The Judge Rotenberg Center has proposed demolishing a large area of woods and wetlands behind their main facility at 240 Turnpike street and replacing it with a parking lot expansion, drainage basin, and access road. The development area includes wetlands, woods, and a walking trail. Development of this area will impact wetlands that are critical for floodwater management and groundwater filtration. Additionally, these woods are home to many different types of trees, turtles, salamanders, frogs, hawks, owls, cardinals, bluejays, deer, bees, and other ecologically important species whose homes will be destroyed by this proposal. This development will hurt our community.

The world is losing tree cover at an alarming rate at a time when storm ferocity and frequency is increasing due to climate change. Allowing this irresponsible tree removal and wetland development reinforces the cycle of greenhouse gas emissions while simultaneously hindering our natural ecosystem’s ability to cope with the storms strengthened by the removal of those very trees.

The Judge Rotenberg Center does not need this additional parking and has not considered reasonable and less harmful alternatives such as re-configuring the space at the many properties it owns throughout Canton, leasing or purchasing one of the many vacant and already developed properties nearby, or building a multi-level garage in its parking lot’s current footprint. Now more than ever Canton needs thoughtful development planning, not senseless destruction of green space and animal habitat.

We, the undersigned, hereby petition the government bodies of Canton, Massachusetts to roundly reject this tragic loss of a vital ecosystem without cause.