To the editor:

Marc Gerstman’s op-ed “Court got it wrong” was misleading and dishonest. Gerstman served as the executive deputy commissioner at the Department of Environmental Conservation from 2011 to 2016, where he was a keen supporter of extra-wide Class II community connector snowmobile trails. During his time at the DEC, he set out to build a network of Class II trails across the Forest Preserve. The New York Court of Appeals just struck down this plan, ruling that these trails violated Article 14, Section 1, the “forever wild” clause, of the state Constitution.

Gerstman complained in his piece that the court got it wrong. Losing lawyers tend to blame the courts and not their case, their facts or their clients. While Gerstman listed in his op-ed his work representing citizens groups against overreaching government before he joined the DEC, he omitted to say that he was the attorney who represented the Adirondack Council when it sued the state, including the DEC, over the 2006 Snowmobile Plan for the Adirondacks. Gerstman lost that case. A few years later, he was briefly part of another lawsuit against the Adirondack Park Agency for its “Snowmobile Trails Maintenance and Construction Guidance” before joining the DEC.

It’s curious that Marc Gerstman never mentioned in his op-ed, where he was critical of environmental groups that sued the state over Class II trails, that he had done the same thing.

Evidently, Gerstman had a problem with extra-wide Class II snowmobile trails when he took the Adirondack Council’s money and tried to stop them. Apparently, when he was on the state’s payroll, those problems somehow evaporated.

Marc Gerstman talks in his piece about “responsible” environmental organizations. He’s quick to cast stones while never admitting to his own legal work against the state’s Class II trail plans. Since Gerstman has played both sides of this issue, he’s a funny one to judge. Was Gerstman being responsible or irresponsible when he sued the state twice over extra-wide Class II snowmobile trails?

All I know is that the Appellate Division, Third Department found that the DEC and APA violated Article 14, Section 1, the “forever wild” clause, of the state Constitution when it started building a network of Class II trails. The Court of Appeals also found that the DEC and APA violated Article 14. These courts ruled against a plan that Gerstman helped put together. Given Gerstman’s flip-flops where he was against Class II trails before he was for them, I’d trust New York’s highest court and not Gerstman.

I imagine that it can’t feel very good for Marc Gerstman to have a line on his long resume that he helped violate Article 14 and “forever wild.” That’s got to sting an environmental lawyer. But Gerstman should stop blaming the courts, accept his loss and deal with it. And when he starts telling the world about who is responsible and who is not, he should first look in the mirror and look at his own history with this issue. The court got it right; Gerstman got it wrong.

Sincerely,

James McMartin Long

Canada Lake

Vice chair, Protect the Adirondacks

Town of Caroga board member