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Crow's Nest name frays some feathers

Two grassroots groups have similar missions--and the same name. Here's their story.

By RUTH FINCH

Date published: 5/2/2004

By RUTH FINCH

It's getting hard to keep track of who is fighting to preserve Crow's Nest these days.

Stafford County has two independent grassroots organizations operating under the same name: Save Crow's Nest.

One started in late January when news broke that the state wouldn't be buying the environmentally fragile peninsula at the mouth of Accokeek and Potomac creeks as planned. It runs a Web site called SaveCrowsNest.org and is responsible for the blue and white Save Crow's Nest signs in people's yards.

Hundreds of people have attended its meetings or participated in its activities, such as speaking at Board of Supervisors meetings or organizing educational events such as the one at last weekend's Earth Day celebration.

The other Save Crow's Nest, launched a few weeks later, is also a non-partisan grassroots effort to prevent development on the peninsula. Its Web site is called SaveCrowsNest.com.

The group's yard signs feature the words "Stop Sprawl" in big red letters. It counts the 400 people who have signed a petition in support of preserving Crow's Nest as its members.

Though both organizations are working to prevent any sort of development on Stafford County's Crow's Nest peninsula, home to one of the region's last stands of virgin forests and a heron rookery, they do not work together.

The dot-org group said it invited its dot-com counterpart to join forces.

"We welcome anyone who is willing to work with us to permanently protect the entire peninsula from development," said Patricia Kurpiel, who is active with the dot-org group.

Paul Milde, who runs the dot-com organization, refused. Milde said he started his group because he thought the dot-org group was overly hostile to the owner of Crow's Nest, K&M Development of McLean, and Clark Leming, a Stafford County lawyer who represents the company.

Milde said there may be times when the two organizations can work together, but he doesn't want to be associated with any movement that would involve trampling the owner's property rights.

Leaders from both organizations say the twin names have caused confusion, but neither is willing to change theirs. Both the dot-com and the dot-org operations also say their group has exclusive legal rights to the name Save Crow's Nest.

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Date published: 5/2/2004