Cherokee County, N.C. native, Silas Allen will be third recipient of the annual award recognizing outstanding support of the river’s beauty and water quality
By Tom Bennett
Special to Hiwassee River Watershed Coalition
Murphy, N.C., Dec. 6, 2010 – In the past, forces harming the Hiwassee River came here from afar to exploit and neglect. Now, I’m happy to say, there’s a trend among Americans to protect and save this natural resource treasure. They are the river’s quiet champions. They act fearlessly to stop diffidence and exploitation. And recognizing one a year is the reason for the Holman Water Quality Stewardship Award.
Silas Allen, Cherokee County, N.C., chief building inspector, is the unanimous selection of the board of the Hiwassee River Watershed Coalition to receive the 2011 Holman Award. In addition to heading the building inspection department, Allen is also the county’s administrator of both the water supply watershed protection and floodplain ordinances.
Allen and wife Bobbie live on land that has been owned by his family for more than four generations and he has been involved with the Coalition since shortly after the organization’s incorporation in 1995. When asked why he’s so dedicated to his career with the county and has volunteered so many hours beyond the call of duty, Allen said, “I care about water quality deeply. It saddens me to see the streams and lakes fill up with silt and trash.”
The award will be presented at a banquet and silent auction event to be held Friday, March 4, 2011 at the Ridges Resort and Club on Lake Chatuge between Hiawassee and Young Harris, Ga. The silent auction begins at 5:30 p.m. followed by the banquet at 6:30 p.m.
Although the primary purpose of the Holman Water Quality Stewardship Award Banquet & Silent Auction is to celebrate the relatively good water quality still being measured in the Hiwassee River and its tributaries and to honor the person or group that has done the most to protect it, the event is also a fundraiser designed to help secure the future of the Hiwassee River Watershed Coalition over the long term. The sponsorship levels are platinum, $5,000; gold, $3,000; silver, $2,000; teal, $1,000; evergreen, $500; and blue, $250. Individual reservations are $30 each, or for $225 you may reserve a table for eight.
The sixteen-year-old Hiwassee River Watershed Coalition with three employees and an annual budget of $137,000, is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization. Its employer identification number is 58-1970878.
The previous recipients of the Holman Award were:
2008, Jim Dobson, retired superintendent of the University of Georgia’s Georgia Mountain Research and Education Center at Blairsville, Ga., himself a former research scientist and UGA associate professor who has since died; and
2009, Lamar Paris, who is sole commissioner of Union County government at the top of Georgia in Blairsville, demonstrated how the organization giving the award is not extremist but rather a coalition of people and government. Paris relied on HRWC’s help to guide an association of north Georgia county commissioners and his state in adopting optional and smarter buffer standards in watersheds, ones that would lead to actual compliance by developers.
HRWC’s address is 3711 E U.S. Highway 64 Alternate, Suite 4, Murphy, N.C. 28906. Callie Moore is executive director and has a Master’s Degree in Water Resources from Indiana University and is also a graduate of Western Carolina University’s Environmental Health Program. Robert Head, III of Union County, Ga., is chairman of the board of directors of 13 volunteers from four counties in two states.
THE HOLMAN AWARD is named for Bill Holman, now Director of State Policy at the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University and a former commissioner of the N.C. Dept. of Environmental and Natural Resources.
David Goldhagen of Goldhagen Art Glass is the creator of the unique trophy presented to the Holman recipient. His studio is on the shore of Lake Chatuge in Hayesville, N.C.
David Goldhagen’s Holman Award is a non-traditional trophy of swirls of glass holding captive inside them many bright colors. So the award is like the river. Glass can be broken, the colors shattered. The river outside any national forest or park draws many users to it who are moved by its beauty and also naively confident of its protection forever, but that is far from ensured.
Tom Bennett of the Martins Creek community near Murphy, N.C., was a retired newsman, Hiwassee River Watershed Coalition member/volunteer/donor and recipient of the 2015 Holman Water Quality Stewardship Award. Tom died on December 28, 2020.