We're not lost, Sergeant, We're in … France

New motto for preservation group: Do whatever you want

The Brandy Station Foundation is a 501(c)-3 non-profit organization dedicated to preserving the natural and historic resources of the Brandy Station area of Culpeper County, Virginia. It used to actually make efforts in that regard. Then, Joseph McKinney became the President of the organization. Now, the organization has published a position statement that states that it is “generally not productive to officially oppose common property improvements”.

I cannot imagine why anyone would bother with a preservation organization that has no interest in preservation of land that is privately owned.

I regularly read Eric Wittenburg’s Rantings of a Civil War Historian and first learned of Tony Triolo’s wanton destruction of the Brandy Station battlefield there. Things got worse with the rains we had here in Virginia, but fortunately, the Army Corps of Engineers got involved at that point, since he was damming a creek to expand a pond in the midst of the battlefield and there is massive erosion occurring.

I like to think it’s surprising, but perhaps it is not surprising at all, that landowner Tony Troilo is a friend of BSF President Joseph McKinney.

Craig Swain, who served a year on the Board of the Foundation, notes that it is effectively no longer a preservation group and has renounced his membership. It is a sad day when preservation groups become unconcerned about preservation.

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