Yesterday I went to a public event that celebrated the launch of Ecowatch’s new nationwide news service website. EcoWatch, publisher of EcoWatch Journal which has a distribution of more than 80,000 copies across Ohio, launched its new nationwide news service which will be based in Cleveland.
The website—www.ecowatch.org—went live the morning of Oct. 27 and will unite the voice of the grassroots environmental movement. This will be the first media source to focus exclusively on environmental news from more than 700 environmental organizations across the country.
The site focuses on five critical issue areas—water, air, food, energy and biodiversity—and covers topics including renewable energy, water and air quality, sustainable agriculture, fossil fuel depletion, solution-based sustainability projects, species protection, global warming, climate change and pending legislation.
The site of the event was in Rivergate park, which is near the historic site where the Cuyahoga River caught on fire 42 years ago in June of 1969. This event played a major role in starting modern-day environmental movement and creation of the Clean Water Act.
The event started with short speeches from Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson; Cleveland City Councilman Joe Cimperman; the George Gund Foundation’s Senior Program Officer for the Environment, John Mitterholzer and the Cleveland Foundation’s Program Officer, Nelson Beckford. The speakers commended the work that Ecowatch has done for Ohio, and talked about the potential that the new nationwide website will do for the country. Joe Cimperman showed support for Cleveland saying that, “Cleveland is a place that learns, earns, and shows why the best is yet to come.”
The keynote speaker at the event was Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., founder and president of Waterkeeper Alliance. Kennedy talked about how the environmental movement is not about protecting animals – but people. He talked about how the parks, rivers, and waterways are assets of the community – and assets of the people. “We don’t have to choose between good environmental policy and good economic policy – we can have both,” Kennedy stated. He then talked about how the environment is an investment and will create economic prosperity in the future.
He talked about the power of grassroots organizing – and talked about what it was like before Earth Day in 1970. Lake Erie was called “dead,” you could not swim in the Hudson and other rivers, large cities had smog so bad that you would get black soot on your clothing, and most waterways were polluted. He talked about the Cuyahoga River burning in Cleveland – and that this was the catalyst for 10 million people going out into the streets demanding rights to clean waterways and fisheries.
Kennedy mentioned throughout history – all tyrannies take away public access to wildlife and waterways – and that it is time for us to take this back. He went to say, “At this time all of the Great Lakes have fish that are deemed to be uneatable, and we need to continue to fight the polluters!”
After the event, I was able to walk by the banks of the Cuyahoga River in the park, which had a quiet but strong presence at the event.
Links: