This article was published in the River Reporter on January 22, 2025

The Upper Delaware National Scenic River Corridor is a national treasure. Let’s not turn it over to the FIMFO corporation to build a $40 million resort. Monetizing this treasure will set a harmful precedent in our community. FIMFO is planning 148 RV park models and 64 permanently placed structures, an aquatic play area, heated swimming pools, bouncing pillows, a mini-golf course and sports courts, all spread over 220 acres. The “RVs” are cabin-like structures on wheels that pose as RVs, but in reality are permanent, not mobile homes. These homes will be part of a sprawling subdivision within a theme park.

This is out of character with the Upper Delaware National Scenic River Corridor, and it does not comply with the Upper Delaware Scenic and Recreational River Management Plan.

This will set a precedent for similar developments along the Delaware. There are several other campgrounds and LLC properties along the Delaware River. If permission for FIMFO is passed, and this precedent is set, those properties will become ripe for corporate real estate development projects.

The FIMFO model clearly cuts out other small family-run businesses that depend on tent campers. The FIMFO patrons will be isolated from the community. That’s what a resort is. Full-service accommodations and amenities are provided by resorts. That is the attraction of a resort. People park their cars and they stay put. This huge, out-of-place development will also put a tremendous strain on essential emergency services.

With record flooding all over the world, why build this resort in a flood plain? Chlorinated pools next to the river? Septics planned for over 200 structures? Parking lots, tree clearings, garbage? In the event of a disaster, will this corporation be accountable?

These resorts are expensive. Their “amenities” cost. Our family, long-time “leave no trace” tent campers, settled in the Upper Delaware because we fell in love with its natural beauty. We camped at the local campgrounds each summer, as our children were growing. We wanted to instill a love and reverence for the outdoors. We camped, we hiked, we explored, we rejuvenated. With no money for big vacations, tent camping was affordable and we did it often.

Camp FIMFO will shut out those, like us, who want to experience and revere nature often with their families. We did not want our children to think that nature was a water park or a theme park, and now that we are seniors, we do not want our grandkids to think that either.

On November 10, 2024, the Upper Delaware Scenic and Recreational River celebrated its 46th anniversary as part of the National Wild and Scenic River System. In 1978 Congress and President Jimmy Carter added 73 miles of the Delaware River to the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System. Less than one-half of one percent of the nation’s rivers are included in this designation.

The act that created the National Park System’s Wild and Scenic River system reads:

“It is hereby declared to be the policy of the United States that certain selected rivers of the Nation which, with their immediate environments, possess outstandingly remarkable scenic, recreational, geologic, fish and wildlife, historic, cultural, or other similar values, shall be preserved in free-flowing condition, and that they and their immediate environments shall be protected for the benefit and enjoyment of present and future generations.”

The National Park Service has made its opposition to Camp FIMFO clear. The FIMFO $40 million “renovation” conflicts with NPS’s guidelines for managing the Upper Delaware. The NPS has deemed the 148 RVs to be permanent structures. This, and its out-of-place character, disqualifies this project from the area.

The scenic beauty of the Delaware River and its gifts must be preserved at all costs, for everyone, in perpetuity. This beautiful, natural, pristine river deserves better and so do its inhabitants, both human and wild. A moratorium on this type of development and an updated comprehensive plan for the river corridor must be implemented immediately.

Camp FIMFO is the largest proposed development project ever along the Upper Delaware River. This project, cloaked as just a renovation of an existing campground, is anything but. It is a theme park. Visit campfimfo.com. And tell us, why is FIMFO, a national corporation, being offered a tax abatement?

The above is an abbreviated version of comments submitted to the Town of Highland Planning Board by Jane Cyphers and Joseph Levine of Damascus Citizens for Sustainability.