Building a Diverse Support Base for the Adirondacks

            Over 90% of the Adirondack Park’s year-round population is white and an overwhelming majority of the visitors who come to the park each year are white as well. The extremely homogenous Adirondack Park is out of sync with the population trends of the rest of New York State, which is rapidly becoming more diverse. In order to garner enough public support to protect the park and its environment, it is necessary that a large portion of the state has experienced all of the wonderful things it has to offer so they have motivation to advocate for its wellbeing. The park’s current support base is primarily an aging white population, so if the park’s population fails to change along with the rest of the state, its future could be in jeopardy.

            Recently, many community members have spoken up about the lack of diversity in the Adirondack Park and have taken action to make a change. Numerous organizations came together to host a symposium the subject in 2014 entitled “Towards a More Diverse Adirondacks.” The organizers hoped the event would expand the conversation about diversity in the park to new community members who had not been involved in the past. Through a full program of speakers and discussions, as well as a keynote speech by Amy Godine, (a scholar focused on the ethnic and social history of the Adirondack Park who wrote the article we read entitled “Hidden History”) the symposium achieved this goal and served as a kick-off event for the movement.

Moving forward, there are many proposed ideas for gaining support for the Adirondacks from a diverse population. Adirondack Almanack writer Jeff Jones suggests that community members tap into the huge population of diverse incarcerated individuals and their families who come to the park to visit them in prison. While these individuals get to see the park during their trips to the prisons, their experiences are certainly no the same as someone vacationing in the park. If community members are able to provide them with a welcoming and positive experience in the Adirondacks, they could gain a whole new group of supporters and visitors for the park while giving them access to the benefits of spending time in nature.

            The efforts to bring more diversity to the Adirondacks remind me of similar initiatives by small, rural colleges such as Hamilton to increase diversity within their student bodies. While the efforts of the administration are strong and they are definitely making progress, our student body’s population is still not incredibly diverse. I think the efforts in the Adirondacks are incredibly important because you need to start somewhere in order to induce change, but I think it is likely that the Adirondacks will mimic our school’s pattern of slowly adding diversity over a long period of time. Though the progress may be slow and hard to see in the near-term, I think the strong effort displayed by the community is a hopeful sign for the future of the Adirondack Park.

Sources:

http://www.adirondacklifemag.com/blogs/2014/08/07/imagining-diverse-adirondack-park/

http://www.adirondackalmanack.com/2014/08/adirondack-diversity-symposium-slated-for-august-16th.html

http://www.esf.edu/nfi/diversity/symposium.htm
http://www.adirondackalmanack.com/2015/02/recognizing-the-adirondacks-hidden-diversity.html#comments