I wrote last week:
> Forum participants are kind to indulge this quick note. I plan to offer 
> more -- next time maybe with fewer words -- including a recommendation 
> as to exactly how Fort Monroe's true friends can best influence Fort 
> Monroe's future.

Today some might want to see, and maybe act on the recommendation in, the following request that I distributed today among friends of Fort Monroe nationwide:

Request for friends of Fort Monroe: Send one brief e-mail message to help save a national treasure?
A short version of this request appears after the first dashed line, for anyone in a hurry. A longer version appears after the second dashed line. Thanks very much. 
Steve Corneliussen, [log in to unmask]
(Comments welcome by reply e-mail.)

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SHORT VERSION OF THIS REQUEST:
Some government, preservation and media leaders aren’t forthrightly reporting that Washington is considering only a bifurcated, balkanized, token national park -- a split national park that doesn’t even extend all along Fort Monroe’s bayfront shoreline. So even if you’ve already answered government officials’ latest request for comments, I hope you’ll transmit something along the lines of the following sample message. It needs to go before Tuesday evening, July 26. Thanks.

To: [log in to unmask], [log in to unmask] 
cc: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Ft Monroe: REAL national park, please
One possible text for your message: Please create a REAL national park at Fort Monroe with an extensive footprint, not a token national park with a huge gap across the heart of Fort Monroe’s historic landscape. At a minimum, the national park should stretch from the moated stone fortress all the way up Fort Monroe’s bayfront shoreline. Thanks.

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LONGER VERSION OF THIS REQUEST:
For Fort Monroe to become a self-sustaining Grand Public Place built on the foundation of an extensive national park, it’s vital for every friend of Fort Monroe to speak up by Tuesday evening, July 26. Government officials are once again seeking public opinions. They’ll faithfully count and classify the raw totals of e-mail messages. If you take a minute to e-mail them, your voice will matter. 

They’re asking about a national park. Unfortunately, though, some government, preservation and media leaders are not forthrightly reporting that Washington is considering only a bifurcated, balkanized, token national park -- a split national park that doesn’t even extend all along Fort Monroe’s bayfront shoreline. 

Please ask key officials for a REAL national park, even if you’ve previously commented. E-addresses and a sample message appear above.

The split-national-park plan confers national park status only on the moated fortress and the northern green areas -- the parts of Fort Monroe that no one was ever going to harm anyway. In between, it leaves a huge gap of national historic landmark land.

That historic landscape could confer on future Fort Monroe its Chesapeake Bay sense of place in American history.

It’s the same old problem: powerful forces here in Virginia still seek culturally and economically counterproductive overdevelopment. Their plan would be like placing a subdivision on a hillside facing Monticello.

It’s also the same old irony: better treatment than mere “redevelopment” would actually generate even more money for Hampton and the region.

But it’s also something new: now that our leaders finally admit that they recognize Fort Monroe’s full importance, their “redevelopment” obsession makes their plan both incoherent and irresponsible.

So please e-mail Virginia’s governor and the National Park Service via the e-addresses shown in the sample message above (also with cc as shown, please). I hope you choose to say something like what’s in the sample. But whatever you say, please tell them we expect a REAL national park at Fort Monroe.

Thanks very much.

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