Seaborg Open Space Fund

Mission & Board Members

Breathing under the sky, freely, out of doors and with the real earth under our feet is one of the very best things we can do for our health. It’s good physically, mentally, for ourselves, our children, our society, our values and for the greensphere of our life.

Unfortunately, however, with the majority of humanity living in cities, space to breathe has become a precious resource, and like all precious things, it needs champions. There are many people and organizations already devoted to the preservation of open space, places we love, and the many places that are yet to be paved. Our mission is to help bring these groups together. When it comes to open spaces, and to the people who preserve them, there is strength indeed in numbers.

The Seaborg Fund was founded for this purpose by David Seaborg in honor of his father Glenn T. Seaborg, UC Chancellor and discoverer of Plutonium. The fund began as a tribute to the elder Seaborg, a Nobel Laureate and UC Berkeley professor. As a Lafayette, CA. resident, Mr. Seaborg was involved in the identification of 10 elements — including plutonium, berkelium and, naturally, seaborgium — and worked on the Manhattan Project developing the first atomic bomb. He enjoyed hiking and frequently spoke before city councils and other agencies in support of preserving open space. A trail in Briones Regional Park was named after him in 2004.

We are now re-forming the organization to continue to honor the Seaborg legacy but also to reach out and join hands with other open space groups.

The new president of the Fund is Shawn Coyle, a Bay Area native and professional active in the field of information technology. Shawn is currently at work to formulate plans to develop the Seaborg Fund and to partner with various groups and people to support every effort to create events that celebrate the places we love, that help remind ourselves and others of the invigorating presence of nature all around, the natural places that clear the mind and the spirit in the fresh air of development-free open space, the world as it used to be, the world as it can be.

Where are your favorite places? Let’s work to protect them together! What can we do to celebrate our shared landscapes, our countrysides, our natural inheritance of true wealth, wonder and beauty? Let’s brainstorm and take action! What are your ideas? Let’s talk!

Welcome to the new website too! It’s a work in progress, and will be, but we are going to have some fun and develop a friendly online channel for artists, bloggers, writers, photographers, poets and filmmakers and other various thoughtful folks to share their ideas and inspirations. We are hooking up this site as well with facebook and twitter, etc., in order to make it as easy as possible to access, share and enjoy what’s going on. The idea is to create on online “open space” –something of value to you, to ourselves, and to our communities. Or objective is to help gain traction for all stakeholders in efforts towards the preservation of open space, and to have fun doing it.

Welcome to the Seaborg Fund!

Open Space Advocacy – Why It Matters

Imagine a city without parks, without gardens, without open spaces of any kind. No outdoor markets, no play areas. As soon as you step out of your door you are in the street, immersed in the noise, haste and traffic fumes of everyday commerce. Your city is, in fact, nothing but a maze of streets. The wider ones, perhaps, are more prized by residents for what little relative space they appear to offer.

In this place, your home is probably prized mostly as a refuge. Air conditioning and filtration units do a brisk business. A new kind of temporary hotel is springing up everywhere, with quiet rooms and wide screens displaying scenes of natural tranquility. Environmental groups are concerned about the diminishing air quality, the energy requirements of all the surface structures and the impact of increased traffic usage.

We doubt any city dweller can have much difficulty imagining the scene. You just need to think about where you live and take away all of the open spaces, including all the pedestrian areas, outdoor cafe spaces and so on. Which, to our mind, demonstrates three things:

1. Open spaces are essential for quality of life.

2. People have an unfortunate capacity to take what space is left very much for granted.

3. This is not a peripheral or minor issue. Our need for room to breath forms the beating heart at the core of most modern issues – environmental, economic and social.

The strength of the value of open spaces, of any kind, becomes the counter argument to the opposing point of view: that everyone needs somewhere to live, and houses have to get built somehow. From the thesis of ‘open space is important’ and the antithesis of ‘people need shelter’ comes the logical synthesis: this problem must be managed. And that’s why open space advocacy is so important. In providing the momentum that prevents the spread of building from gaining the upper hand, it’s a necessary component for managing the environment.

Without open space advocacy, there’s a risk of the kind of scenario we outline above becoming a reality. The commercial pressure to develop open land is not going to go away of its own accord – and open space advocacy, too, is ultimately commercial. Because you value your open spaces, after all, and value is what all commerce is ultimately about. No one wants to live in a city, a state, a country or a world without space to breath. That’s a fact that is not going to go away of its own accord, either.

So what does open space advocacy involve? While protest and complaint are occasionally necessary, for us the chief element to getting things done is dialogue. That means bringing in all the vested interest groups. Among these we would include the advocates, developers, city planners, residents and the media. The advocate’s role is primarily this: to keep reminding everyone concerned of how and why we all place importance on the open space. There are many reasons, ranging from the practical to the spiritual, that might be offered. All of them have the force to apply pressure on opposing interests.

Seaborg Open Fund provides a virtual space of its own – a space that brings together different interests, focusing at first on advocates and residents. As an advocate, you are welcome to get in touch with us and promote your cause alongside others with similar interests. As a resident, you can send us tales of your own experience. Everyone has some experience with open space – with city frustrations and the delights of a newly discovered park. By relating those experiences here on Seaborg Open Fund you can contribute to the ultimate goal – the reminder to all of us of the importance of the open space.

By: Frank O’Connor

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