An issue of justice

I don’t understand how our governor can push for marriage equality while determining that otherwise there are two classes of citizens in New York: those who get to drink safe water and those who don’t.

We in Syracuse, apparently, are First Class Citizens, along with those living in New York City.  The rest of you living in . . . → Read More: An issue of justice

I love my New York water, too

. . . → Read More: I love my New York water, too

If you don’t know how to fix it, please stop breaking it

One of the most riveting speeches I have ever heard, and only 6 minutes long. Given by a 12-year-old at the 1992 UN Earth Summit in Brazil. Please watch this:

Now please put a 1-hour break from life on your calendar:

Tuesday, March 22, 5:30 – 6:15 pm
Thornden Park Water Tower (all the way up to the top . . . → Read More: If you don’t know how to fix it, please stop breaking it

Lifton Calls For Public Hearing on Hydrofracking

Radioactivity in the air or in the water is something neither we nor the Japanese ever thought we’d have to face. Nuclear reactors in earthquake zones suddenly don’t make sense. Did hydro-fracking ever make sense? Your presence at Tuesday’s rally will make a difference (see below). Please read the following (bolding mine):

Lifton Calls For Public . . . → Read More: Lifton Calls For Public Hearing on Hydrofracking

Is Horseheads too far away for us to care?

It’s happening to them, not me. They are far away. Not my concern. It’s too big an issue to wrap my mind around it. It’s so bad, it can’t actually be happening. It’s someone else’s job to make sure this doesn’t happen here. Our state government will protect us from it.

Yeah, right.

On Tuesday, March 22, at . . . → Read More: Is Horseheads too far away for us to care?

Rally to Protect NYS from Radioactive Fracking Waste

Following is all the text from an email I got today. I have no need to add to it:

Rally to Protect NYS from Radioactive Fracking Waste

Tuesday, March 22nd
5:30 – 6:15 pm
Thornden Park Water Tower

Thornden Park, off of Beech St. and Ostrom, near SU
Call 470-0778

Call for clean, safe water, air and food

No to Hydro-Fracking
No to radioactive and . . . → Read More: Rally to Protect NYS from Radioactive Fracking Waste

Burning the furniture to heat the house

The environmental disaster created by hydrofracking has finally hit the front page of the New York Times. It’s a lot worse than we’ve been led to believe.

“We’re burning the furniture to heat the house,” said John H. Quigley, who left last month as secretary of Pennsylvania’s Department of Conservation and Natural Resources.

The NY Times has done . . . → Read More: Burning the furniture to heat the house

NYS Senate votes to ban fracking for 1 year

A huge step in the right direction was taken last night by the New York State Senate when they voted to put a moratorium on hydro-fracking for one year so that there might be time for further study.

New York Times
N.Y. Senate Approves Fracking Moratorium

Over two thirds of our Senators, including 28 Democrats and 20 Republicans, voted . . . → Read More: NYS Senate votes to ban fracking for 1 year

Fracking in my back yard

NIMBY: Not In My Back Yard.  But fracking already is in the back yard: Pennsylvania. Soon to be in New York if we do not act.

Why will I fail to act? Because disaster this preposterous just can’t happen in my back yard. I can’t believe it. I can’t wrap my mind around it.

Right. Tell that to . . . → Read More: Fracking in my back yard

Extreme energy = extreme disasters

Watching the oil disaster playing out in an area of the country that feeds millions of people, we ask ourselves, why wasn’t this prevented? We know oil rigs blow up, we know that our dependence on oil creates environmental disasters year after year. How long will it be before our seas be unable to recover from . . . → Read More: Extreme energy = extreme disasters

Can you do this with your tap water?

Only you and your neighbors can stop hydrofracking in Onondaga County (our drinking water’s watershed). Your government (Albany) is dysfunctional and too busy figuring out the economic mess.

Think this (below) can’t happen to us?

If not, what are you thinking?

CAN YOU DO THIS WITH YOUR TAP WATER? from JOSHFOX on Vimeo.

Read and learn:

Catskill Mountain Keeper WORKING TOGETHER . . . → Read More: Can you do this with your tap water?

BPA: now this is scary!

Some time ago I started posting about our efforts to get the plastic out of our lives. One of the reasons was to avoid BPA, bisphenol-A, which is toxic and is found in water bottles, baby bottles, toys, even the lining of tin cans. All of the drinks in our household now are held only in glass: Continue reading BPA: now this is scary!

Doing without plastic

Some time ago, I got to posting on giving up plastic, especially when it might touch food. Now that there are more young families moving into Eastwood, it might be a good time to revisit this idea. Plastics break down, and there really is no safe amount of plastic molecules that you’d want in your body, much less baby’s.

Continue reading Doing without plastic

Beyond blue-bin recycling

If you don’t  use it in the first place, you don’t have to even recycle it. So we like buying milk in returnable glass bottles. No chance of plastics molecules ending up in our bodies (unless the cows are somehow ingesting it) and the milk tastes better.

If you don’t throw it away, but rather re-use it . . . → Read More: Beyond blue-bin recycling

Eastwood Pride Day

Continue reading Eastwood Pride Day

Earth Hour downtown: SU gets F-plus

For all its connectivity to downtown, how is it that Syracuse University blew the exam on global warming?  Last evening, people in great cities large and small throughout the world participated in Earth Hour. We decided to do the same, turned off all our lights and headed downtown, expecting to see people walking in the balmy evening, enjoying the 60-minute relief from light pollution, maybe even talking to each other in candle-lit bars and restaurants.

Continue reading Earth Hour downtown: SU gets F-plus

Syracuse Brownfield Opportunity Area

I’m sure there has been mention of this in the press, and perhaps some members of the reading public have been to meetings about it, but I completely missed this one:

Syracuse Brownfield Opportunity Area

Steve Skinner, owner of the Eastwood Plaza, brought it to my attention. The big question is: opportunity for whom?  And:

What impact will it . . . → Read More: Syracuse Brownfield Opportunity Area

You can help prevent increased snowfalls

For many of us living in the city, the closest we come to the power of nature is its power to give us a serious backache as we lift seemingly endless shovelsful of snow out of our driveways and off our sidewalks. It’s a fact of life in Syracuse that affects us a lot more slowly than the tornadoes, floods and fires affect other parts of the country, but one we deal with nevertheless. And it’s getting worse.

Continue reading You can help prevent increased snowfalls

How much more can we take?

Online Climate Time Machine

I get a newsletter from the Organic Consumers Association. In today’s note, we are told:

“NASA has launched a website that provides a dramatic visualization of temperature change, sea level rise, co2 emissions, and ice melt from the beginning of the industrial revolution to the present.”

Give it a try (the link at the top . . . → Read More: How much more can we take?

“Save The Planet: Live In a City”

Here in Walkable Eastwood, we’ve known for about 150 years that it’s easy and quick to get from here to just about any place in the Syracuse metropolitan area. We have the lush green of a suburban setting but the proximity to all the necessities and many of the joys of life. This “village within the city” was developed at a time when there was no gasoline and no cars. Just feet and public transportation, unless you happened to have a horse. This is old urbanism at its finest, residential and business development on a human scale. Continue reading “Save The Planet: Live In a City”