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Urgent! Protect Fire Island and Long Island -- Rebuild our sand dunes!

To: Governor Andrew M. Cuomo, Senator Charles Schumer, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, Congressman Tim Bishop, Congressman Steve Israel, County Exec. Steve Bellone, Islip Supervisor Tom Croci, Suffolk Cty. Legislator Thomas F. Barraga, Superintendent Chris Soller

As residents and supporters of Fire Island, we are asking for your immediate support in rebuilding our dunes that were decimated by Hurricane Sandy. As you well know, the dune line protects both communities on the barrier island as well as life and property on Long Island's South Shore.

Fire...

As residents and supporters of Fire Island, we are asking for your immediate support in rebuilding our dunes that were decimated by Hurricane Sandy. As you well know, the dune line protects both communities on the barrier island as well as life and property on Long Island's South Shore.

Fire Island's Atlantic beach dune system needs to be rebuilt as soon as possible. This is not simply about protecting communities on Fire Island, this is about defending the Shore Shore of Long Island for the future.

This petition closed on December 31, 2012.

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25,000

25,534 people signed the petition

Want to do more? Learn how you can donate to help in the relief efforts at: www.causes.com/fireislandrelief.

In Hurricane Sandy's aftermath, most of Fire Island's dunescape was flattened, leaving Villages once shielded by imposing walls of sand and vegetation naked to the elements.

The dunes on Fire Island are to its residential dwellings what Fire Island is to the South Shore of Long Island —protection from the sea. Our dunes protect structures and lives on Fire Island from violent ocean swells; Fire Island protects homes, lives, and essential infrastructure on Long Island in essentially the same way. There is little doubt that without Fire Island, the densely populated South Shore of Long Island would have been devastated by Sandy.

In the wake of hurricane Sandy, we were promised assistance without "red-tape". Yet, when as simple and vital an activity to our survival as replenishing lost dune is broached, "red-tape" is unfortunately all we see. For example, to prepare for the November 7 nor'easter it was recommended that we "backscrape" our dune line: a slow and ineffective process of moving sand displaced by the hurricane in the residential district back onto the dune. The more conventional, and far more effective, method of scraping sand directly from the beach onto the dune was prohibited.

But, in today's reality both traditional beach scraping and backscraping are woefully inadequate, as we need much more sand than either method could possibly yield. There is more than enough sand to go around, but Fire Island cannot be forgotten!!

Issues:
  1. Update #3

    Posted by Lauren Eckstein Forman (Campaign Leader) on Dec 20, 2012

    WE DID IT! Thanks to you, we met our goal and have over 25,000 signatures in support of rebuilding Fire Island's dunes and protecting Long Island's future. Now is when the work really begins. We are in the process of hand delivering petitions to our elected officials as they begin fighting for and debating our cause. We encourage each of you to tweet and post our petition on elected officials pages as well.

    Below is a sample of what you can post:

    @ChuckSchumer Protect Long Island and pass...

    WE DID IT! Thanks to you, we met our goal and have over 25,000 signatures in support of rebuilding Fire Island's dunes and protecting Long Island's future. Now is when the work really begins. We are in the process of hand delivering petitions to our elected officials as they begin fighting for and debating our cause. We encourage each of you to tweet and post our petition on elected officials pages as well.

    Below is a sample of what you can post:

    @ChuckSchumer Protect Long Island and pass funding to rebuild Fire Island Dunes. 25,000 signed our petition: causes.com/fireislandpetition.

    @SenGillibrand Protect Long Island and pass funding to rebuild Fire Island Dunes. 25,000 signed our petition: causes.com/fireislandpetition.

    @TimBishopNY Protect Long Island and pass funding to rebuild Fire Island Dunes. 25,000 signed our petition: causes.com/fireislandpetition.

    @RepSteveIsrael Protect Long Island and pass funding to rebuild Fire Island Dunes. 25,000 signed our petition: causes.com/fireislandpetition.

    @tomcroci Protect Long Island and pass funding to rebuild Fire Island Dunes. 25,000 signed our petition: causes.com/fireislandpetition.

    @SuffExecBellone Protect Long Island and pass funding to rebuild Fire Island Dunes. 25,000 signed our petition: causes.com/fireislandpetition.

    And/or please post the following on the Facebook pages below:
    Protect Long Island and pass funding to rebuild Fire Island Dunes. 25,000 signed our petition: causes.com/fireislandpetition.

    http://www.facebook.com/chuckschumer
    http://www.facebook.com/KirstenGillibrand
    http://www.facebook.com/RepTimBishop
    http://www.facebook.com/israelforcongress
    http://www.facebook.com/SuffolkCountyExecutiveStevenBellone
    http://www.facebook.com/crociforislip

    Thank you again for all of your support! Together we will make this happen!
    Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year.

  2. Update #2

    Posted by Lauren Eckstein Forman (Campaign Leader) on Dec 7, 2012

    3 weeks ago we started this petition to help protect Fire Island and Long Island and rebuild our sand dunes. 3 weeks later we are over 23,000 strong. Help us reach our goal of 25,000. We're so close! Please post this petition to your Facebook wall today, invite a few new friends and give us one last push! As sand and money starts to get allocated on Long Island, Fire Island cannot be forgotten!! This petition is critical to our efforts. On behalf of everyone involved in this cause, thank you everyone for coming together!

  3. Update #1

    Posted by Lauren Eckstein Forman (Campaign Leader) on Nov 22, 2012

    We have so much to be thankful for as we gather today with our friends, family and neighbors to celebrate Thanksgiving. We are thankful for the collective optimism that we will rebuild Fire Island and our damaged communities and come back stronger. We are thankful that we have reached over 10,000 petition signatures and still going strong in our mission to rebuild our dunes ASAP and protect Long Island's future. We are thankful for everyone that has supported our campaign for the Ocean...

    We have so much to be thankful for as we gather today with our friends, family and neighbors to celebrate Thanksgiving. We are thankful for the collective optimism that we will rebuild Fire Island and our damaged communities and come back stronger. We are thankful that we have reached over 10,000 petition signatures and still going strong in our mission to rebuild our dunes ASAP and protect Long Island's future. We are thankful for everyone that has supported our campaign for the Ocean Beach Fire Department (almost $13,000 raised to date).

    Thanksgiving is a great opportunity to share our efforts with the people that care about us around our Thanksgiving table. If everyone who has signed our petition asks 3 people at their Thanksgiving to sign the petition, we will get 30,000 more signatures! Wouldn't that be something. It's really easy to do and would give us a big final push to reach our goal:

    www.causes.com/fireislandpetition

    We are wishing everyone a Happy Thanksgiving and a better year ahead. We are thankful to have such an amazing community of supporters.

Recent Signatures

  1. 25,534
    Sujan Chailatte Oakland Gardens, NY
    4 mos ago
  2. 25,533
    Lori Scott Brady Bellmore, NY
    4 mos ago
  3. 25,532
    Keiya Gummybear Grimes Rochester, NY
    4 mos ago
  4. 25,531
    Ira Charles Ocean Beach, NY
    4 mos ago
  5. 25,530
    Kate Jackson Canada
    4 mos ago
  6. 25,529
    4 mos ago

Reposted by 6 campaigns

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Discuss the petition

602 comments have been posted
to participate in the conversation

well I invited my entire friends list of 2,633 one click at a time, so hopefully that helps you guys out and gets something done...

Chris MacGibbon

Signed my friend, and sent off 50 invites as well. Hope it helps.

Lauren Eckstein Forman

Thank you all!! The support is amazing.

Please sign and get everyone you know to sign!

Lauren Eckstein Forman

Terrific! Thank you!!! It's amazing. We have 482 signatures in just a few hours.

Fire Island is an essential element to Long Island. It NEEDS rebuilding. This petition has one more signature added to it!

Barbara Symer Kane

Yes and passing along.

I first sent this out before we got hit by the hurricane. Please sign we need this more then ever since Sandy!

I just came back from the beach Our house is in Summer Club a community of 40 homes just west of Ocean Beach.. All our dunes are lost and so are 4-5 homes.. At least 15 other homes had water and/or sand inside them.. For these homes to survive the must be rebuilt.. The dredging of the Fire Island inlet is LONG overdue..This past summer it was half open.. The amount of sand available will help rebuild the dune system on Fire Island.. In addition to being a wonderful place to spend a...

I just came back from the beach Our house is in Summer Club a community of 40 homes just west of Ocean Beach.. All our dunes are lost and so are 4-5 homes.. At least 15 other homes had water and/or sand inside them.. For these homes to survive the must be rebuilt.. The dredging of the Fire Island inlet is LONG overdue..This past summer it was half open.. The amount of sand available will help rebuild the dune system on Fire Island.. In addition to being a wonderful place to spend a summer.. It is an important barrier island and protects Long Island.. We must protect the barrier island before Bayshore becomes the seashore!

Valerie J Brown

God bless you all!

Ginger-Glenda Whittington

I was wondering if the boardwalks were all washed out - a lot of work will need to be done. Is Kismet LH o.k.?

Please sign this petition!

we need to do more then rebuild the dunes.

Mark Gill

Try to get local people to build a barrier at sea with old truck tyres,, apparently they will form a barrier reef for fish and other wildlife,, plus protection for your island too,, plus biig boulders under your sand dunes,, good luck ,,

Valerie J Brown

There needs to be some sort of steering committee started and everyone giving different inpu, would be a great start to get this back in order. That history was put together from hard work from our forefathers, now can't man who is creating all kinds of technology put it back together again? The generations should be able to still enjoy that great history and it can be done!~~health and wellness~~God bless

Everyone: "All Aboard!"

Catherine Lorentz

the question is who should pay for it?

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