City Lit: Through the Mill

Who ever said that only the winners write history? Here we have two books about a Bronx paper mill that never even got built. One is by an environmentalist who dreamed up the idea and very nearly made it happen; the other is by a journalist who chronicles its collapse. Neither book is likely to make it to the big screen, but if they did, imagine Gangs of New York meets The Sopranos--minus the stabbings and whackings, but with plenty of backstabbing, double-dealing, blackmailing, turf wars and general sabotage.

In Bronx Ecology: Blueprint for a New Environmentalism, Allen Hershkowitz, a senior scientist for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and a leading expert on recycling and solid waste issues, offers his recipe for sustainable development. Never mind that it's drawn from a failed venture: To him, a truly sustainable planet will only be achieved when environmentalists get wise and learn how to run businesses and factories that meet both profit margins and stringent anti-pollution standards. In the early 1990s, he set out to show that you could do both by developing an "environmentally benign paper mill" in the South Bronx. While most of his book is all about what went wrong, there are sparkling parts where Hershkowitz delineates a clear-eyed, even enlightened vision for environmentalism's future.

The Brooklyn-born, self-described "eco-realist" fervently believed that an urban-centered recycled paper mill would yield both environmental and economic benefits. Using advanced technology, the energy-efficient and environmentally designed facility would transform the 12,600 tons of daily paper waste generated mostly by the city's law firms, securities and publishing industries into newsprint. By building the mill on a brownfield, the project would both clean up a polluted site and bring much-needed jobs to the South Bronx. Ultimately, Hershkowitz wanted to develop a model demonstrating how paper mills could become "helpful stewards of life on Earth."

Of course, back in the real world, everyone just wanted a piece of the action. Over eight torturous years, financiers, paper companies and construction firms came and went. In 2000, the project finally fell through, dying the death of a thousand cuts, NRDC staffers believed. Others in the business community suggested that it fell victim to "deal fatigue" and to Hershkowitz's lack of business savvy.

In the end, Hershkowitz believes he was foiled by "social obstacles," imposed by several unsavory community groups, unions, and "self-interested development hustlers who pass[ed] themselves off as community spirited activists"--most notably Banana Kelly, the South Bronx community development corporation that he empowered as the sole owner of the mill.

In Bronx Ecology, Hershkowitz casts himself as the naïve do-gooder, a business neophyte and social progressive with "ideologically pure" intentions. To a large degree, his account of events jives with Lis Harris' Tilting at Mills: Green Dreams, Dirty Dealings, and the Corporate Squeeze. But if you want the uncensored version, read Harris' chronicle, which is based on an article she wrote for The New Yorker a few years ago.

Harris gives a much fuller explanation of the opposition that the project faced from a small but vocal group of community activists, who argued that the mill's siting at the old Harlem River rail yard would have added to the South Bronx's already terrible pollution problems, vis-à-vis increased truck traffic. For example, Harris recounts how one NRDC staffer--Vernice Miller--flabbergasted Hershkowitz by attacking the project in public meetings as a disaster in the making. Yet Miller is conspicuously absent from Hershkowitz's Bronx Ecology.