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August/September Issue, 2004

Three decades ago, 2 out of 3 students walked or biked to school. Today it’s about 1 out of 10. That’s just one startling fact I learned while researching our cover story (“Something's Afoot”). Apparently, more than half of the students now get to school in some form of private vehicle -- car, van, SUV, etc.

It seems kids are walking to school less for a number of reasons, most of them safety related, but the reliance on automobiles and buses is just one more example of how today’s kids are less active, and one more reason why today’s average 11-year-old boy weighs 11 more pounds than 30 years ago.

The Ecology Center hopes to change some of that as part of an initiative, funded by the Community Foundation of Southeast Michigan, to get kids active in the outdoors again. As one of a dozen “Great Outdoors” programs in the region, we have teamed up with the Ann Arbor Public Schools to create a Walking School Bus. Right now it is a pilot project, but organizers designed it with long-term, district-wide viability in mind.

Like other “walking school buses” and walk-to-school efforts taking place all over the nation, the Ann Arbor Walking School Bus will provide many benefits -- improving the health of participants, and air quality, safety, and traffic congestion in the community. Find out how local organizers are going one step further to make the Ann Arbor program truly unique.

Despite repeated rebukes, environmentalists and public health activists took the fight back to Dow Chemical at its annual shareholder meeting held in Midland, Mich. The May event drew protesters from near and far – including Bhopal, India -- to Dow’s doorstep to pressure the international chemical giant to act more responsibly. Like last year, they asked Dow’s chairman -- to his face -- to own up to Dow’s public health and environmental liabilities. Once again, they were met with subterfuge and obfuscations. Despite the chairman’s refusal to accept responsibility for Dow’s damages, we are gaining ground with the shareholders; enough shareholders voted for a corporate accountability resolution to allow the issue to be brought up again at next year’s meeting... and we will be there again next year to continue the fight.

Another Dow-related report focuses on a June meeting between the governor, the lieutenant governor, the DEQ director, and residents from Dow-affected areas in Michigan. The article details how residents of Midland and the Tittabawassee River flood plain feel about living in dioxin-contaminated communities and what they told the state’s highest officeholder about their fears and hopes forthe future.

Few could possibly envision what lay ahead when Ann Arbor voters last fall overwhelmingly passed the greenbelt and parks program. Read about the latest greenbelt ripple effect in our Huron Valley News column: the defection of pro-environment remodelers from the Home Builders Association, historic opponents of local land-use ballot proposals.

For the latest scoop on the EDS hazardous-waste deep injection well controversy in Romulus, check out our Wayne County News column. The winner-take-all race to Mount Simon between Environmental Disposal Systems and another local business has taken a turn for the worse and could be a deciding factor in the 12-year struggle to keep Michigan’s first commercial hazardous-waste well from opening.

In the minor-bummer news department, turn to our newly revived Cranky Consumer column for an article with an attitude about trendy, “health-conscious” Nalgene water bottles.

For a more uplifting spin, see the reports in the At The Ecology Center section about two very successful fundraising events for the Center -- EcoRide 2004 and the Aveda Earth Month Partnership

There are many more interesting articles and reports throughout this issue of FTGU and we hope you will read them all. A lot of people try very hard to make FTGU a first-rate publication and we strongly urge you to take the time to write and tell us how we’re doing. Comments, questions, criticism, article ideas, layout and format suggestions – any feedback would be deeply appreciated (117 N. Division, Ann Arbor, MI 48104; or email: stephanie@ecocenter.org, ATTN: Editor).

 

-- Ted Sylvester, Editor

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