CRMC executive director receives lifetime achievement award from RI Sea Grant

October 28, 2008, BRISTOL – Rhode Island Coastal Resources Management Council Executive Director Grover J. Fugate was honored with a lifetime achievement award from R.I. Sea Grant on October 24 at the seventh annual Marine Law Symposium at Roger Williams University. Fugate has served as the executive director of CRMC for 22 years.

U.S. Senator Jack Reed presented Fugate with the award, which was given to him for his efforts in helping the CRMC fulfill its mandate to “preserve, protect, develop, and where possible, restore the coastal resources of the state.”

“Grover is not only an extraordinary public servant, for which I admire him greatly, but he’s one of the reasons we have so much to be pleased and proud of in this state,” Reed said of Fugate. “No one has been more instrumental in cleaning, preserving and restoring Narragansett Bay and most importantly, done it right for 20 years. And he’s done it with decency, respect and integrity and that has made all the difference.”

Fugate was at the symposium as one of the panel members chosen to speak about strategies for marine renewable energy regulation. The CRMC is in the process of developing an Ocean Special Area Management Plan, along with the University of Rhode Island. Among the many areas to be studied in the offshore environment is whether or not alternative energy – namely wind power – has a place in Rhode Island’s waters.

Fugate, who said he was “immensely honored” by the award, added that “although this award is going to me, it also goes to a lot of other individuals. I do not do this alone. I have a staff that works hard and is so dedicated, and we have a Council that lets us do some weird and wonderful things.” Fugate also thanked the staff at the state’s universities for their cooperation and invaluable resources, and noted that the political leadership in the state was especially supportive of the CRMC and its initiatives.

Representative Eileen Naughton, chairperson of the Committee on the Environment and Natural Resources, also presented Fugate with a proclamation from the R.I. House of Representatives, and Ken Payne, former R.I. Senate policy director, presented one from the R.I. Senate on behalf of Senator V. Susan Sosnowski.

“Twenty-two years is a long time and Grover has filled each of those years with some amazing things,” Naughton said. She cited from the proclamation the six Special Area Management Plans (SAMPs) that the Council has adopted, the CRMC’s Urban Coastal Greenway policy, part of the Metro Bay SAMP and nationally-recognized, and the development and implementation of the Marine Resources Development Plan, which the General Assembly required the CRMC to undertake in 2005 to protect and enhance the marine resources of the state.

The proclamations also credit Fugate with helping to build the state’s coastal management program “so that it is now considered one of the best in the nation and has won international respect for its abilities to manage the coast and marine resources in a manner that produces the maximum benefit for society as well as preserves and restores the ecological systems that are so valuable to Rhode Island.”

Payne, now senior policy advisor for the URI College of Environment and Life Sciences, and an adjunct professor of marine affairs, recalled being summoned to the corner office on the third floor of the State House, often about something Fugate and the CRMC was undertaking.

“Grover has an enormous capacity for creative thinking,” Payne said. “We measure his success not only by the good things he’s done, but also by all of the squirrelly things he’s prevented from being done. Imagine what our state would be like without him.”

Reed quoted the epitaph of Christopher Wren, the great astronomer and architect, “If you seek his [monument], look around you. If you want to see Grover’s [monument], look at the Bay.”