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Rockland County Additionally Purchases Almost 12 Acres of Wooded Land On New Valley Street In New Metropolis
By Tina Traster
Edmund Wyatt Gordon relocated from North Carolina’s segregated South within the Nineteen Fifties to boost his household in Skyview Acres in Pomona, a 110-acre cooperative group of 46 properties that values conservation and land stewardship. On the time, earlier than the Tappan Zee Bridge was constructed, Rockland was comparatively rural, stuffed with farms and open area and the Gordons had lived briefly in New York Metropolis earlier than settling in Pomona.
“So far as I can bear in mind, my mom was a conservationist, even earlier than that was a factor to be,” stated Gordon.
Gordon, an esteemed physician and scholar, and his spouse Susan Gitt Gordon, a pediatrician from rural Pennsylvania, raised 4 kids on their prized land in a group that shared core values, baby elevating, and safety of the pure setting. Within the Nineties, the Gordons purchased two massive, wooded tracts abutting their parcel to reserve it from business improvement.
Now, Rockland County, as a part of its Open Area Acquisition Program, has bought the 2 parcels totaling 13.34 acres located to the west of Route 45 and the east of the Palisades Parkway in Pomona for $1.39 million from two Gordon household trusts. The county additionally lately bought 11.83 acres at 20 New Valley Street in New Metropolis from Davies Farm Inc., paying $4 million for the vacant residential land. The acquisition is just not associated to the present Dr. Davies farm household.
“My dad and mom purchased this land with the intent to maintain it from being commercially developed a very long time in the past,” stated Chris W. Gordon, Edmund and Susan’s son. “This was my dad and mom’ want. We’re completely happy we may come to an settlement with the county.”
The 2 parcels are positioned at 1015 and 1019 Route 45 in Pomona.
The vacant land, which incorporates woodlands, wetlands, and a primitive strolling path named in Susan Gordon’s reminiscence, shall be devoted parkland, in keeping with a restrictive covenant recorded with the deed. The Gordon household hopes the half mile primitive strolling path shall be developed and maintained by the county, maybe by youth teams or conservationists.
“So far as I can bear in mind, my mom was a conservationist, even earlier than that was a factor to be,” stated Gordon. “She’d take the youngsters into the woods and educate us in regards to the bushes and crops. She all the time taught us to respect the outside and the setting. This land is a continuation of her legacy.”
The Gordons have left a deep and enduring imprint on Rockland County and past.
Susan Gordon, who died in 2016, practiced pediatrics for 60 years.
Her husband Edmund Gordon, who turns 102 this June, is the John M. Musser Professor of Psychology, Emeritus at Yale College, Richard March Hoe Professor, Emeritus of Psychology and Schooling and Founding Director of the Institute of City and Minority Schooling (IUME) at Academics Faculty, Columbia College.
He’s a member of the Black Educator Corridor of Fame.
He’s additionally the Senior Scholar in Residence on the Faculty Board and a founding member of Spring Valley NAACP. He co-founded The CEJJES Institute in Pomona.
Gordon’s profession accolades checklist skilled follow, minister, scientific counseling, analysis scientist, creator, and editor. He acquired his bachelor’s levels in zoology and social ethics from Howard College; his masters in social psychology at American College; and a doctorate in baby improvement and steerage from Academics Faculty, Columbia College. For many years, he led a workforce on the Faculty Board in quantifying the racial achievement hole in take a look at scores, grade level common, class rating, difficult the orthodox view that discussing deficiencies in Black households and communities perpetuates painful stereotypes about racial inferiority.
The Gordon kids proceed their dad or mum’s life work to advertise social justice, with a concentrate on well being, training, and environmental and materials well-being of marginalized communities, in their very own work and thru the CEJJES Institute, which works primarily in collaboration with communities of shade, notably these of African descent.
Chris Gordon, president of CEJJES, stated the proceeds from the sale should not associated to the Institute. “It’s a non-public sale,” he added.
The Institute features a convention heart, the Charles W. White Memorial Artwork Gallery, the Rockland African Diaspora Heritage Middle and an training and useful resource heart.
CEJJES, which additionally homes the African American Historic Society of Rockland County, believes that by partaking in training, essential considering, activist analysis, strategizing, and organizing with such communities, social justice and liberation may be achieved.
Earlier this 12 months, Edmund Gordon instructed a Philadelphia blogger: “I’m not going to be round for that for much longer, and I wish to do one thing the place I’ve some likelihood of success… I doubt we are able to do something in that time-frame on the decrease socioeconomic stage. However we do perceive what to do to assist the minority youngsters in [New Jersey] or East Ramapo or Shaker Heights. And even that’s a tall order within the few years I’ve left.”
The first focus of the work of the Institute is in Rockland County, New York, however the considerations of the Institute are worldwide.
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