New Hampshire’s Great Bay, located in the Seacoast region, is beautiful and pristine. The towns and cities around it want to keep it that way. So do the state and federal governments. A recent agreement to work together to reduce pollutants like nitrogen is designed to protect this estuary. Roger Wood in his latest podcast talks via Zoom with Blaine Cox, John Coon and Melissa Paly, representing major stakeholders in this effort.
Melissa Paly is CLF’s Great Bay–Piscataqua Waterkeeper working to advocate, inform, and inspire people to protect and restore the rivers, bays, and coast that make the Seacoast such a spectacular place to live, work, and play.
Before joining CLF, Melissa was a principal of CrossCurrent Communications where she provided communications strategy, public relations, and media production services to many state agencies, businesses, and nonprofits focused on environmental and social issues throughout Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Maine. Paly holds a B.A. in geology from Yale College and a Master of Forest Science from Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. An avid telemark skier, sailor, sea kayaker, and gardener, Melissa was past President of the Kittery, Maine, Land Trust. She currently serves as a trustee of the Maine Island Trail Association, Maine Coast Heritage Trust, and Yale Forestry School Alumni Board.
John R Coon, JD, PhD, is a partner in the recently formed law firm of Archipelago Law, LLP, headquartered in Portland, Maine. The firm was formed to provide an alternative to traditional law firms for groups and individuals involved in issues related to environmental, coastal, land use and natural resources conflicts. Dr. Coon has been a trial attorney for over 35 years and holds a PhD in Natural Resources and Environmental Studies from the University of New Hampshire.
The firm routinely works with a network of trusted regional and national law firms and consultants on cases related to groundwater/soil contamination, coastal development, land use and planning, and other natural resource and environmental conflicts. In the last year, the firm has been active in coastal intertidal issues in New England and on contamination and land use/coastal development cases in Michigan, Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New Jersey and the Florida Keys.
Blaine Cox, Rochester’s Deputy City Manager/ Director of Finance & Administration, serves as both the chief financial officer as well as chief operations officer for the City of Rochester.
Cox assists the city manager as directed, and directly oversees the departments of Finance, Business, Human Resources, City Clerk, City Tax Collector and City Assessing. Cox prepares the city’s capital budget, operating budget, revenue budget and capital debt budget and advises the City Council and Utility (Water & Sewer) Advisory Board.
Roger Wood bio
Roger Wood is an award winning radio, newspaper and television journalist, with over 40 years of experience in the media. Roger has spent his entire professional career in New Hampshire. Roger currently serves as associate publisher at InDepthNH.org. He has produced news and special feature reports for InDepthNH, New Hampshire Public Radio, NPR, and other Public and commercial radio stations. He also produced spot news for CBS Radio.