 |
Woods & Wetlands
News
|
|
Joining Illinois Sierra Club Members in Lake and Northeastern Cook Counties
February, 1997, Issue #20
In This Issue
|
 |
CALENDAR: Meetings & Outings
|
|
Newsletter Editor Needed
|
|
Woods & Wetlands on the World Wide Web
|
|
Success in Glenview
|
|
Ecosystem Partnership
|
|
W&W Goes 100% PC
|
|
Zion Closing Not Soon Enough
|
|
The Untold Costs of Electricity
|
|
Renewables Are Ready
|
|
Send Us Your E-mail Address
|
|
Join the Club, Get Involved !
|
|
Contributions Welcome!
|
If you love nature, you’ll love our summer calendar. Outstanding speakers
prime us for Visit Your Forest Preserves, a series of outings. These culminate
in June and July with Forest Preserve Adventures, where we will experience
nature on her own terms.
Restoration is alive and burning in Lake County, and the return of native
species depend on techniques that are being challenged in Cook County.
Steve Packard will explain why and how to defend these practices. Then
Dr. Ware will show us the role of oak trees in the restored environment.
In July, Ken Klick, who has been out doing a lot of spring burning, will
double as a speaker and outings guide for a special Forest Preserve Adventure.
Visit Your Forest Preserve Beginning on April 26th, there will be a
hike every 4th Saturday at a different Forest Preserve. Each one will start
at 9:00 a.m. at the trailhead, last for an hour or so, and cover about
3 miles. All are welcome. Please contact the leader to confirm, and
to help limit the group to 20. See |VYFP on Calendar, and the cover page
for how to contact us. Check the Hot-Line or Web for locations TBD.
O Forest Preserve Adventures will explore our Forest Preserve as they
naturally occur. They will last longer, start at varying times, and be
somewhat more challenging than our VYFP outings. Contact us for more information,
directions, and to sign up.
More outings are being planned, and more will be planned if there is
a demand. Find out and speak out through the Hot-Line, or our web page.
These Sierra Club sponsored outings are each led by a certified outings
leader.
Newsletter Editor Needed
The newsletter continues to be our only method for reaching all of our
members. We need help to continue producing a high quality document. If
you are familiar with a word processing program, such as WORD, or WordPerfect,
please volunteer to be our newsletter editor. The editor receives articles
and graphics from group leaders, members, and guests, and arranges it into
this format. If you have access to e-mail, you can easily collaborate with
the present editor, and others who want to help, for proofreading, grammatical
editing, clip art, and other skills you are unsure of yourself. Our printer
also uses e-mail, which makes it easy to send them the final documents.
Count on plenty of help if you need it getting started. Contact Evan (auk@interaccess.com),
or any Group leader, if you’d like to help out.
Woods & Wetlands on the World Wide Web
There are a few things we can’t tell you in our newsletter. We can’t say
that we didn’t cause pollution on printing and distribution. We can’t say
that we got the news to you in less than three weeks. And we can’t say
that we didn’t spend hundreds of dollars on postage. Using WWWWW, these
are things we can tell you. If you haven’t tried "surfing the web" on the
Internet, get your kids to show you how. Most libraries have web "browsing"
(which is the same as "surfing") systems that you can use for free. Besides
reducing pollution and costs, you can get up-to-the-minute information
on, among thousands of other things, activities of the Woods & Wetlands
Group!
WWWWW has been up since mid March, and already contains a wealth of
information. By simply clicking, you can find out about Meetings, Outings,
Alerts, I-TAN, and the Photo-Club. There’s also a section that tells how
to contact the W&W leaders. We will be relying on WWWWW, and the Hot-Line,
to publicize stuff that isn’t ready, can’t fit, or can’t be printed in
this newsletter. This will include:
-
locations for VYFP’s (see p.1) and other Outings,
-
Meeting topics that miss deadline,
-
threatened natural areas that our members tell us about (maybe in YOUR
back yard),
-
color photos from members of W&W
Perhaps the best thing about WWWWW is how easy it is to contact us. Just
clicking on a leader’s name automatically enters the address; all you do
is type your message and hit send.
New material is being added to WWWWW every week or so. If you’re doing
something environmental that might interest other members, please get in
touch, even if you don’t yet surf. We might add it to the "web page."
You can get to WWWWW in many ways. The most direct is to type the following
location (URL) into your browser: http://www.sierraclub.org/chapters/il/w&w/
If this doesn’t work, you probably made a typo. Lucky you can also get
there by using Alta Vista, a "search engine," to search for Sierra Club
Woods & Wetlands . When you get a list of sites, click on the one that
mentions Lake County. If even this eludes you, get in touch with Evan (see
the back page) by e-mail or phone.
In addition to WWWWW, you can get current information by using a touch-tone
phone to call the Hot-Line. Just dial 847-680-6437, and follow the menus.
Success in Glenview
Local resident Jane Rans reports that advice and support from W&W has
prompted the Army Corps of Engineers to suspend planned development of
the retired Glencoe airbase. The base has several natural wetland areas
that provide open space and run-off retention. Development plans were in
motion which ignored earlier approved plans to preserve the open space.
This is a typical case where a watchful resident noticed development outpacing
approved plans. If you think this might be happening in your area, call
the John Massman, or the Hot-Line.
Ecosystem Partnership
by Carol Sonnenschein
Cooperative ecosystem management is a new approach to the problems associated
with sustaining complex natural systems. In Lake County, a new organization
based on this strategy, called the Wisconsin-Illinois Upper Des Plaines
River Ecosystem Partnership, has been formed. The partnership includes
the Liberty Prairie Foundation, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Lake
County Stormwater Management Commission, the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional
Planning Commission and a number of other groups with an interest in improving
the quality of life within the watershed. Administered by the Illinois
Department of Natural Resources, the Ecosystems Program provides
financial and technical support to groups that seek to maintain and enhance
ecological and economic conditions in key watersheds. The program is funded
under Conservation 2000, a multi-year initiative developed in 1994 by Governor
Edgar to preserve and restore Illinois’ natural resources.
The goals of the Wisconsin-Illinois Upper Des Plaines River Ecosystem
Partnership are:
-
Wildlife habitat and open space protection and restoration
-
Floodplain and stormwater management
-
Water quality improvement and reduction of soil erosion
-
Enhancement of recreational opportunities
-
Integration of appropriate economic development and land use in rural and
urban areas
-
Demonstration of the feasibility of interstate and public/private partnerships
In March, the partnership received a grant of $95,000 to update wetland
inventory maps, prioritize areas for protection and educate community leaders
and the public about the functions and value of wetlands. The partnership
welcomes ideas for future collaborative projects.
Carol is Project Coordinator of the Wisconsin-Illinois Upper Des
Plaines River Ecosystem Partnership, and was our Program Meeting Speaker
in April. For more information, please contact Carol Sonnenschein, Project
Coordinator, at 847-548-4062.
W&W Goes 100% PC
Post Consumer, that is. Most "recycled" paper is made mostly from fibers
that have never left the paper mill. And typical white paper has been bleached
with chlorine, usually accompanied by release of dioxin into the environment.
Thanks to a 3-way collaboration, the paper you’re looking at is made 100%
from unbleached, post consumer recycled paper. After a tip from Mark Loughmiller
(SWALCO), W&W teamed up with Amerikal Paper of Mundelein, and Irving
Cloud, our printer, to go 100% PC. This paper looks better, costs less,
saves trees, and reduces pollution. During the effort, experts at Amerikal
offered tips to our printer that will help him run lighter weight paper
through his presses - a conserving option for his other customers. Thanks
to Charles Wilson at Irving Cloud for his extra effort.
Could you use this paper at your company?
Zion Closing Not Soon Enough
It was no surprise to hear that ComEd will be closing Zion several years
ahead of schedule. 
The
high cost of electricity generated by these miserably operated reactors
makes them indefensible in the approaching deregulated electric power market.
The considerable risk they continue to pose to the surrounding highly populated
area, in terms of the likelihood of a reactor containment failure, and
the storage and transport of high level radioactive waste, makes anyone
with common sense shudder.
The ill-conceived Yucca Mountain Nevada transfer and storage scheme
passed the Senate over the objection of Senator Richard Durbin, with an
aye from Carol Moseley-Braun. An earlier closing would end the hideous
suspense, and stop the accumulation of waste that no one knows what to
do with.
The Untold Costs of Electricity
Cost estimates used to compare new energy sources to replace nuclear and
dirty coal overlook the environmental costs of extraction of fossil fuels,
the pollution that results from burning them, and the unknown costs of
disposing of radioactive waste. These costs are paid through federal taxes,
health problems, destruction of our public lands and depletion of their
resources for ridiculously low fees. A truly competitive economy in electric
power will include these costs in the price paid at the meter.
Renewables Are Ready
Wind, solar, and other renewable energy sources approach the artificially
low costs of fossil fuel (coal) without burdening us with the "external"
costs of pollution, environmental destruction, and resource depletion.
For this reason, renewables are the low cost energy source for the 21st
century.
Join Sierra Club !
INVITE A FRIEND TO JOIN SIERRA CLUB TODAY
 When you or your
friend join Sierra Club, it helps make the Club stronger. When you do it
using a W&W form, more of your membership contribution goes to W&W
for local action. Copy this invitation into an e-mail to your friends and
edit it so they know it's from you. E-mail
your friend.
Friend -
I belong to the Sierra Club Woods & Wetlands because it helps me
understand, enjoy, and protect our environment. The Woods & Wetlands
Group organizes members from Lake and NE Cook counties for local events,
outings and actions. Membership includes the benefits of the national Club:
Outings, Sierra magazine, and involvement with national issues. Visit their
websites: http://www.sierraclub.org/chapters/il/w&w/ and you'll see
what I mean. I hope you'll consider helping to protect our environment
and become a member. |
Send Us Your E-mail Address
In an effort to cut costs and improve effectiveness, we are giving you
the option of receiving issues of this W&W News on our Web site, with
e-mail notices, instead of by mail. So far only 34 of our 2,000 members
have joined the ALERTS list and requested this option by using their membership
number in place of their lastname (see below).
Members are invited to join the
W&W group's e-mail lists. On the ALERTS list you will receive infrequent
timely posts from the Group Chair (only), primarily on local issues. Some
of these appear on this website, and if you subscribe you will learn about
them in time to help. The ISSUES list allows you to share in a discussion
with other W&Wers. To sign up, click LISTS,
and then, for each one you want to try out, insert your name into these
commands in the body of the message :
SUB IL-WWG-ALERTS firstname lastname
SUB IL-WWG-ISSUES firstname lastname
and send the message.
We do not share e-mail address lists, and you can remove yourself from
either list at any time.
Contributions Welcome
To return to the Main selection page, click Go
Back to Main