New director guides coalition

Cumberland Plateau group aims to raise awareness through cooperation

By MORGAN SIMMONS, simmonsm@knews.com
January 9, 2005

Hunters, land managers and environmentalists from Tennessee and Kentucky have banded together to protect one of the last unspoiled regions of the South.

Calling themselves the Alliance for the Cumberlands, the coalition's focus is on the Cumberland Plateau, a region of uncommon cultural and natural diversity that stretches 400 miles from Alabama to West Virginia.

The group, which evolved out of a series of meetings sponsored by Tennessee Citizens for Wilderness Planning, recently took a major step forward by hiring a full-time executive director.

Current members include state and federal agencies such as the Kentucky Division of Forestry, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Tennessee State Parks, as well as numerous private groups like the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, Historic Rugby and the Tennessee Parks and Greenways Foundation.

Katherine Medlock, the alliance's new executive director, said the coalition is locally driven and that promoting economic sustainability and preserving the beauty and richness of the environment are goals that go hand in hand on the Cumberland Plateau.

"We want to work together to do conservation projects that couldn't be done on a smaller scale," Medlock said. "The alliance is an environmental clearinghouse. We need to be greater than the sum of our individual parts."

One of the alliance's goals is to raise public awareness in regard to the plateau's unique natural, cultural and recreational resources.

In 2004 the Natural Resources Defense Council placed the Cumberland Plateau on its annual list of national BioGems, citing in particular the region's deep river gorges and remote forests.

Botanical studies have shown that the Cumberland Plateau actually is richer in woody plant diversity than the Smoky Mountains. The plateau is home to the largest sandstone arch and highest waterfall in the eastern United States, and in terms of caves, no region of the country comes close.

"Comparing it to an area like Yellowstone is not a stretch," said Alex Wyss, Cumberland Plateau program manager for the Tennessee chapter of The Nature Conservancy. "The plateau might not have bison, but it's globally significant in terms of its aquatic species, forests and caves."

The northern end of Tennessee's Cumberland Plateau, where the alliance for the Cumberlands is focusing its initial efforts, includes the Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area, Pickett State Park and Forest, the Obed Wild and Scenic River and the Daniel Boone National Forest just over the border in Kentucky.

"An important feature of the alliance is that it's multi-state," said Sandra Goss, executive director of Tennessee Citizens for Wilderness Planning and coordinator for the Alliance for the Cumberlands. "It's taken three years to get all the parties to the table. Hopefully, this regional approach will make us a stronger organization."

Barbara Stagg, executive director of Historic Rugby, is a member of the alliance's steering committee who grew up on the Cumberland Plateau.

"I'm aware of how critical it is to protect what is unique and natural in the region, and I'm also very aware of how much we critically need economic-based improvements," Stagg said. "This organization is trying to meld the two."

Chris Stubbs, community planner for the Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area and the Obed Wild and Scenic River, said the alliance enables the National Park Service to work with a broad cross-section of stakeholders, some of whom don't always see eye to eye.

"How often do you see environmentalists and the coal industry sitting at the same table?" Stubbs said. "Our parks are not isolated islands. We need to work with people and groups outside our boundaries, because what they do has a ripple effect inside the park."

Morgan Simmons may be reached at 865-342-6321.