Local Hero Honored For Environmentalism, Moriches Bay Project

WESTHAMPTON BEACH, NY — To mark Women's History Month, the Westhampton Free Library is set to honor a community hero who has made great strides toward protecting the area's natural resources.

As part of its new community recognition initiative, the library will honor its second local hero, Laura Fabrizio, co-founder of the Moriches Bay Project, on March 14 at 7 p.m.

Fabrizio was selected by the library’s adult services department for her commitment and dedication to raising public awareness regarding the state of local waterways through educational programming, organizers of the event said.

“The library has worked with Laura Fabrizio on a number of projects over the years and has always been impressed and awed by her determination,” said Library Director Danielle Waskiewicz. “She is well-deserving of this recognition.”

Five years ago, Fabrizio and Aram Terchunian, owner of First Coastal Corporation, co-founded the Moriches Bay Project with the help of Senior Library Director Dwight Surgan, a release for the event said; the nonprofit has grown to also include Director James Hulme.

"Together, the quartet has cultivated the initiative, which works to improve water quality through education, outreach and the restoration of oyster populations," the release said.

In 2017, the program doubled the number of oysters it seeded into Moriches Bay to 400,000, held numerous educational workshops and provided educational programming to 15 schools, the release said. Additionally, the project monitors two new nitrogen tracking systems and is collaborating with researchers to study eelgrass restoration.

And the work is just beginning, said Fabrizio, who added that the Moriches Bay Project has future goals to seed 500,000 more oysters into the bay to naturally filter water and absorb nitrogen, add a fifth floating upweller system to its oyster farm, increase its water quality monitoring efforts and continue to expand its educational outreach.

“We truly work as a team and couldn’t do all of this without the generous support of community members and businesses,” said Fabrizio.

Fabrizio helped pioneer the Moriches Bay Project while working as a senior vice president at J. Crew in New York City. She left that position in 2016 to focus more on the Moriches Bay Project while simultaneously opening her own business, Coastal Concierge Management.

“I thank the library for recognizing the efforts of the Moriches Bay Project,” said Fabrizio. “We are honored.”

Photo courtesy of the Moriches Bay Project.