The Real Reason for the End of Wafting
Riverdave's Journal
March 4, 2009
Wafting the Eno did not end, as the Herald-Sun’s March 1st
editorial claims, because of a “lack of insurance.” Wafting ended
because the Durham Parks and Recreation Department took away our base
of operation, the old blacksmith shop. The alternatives they left us,
of storing our equipment under the mill or in a temporary pod, are
completely inadequate for the continuation of our wafting program.
Wafting requires a dry and secure place to store boats, paddles and
life jackets, a place for a reservation landline phone, a desk and file
cabinet for handling registration paper work and money and shelter from
inclement weather for ourselves and waiting participants.
In 1995, in an agreement with assistant DPR director Tom
Maynard, I was given the title of “Resident Field Naturalist at West
Point on the Eno Park.” In that agreement I was also provided an
office in the basement of the McCown-Mangum House, given triplicate
waver forms produced by the City of Durham for registration of
participants, and told that the City of Durham was self-insured and
would cover my needs for liability insurance. With the beginning of the
1996 Wafting season, I was informed by the West Point Park Manager,
Beth Highley, that I was no longer required to use the waivers in
registering participants. As a consequence, the City of Durham ceased
to provide me the waiver forms.
We have operated faithfully under these terms through 2008.
Our yearly contract with the DPR has never called for any further
change. As self employed individuals, we keep records for three years
and then destroy them, so we do not have a copy of our 1995 agreement
with Mr. Maynard. The CIty of Durham should have these records on file,
but the West Point Park Manager claims that she cannot find them.
Also, contrary to what the Herald-Sun editorial stated on May
1st, It is not a “minor miracle” that no serious wafting accident has
happened. Instead, my safety record can be attributed to the careful
focus on detail in the management of this program by myself and my
partner, in such matters as the quality upkeep of our equipment, the
ability to accurately monitor and interpret changing river and weather
conditions and our careful screening process of participants who might
have otherwise endangered themselves and others.
No matter how welcoming the DPR director Rhonda Parker is to
our return to Wafting with insurance, without the use of the dry and
secure office space of the Blacksmith Shop, my partner and I are unable
to continue to offer the same high quality and safe program that we
have done in the past. The City of Durham has its priorities and they
have clearly demonstrated what they are by their actions of denying
wafting the continued use of the old blacksmith shop. All decisions in
life are about priorities.
In 2008 wafting had a sharing agreement with city programs
for the use of the blacksmith shop that worked smoothly. But for 2009,
we were never consulted in any way to try and work out a shared use of
the building and neither were we notified in a timely manner of our
relegation to the mill basement. As a consequence of their actions, DPR
has replaced a unique, guided river program which brought in revenue to
the City of Durham with a taxpayer subsidized youth camp, the likes of
which already exist at West Point Park.
With no other choice before us, this spring my partner and I
will morph our love of nature education into a new land-based program
known as TreeCamp. This program will focus on trees as a powerful
healing remedy for that rapidly spreading modern malaise of nature
deficit disorder.
Photo by Riverdave: Wafting the Eno River at West Point Park, Durham, NC
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