Island Land Trust, and the other environmental groups opposed to the proposed marina expansion. This finally puts an end to any consideration of Champlin’s 2003 application to CRMC to nearly double the size of the marina which would (with a 240’ expansion of the main dock) blow right into the Town’s Mooring Field “D”, not only eliminating the existing navigation fairway but would also displace 20-40 Town moorings.  This decision also affirms that the decisions of the state regulatory agencies, charged with protecting the state’s fragile marine environment, cannot be easily overturned with appeals to a court system which may be friendly to developers.

The Committee for the Great Salt Pond was initially confident that the decision issued by Superior Court Judge Rodgers in June of 2020 would be upheld because her decision set forth over one hundred points of law and fact upholding the 2010 CRMC decision denying Champlin’s original application. All this changed in January 2020, when the CRMC announced that they had met the previous month with Champlin’s in secret “mediation” and given Champlin’s an assent to build a slightly smaller dock expansion, without any participation or agreement of the long-time opponents of the marina expansion proposal. Champlin’s and the CRMC filed a joint motion asking the Rhode Island Supreme Court to accept the “mediated” result, an “end run” around Judge Rodgers’ June, 2020 ruling.

And so, the Committee, the Town, and the other project opponents went to work… The Committee raised extra funds, hired lobbyists, mobilized other state environmental groups, and started influencing public opinion by soliciting well written letters to place in the “Block Island Times”, the “Providence Journal”, and other influential publications including “Rhode Island Lawyers Weekly”. Our appeal to the RI Attorney General, to join the case, on our side, was successful and his briefs to the court on behalf of the “People of the State of Rhode Island” added weight to our position, that the CRMC, in granting an assent, was acting in a lawless manner.

In retrospect, it was a number of well researched and well written articles by Jim Hummel of “The Hummel Report” which were published in the “Providence Sunday Journal” which put the CRMC’s backroom dealing on the front page of almost everyone’s breakfast table reading, which certainly exposed a process which was shocking in its disregard for the state’s established environmental regulatory process.

Thanks go to the Town, The Land Trust, the Block Island Conservancy, and our sister conservation groups, and to everyone who helped raise funds and write letters to bolster our cause, and especially to Dan Prentiss, our attorney who expertly handled this process from the very beginning. The arc of environmental justice may be long, but this ruling helps demonstrate that eventually, it will bend to ultimately protect the environment.

Champlin's Chronology

2003 Champlin’s Marina on Block Island files an application with the Rhode Island Coastal Resources Management Council (“CRMC”) to effectively double the size of its marina. The Town of New Shoreham, as well as a group of Block Island and Rhode Island conservation groups (CGSP, BI Land Trust (“BILT”), BI Conservancy, and the Conservation Law Foundation (“CLF”)), who came to be known as the “Intervenors,” file objections to Champlin’s application. Even though objections are filed, the CRMC sets the application for decision by the entire CRMC in December, 2003, rather than sending it to subcommittee for hearings as required by the regulations. But for the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management’s (known as DEM) last-minute decision to send a representative of the DEM Director to the hearing (who provided the crucial fourth vote in favor of sending the application to subcommittee for hearings), the application would have been immediately approved! (The CRMC is required to include a person from the Town of New Shoreham on the Champlin’s subcommittee. Interestingly, the CRMC rejected the Town’s designated representative, and named Exeter developer Jerry Zarrella instead, because he owns a summer cottage on the Island.)

2003-2006 A CRMC subcommittee conducts a total of twenty-three (23) hearings over an approximately two-year period. Although the CRMC subcommittee recommends substantial approval of Champlin’s application, the full CRMC votes to deny Champlin’s application. Champlin’s appeals this CRMC decision to the Rhode Island Superior Court sitting in Providence. The Superior Court found that Champlin’s rights had been negatively affected by certain procedural irregularities within the CRMC but, instead of remanding the case to CRMC to correct the irregularities, the Superior Court reversed the full Council’s decision and upheld the CRMC subcommittee’s recommendation for a modified expansion. This superior court decision is then appealed by CGSP, CLF, BILT, BI Conservancy, and the Town to the Rhode Island Supreme Court.

2010 The Rhode Island Supreme Court reverses the Superior Court decision to grant the application, and remands the case back to the RI Superior Court with directions that the case be returned to the CRMC for further hearings to consider a CRMC staff recommendation (the so-called “Goulet Plan”) that had not been provided to all CRMC members and that had been the subject of some of the earlier procedural irregularities.

2011 The CRMC again votes to deny Champlin’s 2003 application and on May 6, 2011 issues a written decision to this effect. Champlin’s appeals this decision to the RI Superior Court in Washington/South County.

2012 The Rhode Island Superior Court again remands the case back to the CRMC for additional evidence regarding the CRMC’s recent approval of a smaller expansion of Payne’s Dock on the Block Island Great Salt Pond.

2013 The CRMC again denies the Champlin’s application and states specifically that there was a “rational basis” for the CRMC’s approval of the relatively modest Payne’s Dock expansion.

Feb 2020 The case effectively sits idle with the Rhode Island Superior Court in Wakefield for approximately seven (7) years. Finally, on February 11, 2020, the Rhode Island Superior Court, in a decision that literally becomes known as “the Decision,” affirms both the 2011 as well as the 2013 decisions of the CRMC to deny the Champlin’s application.

Oct 2020 The Rhode Island Supreme Court grants Champlin’s petition for review of the Decision, and this is the appeal that is currently pending with the Rhode Island Supreme Court.

Dec 2020 Without notice to CGSP, the Land Trust, the BI Conservancy, or CLF, Champlin’s and CRMC engage in a closed-door, behind-the-scenes “mediation” during December, 2020. On December 7, Champlin’s and the CRMC announce that they have entered into a “settlement” whereby Champlin’s would be allowed a 156-foot seaward expansion of piers, a 65-foot westward extension of its fuel dock, and a 20-foot eastward extension of its fuel dock. On Dec 23, 2020, Champlin’s Marina is sold to new, Cranston-based owners for more than $14,000,000. Neither the Town, CGSP, the Land Trust, the BI Conservancy, nor CLF have prior knowledge of or participate in the “settlement.”

Jan 2021 The validity of the behind-closed-doors “settlement” is disputed by the Intervenors to the Rhode Island Supreme Court. The Office of the Rhode Island Attorney General also joins the case as an intervenor, opposing the validity of the “settlement.” 

Mar 2021 The RI Supreme Court denies Champlin’s application and motion to approve the “settlement” and remands the case back to Superior Court for proceedings on the validity of the “settlement.” During the summer of 2021, such proceedings are conducted in the Washington County Superior Court in Wakefield.

Sept 2021 The Washington County Superior Court inexplicably approves the “settlement.”

Oct 2021 The Rhode Island Supreme Court denies Champlin’s motion to withdraw its October, 2020 appeal of the “Decision” of the RI Superior Court, which affirmed both the 2011 as well as the 2013 decision of the CRMC to deny Champlin’s original application for expansion of its marina. The RI Supreme Court sets a briefing schedule for Champlin’s appeal of the February, 2020 “Decision.” The Supreme Court also enters into the record the Superior Court’s finding of the validity of the “settlement” between Champlin’s and CRMC, although it is unclear what effect if any this will have on the Supreme Court’s opinion of the correctness of the 2020 “Decision” denying Champlin’s application for expansion.

Apr 2022 Oral arguments take place before the Rhode Island Supreme Court. A final decision was expected in June or July, 2022, but another Block Island summer comes and goes without a word from the RI Supreme Court.

Friday Oct 14, 2022.  The Rhode Supreme Court finally publishes its opinion affirming, in its entirety, the 2020 “Decision” of the Superior Court denying the Champlin’s application to expand its marina.  Chief Justice Suttell, writing for a unanimous Supreme Court (one justice did not participate), in 54 pages of fact finding and conclusions of law, sets forth the Supreme Court’s finding that the CRMC and Champlin’s did not have legal authority to “mediate” and that Champlin’s would not be allowed to expand its marina further into the Great Salt Pond.