Hugh Mitchell environmental activism collection

Hugh Mitchell is a retired New York State Certified Social Worker who spent most of his career helping individuals with developmentally disabilities at Monroe Developmental Center where he filled a number of roles such as service coordination, case management, family support, and clinical social work for institutionalized intellectually handicapped individuals. He taught anger management to offenders in the secure intensive treatment unit which was a prison for young men. He also worked four years for New York as a Marriage Conciliation Counselor in the Conciliation Bureau of the New York Supreme Court and he served two years as Assistant to the President of the State University of New York at Binghamton. Early in his career he was selected in a nation-wide competition as the Barnett Fellow, representing the American settlement movement in Great Britain, where he studied at The London School of Economics 1966-67. Previous to that he taught English, reading, and study skills at various schools and was the Education Programmer at the Five Towns Community House in Inwood, New York.

Hugh is well known in the Rochester, New York region for his “other vocation” as an environmental activist, watch dog, and conservation leader. He led a successful eight year battle to save Genesee Valley Park, which resulted in the development of the cross-state Erie Canal Hiking-Biking Trail. Hugh also worked on various coalitions which succeeded in the preservation or creation a number of new parks in the Rochester area. He engaged in coordinating a multi-year effort to create a new park on Pinnacle Hill, which was described as “The Emerald Necklace” - a green belt on the hills across the southern side of the city. This effort failed but the hill was preserved from development after an extensive organizing effort.

In 2000 Hugh Mitchell became the chairperson of the 2,000 member Rochester Regional Group of Sierra Club. Some of the projects they were engaged in included fighting to control suburban sprawl, saving wetlands, saving threatened parks, population control, and “persuading” Kodak to control their air pollution. He spearheaded the creation and publication of a ‘Green Paper’ exposing the way the local Republican controlled Monroe County Water Authority operated to encourage sprawl. The paper, titled “Sprawl Follows the Pipes”, was sold nationally and resulted in the NY Attorney General investigating the agency. Perhaps Hugh’s best environmental advocacy effort came after a 25 year effort to preserve the wild forests around Hemlock and Canadice Finger Lakes which were threatened reservoir lands.

Subsequently to his local leadership work Hugh became chairperson and coordinator for four years of the conservation programs of the NYS Atlantic Chapter of Sierra Club with 22 environmental committees. One of his administrative achievements was creating the Chapter-wide Conservation Council who reviewed the conservation budget and awarded conservation grants.