Earth Week Begins

This week is Earth Week and April 22nd is Earth Day. 

There are many things to note, many to celebrate and many things that can bring you down if you let them.


We will highlight some of those things this week and try to find a path to the light at the end of this week. Barring any local disasters, we'll find some hope for our environment. 


Hang in there Shoreline Area. Don't give up hope even though that is sometimes tempting. Things may seem bleak at times in the rainy spring of 2011 and in the middle of the "so-called" economic recovery.


But, if you look at things in the right light you can find rays of sunshine!

Bright Morning Sunshine Across Paramount Park
ph credit-Janet Way

For starters for Earthweek, here is a fascinating story in Pacific NW Magazine of Seattle Times, of a guy who just keep plodding along on the Duwamish River in what seems like a thankless and impossible task......cleaning up a century of pollution. But is he discouraged? No? He just keeps picking up trash every day.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/pacificnw/2014703392_pacificpduwamish17.html?cmpid=2628

Reclaiming the Duwamish River

Mostly to satisfy his own obsession, West Seattle sailor Neal Chism has made almost 90 trips down the Duwamish in 2-1/2 years, trying to rid its banks of debris.

By Craig Welch

Neal Chism uses his homemade grabby tool to pull trash out of the Duwamish,
a task he has set for himself and repeats week after week,
cleaning the same places over and over, for free.
Overall cleanup of the river will require an
abundance of persistence.

photographed by Tom Reese

THE GARBAGE man needs another tool.

He stands in a parking lot at the southern tip of Harbor Island, gazing at the muddy Duwamish River below. Even before shoving off to find the trashiest spots on our dirtiest waterway, Neal Chism already packs quite a load. He's tucked five empty black trash bags into his waistband. On his chest he wears a personal flotation device. In one hand he holds a five-gallon bucket. In the other he's wedged the day's most important weapon: a pair of pincers attached to a shaft of wood — a homemade trash picker-upper.

But Chism has made this journey so often he can sense he's missing something. He hovers in a square of sun for a minute, then pops the hatch on the white Rav4 he calls Snowball. He pulls out a red medical-waste container and carts it by the handle like it was a child's lunch box.

"Almost forgot," he says, rattling it with a grin. "For the syringes."

Ten years into a massive federally directed cleanup effort on the Duwamish, it's hard to ignore that progress has been made. Fresh grass and picnic tables sprout from waterfront parks. Ospreys are back, and their fish diets contain fewer pollutants. Boeing last year settled a long-fought suit with the federal government and agreed to create new wetlands. Contractors are ripping out a World War II-era warehouse that leached poisonous solvents where workers built B-17s.

Southwoods Makes the News!

Hey Shoreline! Southwoods and Hamlin recommended trails in Seattle Times! 

South Woods Preservation Group

Southwoods Park became a park a few years ago because of the efforts of many people, including, South Woods Preservation Group (SWPG), the 2006 Openspace, Parks and Rec Bond, Shoreline voters and taxpayers, City of Shoreline and originally, the students and staff of Shorecrest SAFE Club.

At Southwoods, SWPG members and neighbors have spent countless hours fighting to control the invasive plants like English Ivy, English Holly, and Cherry Laurel among others.

It could just as easily have been a housing development if it were up to the school district and water district!

Be proud!

Dogwoods and Planted Swale by City with pervious
paved sidewalk - Southwoods Park 2009
ph cr - Vicki Westberg

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/outdoors/2014699243_nwwwalkabout07.html

Walkabout

Enjoy family-friendly Hamlin Park and South Woods

Hamlin Park and South Woods in Shoreline offer easy walks for families with kids.

By Cathy McDonald

Special to The Seattle Times

Where: Hamlin Park and South Woods

Location: 1653 N.E. 168th St., Shoreline.

Length: About three miles of trail; South Woods has a central paved trail running north-south that bisects the park and connects to a about a mile of dirt/gravel trails, with a paved pedestrian path on the south edge along Northeast 150th Street.

Difficulty: Level-to-moderate.

Setting: This 80-acre park is a forested haven for birds and people within a neighborhood of single-family homes. Bring your kids to walk the trails, listen for woodpeckers, climb the play structures, and watch a young batter hit a homer at the ballfield. In the last few years, park trails have been spiffed up with wooden bridges over mucky areas and new steps for climbing the steeper grades. South Woods, a 16-acre area south of Shorecrest High School, was recently added to the park system.

Highlights: This area was part of the Hamlin family homestead, which was logged during the last part of the 19th century. The current second-growth forest is a little more than 100 years old. The Shoreline neighborhood was settled in the early 1900s, aided by the Interurban streetcar line that extended north from Seattle. The U.S. Navy purchased the land in 1923, and constructed a hospital complex and housing (including six houses and an officer's barracks in South Woods).

After World War II, the land was used as a state hospital and sanitarium into the 1960s. Much of the eastern portion was transferred to the local school district (and Shorecrest High School and Kellogg Middle School were built). In the 1980s, the Navy transferred South Woods to the state. The high school's environmental club and a neighborhood group stopped the property from being developed in the 1990s, and the city finally acquired the land in 2007.

Facilities: Restrooms and playgrounds at Hamlin Park.

Restrictions: Leash and scoop laws in effect.

Directions: From Interstate 5, take Exit 175 and head east on Northeast 145th Street. Turn left on 15th Avenue Northeast, then turn right into Hamlin Park at Northeast 160th Street (trail access is best from the first parking lot). To reach South Woods, turn right off 15th Avenue Northeast on Northeast 150th Street, turn left on 25th Avenue Northeast, and turn left into Shorecrest High School (where you can park after school hours).

More information: 206-801-2700 or www.cityofshoreline.com.

Renton-based freelancer Cathy McDonald, a geologist by training, has written about science and nature travel for 20 years. She's currently a travel guidebook editor at Rick Steves' Europe Through the Back Door. Contact her at nwwriter@hotmail.com.

Southwoods Park dedication plaque
ph cr - Janet Way

Nuclear Energy Issues - Japan and Hanford

Everyone in the Northwest is obviously watching with horror the events in Japan. We were actually affected in a minor way watching for the tsunami to reach our shores, but never felt any real impact.

We all probably know someone who either has friends or relatives in Japan. 

The Seattle Times has some incredible photographs today of the disaster, and these give you some sense of the magnitude of this catastrophe. 

KYODO NEWS DISTRIBUTED BY AP

The town of Minamisanriku rests submerged in the tsunami's receding water on Saturday, March 12, 2011, after Friday's strong earthquake triggered a 30-foot tsunami in Miyagi Prefecture, northern Japan.

Everyone feels the anguish of the victims of this tragedy.

But now, the nightmare has deepened. Japan has few homegrown energy resources and has built up quite a large network of Nuclear Plants to produce their own energy. Several of these reactors are in

a crisis of historic proportions right now.  Over 170,000 people have been ordered away from the Fukishima Nuclear sites. Meltdowns and partial meltdowns seem to be underway. "Hail Mary Passes" have been thrown by on site workers, in last ditch efforts to control the overheating of the reactor cores and "venting" of radioactive steam has already been deployed. They've flooded the reactors with seawater, which is guaranteed to destroy the reactor, but not necessarily stop the meltdown. All the expert engineers and nuclear scientists on site, at the NISA (Nuclear Agency) and even the UN are trying to contain the problem, but it seems to be growing in urgency.  

Huffington Post has a recent update. 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/12/japan-earthquake-2011-nuclear-meltdown-threat_n_835002.html

And of course the aftershocks continue, further threatening the nuclear reactors, which ironically do not have any electrical power, and that is why they are overheating.  

Here in the Pacific NW the irony continues since we have our own legacy of the nuclear energy programs. Hanford Nuclear Reservation was the birthplace of nuclear energy and the atomic bomb which devastated two cities in Japan to end WWII. 

Heart of America Northwest is a citizen advocacy group that has been working for many years to guarantee that the clean-up of Hanford is carried out effectively, and to prevent further damage from misuse of the site and impacts of nuclear energy. 

Gerald Pollett is Executive Director of Heart of America and says today,

The Japanese reactor crisis has important implications for Northwest: We recently helped expose how Energy Northwest, formerly WPPSS, was secretly planning to use experimental Plutonium fuel in the commercial reactor at Hanford. This is the same type of experimental Plutonium fuel that is in Reactor 3 in Japan, which news reports this afternoon state, has had its fuel uncovered for several hours and that a partial meltdown and release would be far more catastrophic due to the Plutonium fuel than at the adjoining Reactor 1 (which is the reactor whose sceondary containment building blew up yesterday).

Ironically, we have been working last week to prepare lawsuit over Energy Northwest's falure to provide all public records on its secret plan to use Plutonium fuel, with deadline to file suit this coming week. 

Heart of America is asking supporters and interested citizens to weigh in on the clean up  process underway at Hanford. Upcoming public meetings where you can make a difference -

Join us at public meetings with Hanford and regulator decision makers: Tuesday March 29th Seattle Center Northwest Rooms; Thursday March 31 Portland Red Lion Jantzen Beach Hotel                 town hall style meetings begin 7 PM   open house at 6PM 

Hearing on USDOE's Plan to import and bury EXTREMELY radioactive "GTCC" waste: Portland Thursday May 19th 6:30 PM  Doubletree Hotel Lloyd Center  Fact Sheet click 

UPDATES: Vitrification Plant, HoA's lawsuit to stop USDOE from using Hanford as a National Radioactive Waste Dump, Hanford’s Unlined Trenches: 

click here for  our  Citizens' Guide on the 40 miles of unlined ditches into which radioactive and chemical wastes were dumped for over 30 years.     
                                                                       
 click here for Recommendations on safety - explosion risks - and $12 billion cost of Hanford's Vitrification Plant to turn liquid High-Level Nucelar Waste into glass - on our blog with fun read
The New York Times quoted Heart of America Northwest in a July 11, 2010 article about Hanford, "A New Analysis Triples U.S. Plutonium Waste Figures."  Our testimony to President Obama's Blue Ribbon Commission was also featured on the NY Times Green Blog! 


So the Nuclear Energy issue is back in the spotlight in a big way. People's foggy memories are being jogged with a 2 x 4 to the brain, of past nightmares at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. 


 Of course the nuclear industry wants us all to believe that this is no big deal, and we shouldn't rush to judgement on renewing permits for new nuclear plants in America. The experts say "No Danger" and we should all go back to business as usual. 


What do you think?

Wow! Times Pulls Endorsement of State Supreme Court Justice

The Seattle Times has pulled its endorsement 
of Justice Richard Sanders.

Supreme Court Justice Richard Sanders, made some controversial statements recently, implying
"blacks... [have} a crime problem".

Sanders opponent is Charlie Wiggins, who was endorsed by the 32nd District Democrats.
Mr Wiggins has been championing "judicial independence" as an attorney who practices law and tries cases at the Supreme Court.

Publicola has a brief item on this matter.

http://www.publicola.net/2010/10/25/on-other-sites-seattle-times-pulls-endorsement/

Election 2010, News & Politics

On Other Sites: Seattle Times Pulls Endorsement

By Josh Feit, Monday, October 25, 2010 at 12:57 PM
0 Comments and 0 ReactionsThe Seattle Times has rescinded its endorsement of state Supreme Court Justice Richard Sanders because of recent statements Sanders’ made about blacks having a “crime problem” because they commit a disproportionate percent of crimes—apparently dismissing  long list of social factors, like inadequate legal representation and policing policies, that affect African Americans.

The Times, which pulled its Sanders endorsement yesterday, is now endorsing Sanders’ opponent, Charlie Wiggins.

PubliCola endorsed Wiggins, a Bainbridge Island attorney, as one our early No Brainer PubliCola Picks.