ENVIRONMENTAL ADVOCATE — Aaron Mair, now chairman of the Sierra Club Atlantic Chapter, possesses the determination and passion to alert people to the importance of the Hudson River. Story and Photo By DEBORAH A. MILES Strolling around the tiny Island Creek Park tucked away in Albany’s south end, PEF member Aaron Mair noticed a heap of broken corrugated boxes nestled in the banks of the Hudson River. “I’ll have to make a call and have that removed,” he said with a sigh. “There’s no reason waste like that should be dumped, especially when there is a compactor a few yards away.” He shook his head. “Look over there,” he said, pointing to a row of dilapidated, low-income housing units and a zigzag of concrete roadways. “Children have to cross four arterials and railroad tracks just to get to this piece of land.” Mair’s passion for a better environment recently won him the election for chairman of the 40,000-member Sierra Club Atlantic Chapter. He is the first Capital Region resident and first African-American to head the chapter. He beat out Jim Lane, a New York City attorney for the chairmanship. Clean-up of the Hudson River is a key priority. It’s personal By day, this PEF member and environmental zealot works as a program research specialist 2 for the state Health Department’s Office of Medicaid Management in Albany. “My love for the environment is not my vocation, but my avocation,” he said. “I’m a true grass-roots volunteer who puts about 60 hours a week into environmental advocacy. “When I walk the walk, I’m not paid to walk it,” Mair said. “It is walking from the heart, and from the spirit of being a true John Muir environmentalist.” Fighting industrial pollution When Mair was vice chair of the Sierra Club Atlantic chapter, he led the campaign against General Electric’s PCB pollution of the Hudson River. “When a corporation pollutes our natural resources and puts our health in danger, we must come together and protect those resources,” Mair said. GE’s campaign against dredging the Hudson River, according to Mair, assumed people living near the river had only a recreational dependency on it. GE, he said, treated the river as if it were only a sewer or storm-run-off system for municipalities. “What a profoundly disappointing and myopic kind of view,” he said. River more than water Now, the core of Mair’s campaign to restore the Hudson River emphasizes its importance as part of New York’s natural heritage and a natural resource. “As a resource, the river provides an abundant amount of nutritional food. And you don’t have to get a food-stamp voucher to go fishing,” he said. Mair also noted religious groups have used the river for baptisms and anointments. “The Sierra campaign is to educate people on how functionally and culturally dependent we are on the Hudson River,” Mair said. “The river inspires our heritage and history,” he added. “The Hudson River School of art continues to inspire artists. The valley has long stretches of land where many municipalities enjoy its vistas. This is a very powerful river that symbolically cuts to the core of our nation.” Don’t live with it, fix it Mair said he will also focus attention on water quality in urban and suburban areas, and “PM 2.5” — airborne particulate matter small enough to get trapped in your lungs and cause respiratory illness and disease. “The issue of PM 2.5 is raised by a major piece of federal legislation that will be hotly debated this year,” Mair said. This legislation would lower standards on polluting entities that emit small particulates. The priority, he said, should be on preventing and reversing environmental health threats, rather than looking for ways to live with them. “We don’t want to just talk about producing medications that allow people to live in a dirtier environment,” he said. “We need to deal with manufacturing and combustion processes that contribute to degrading the environment and human health.” Environment affects all Mair is also founder of the Arbor Hill Environmental Justice Corp. which works to give all people a voice in the community, regardless of their race or ethnic background. “The organization aims to build awareness in inner-city communities, especially those that are economically challenged,” Mair said. “These people are underserved when it comes to environmental amenities. And that can have a profound impact on children and on breaking the cycle of poverty. “A clean-up anywhere, is a clean-up everywhere,” he said.