Remembering Dick Leavenworth
In early October, our community lost Dick Leavenworth, a beloved friend and lifelong conservationist. Dick will be most remembered for his decades of leadership in the preservation of land and water quality in Northwest Connecticut. He was co-founder and former Chair of the Pomperaug River Watershed Coalition, Vice President of the Northwest Conservation District, Founder and Chair of the Woodbury Conservation Committee, a member of the King’s Mark Resource Conservation and Development Board, and a diligent advocate for the Town of Woodbury’s acquisition of the 240+ acre Trolley Bed Preserve. He was also a dedicated volunteer at Flanders Nature Center, assisting in their acquisition of hundreds of acres of land committed as open space.
In remembrance of his dear friend, Joe Eisenberg, past PRWC Board member, wrote: “Dick led by shining a light on the path forward and creating a vision for others to follow. In doing so he created a great legacy of kindness, knowledge, conservation and compassion – a legacy we can both learn from and enjoy for the future. Dick was truly a man who worked hard to leave the world a better place than he found it and he got results that counted. He left a footprint and a path that will serve us well in his remembrance as we go forward on the trail that he forged.”
At PRWC, we are honored to carry on the legacy Dick helped forged in protecting the precious and irreplaceable water resources in our community. Dick saw that the Pomperaug watershed was beginning to be seriously threatened by land development and by possible diversions of water out of the watershed. With shared concerns about the effects that land development would have on water quality and whether there was enough water available to support future development, Dick teamed up with Larry Pond and the late
Dr. Marc Taylor to create a partnership of diverse stakeholders to protect our local drinking water and the rivers and streams. Together, they formed our coalition and focused on using scientific data to protect our water supplies. Thanks to the outstanding examples of leadership these men provided, the Coalition’s staff and volunteers work daily on water-related scientific research projects, policy-making initiatives, conservation and restoration projects, and community education programs in effort to protect our most vital resource: water.
To learn more about Dick's legacy, visit http://www.pomperaug.org/single-post/2018/10/22/PRWC-Mourns-Loss-of-a-Founder.
