Judul : Ct Dept Of Public Health
link : Ct Dept Of Public Health
Ct Dept Of Public Health
thank for all those great rivers in connecticut. thank you for long island sound. thank you for the clean air. thanks for our heritage of parks and forests. thank you for our magnificent diversity of plants and animals.
Ct Dept Of Public Health, thanks for the people who are working to help the environment. connecticut has made great progress in cleaning up our air, water and lands since the first earth day in 1970. the 40th anniversary of earth day is a time to celebrate our successes, while recognizing the challenges that we still face.
in the late 1960's, environmental problems had reached a crisis point in our nation. connecticut was a much different place 40 years ago. you had rivers that were still in really poor shape. we had let the condition of rivers deteriorate and i can remember canoeing the connecticut river and in the hartford area, the river stunk. it was the most beautiful open sewer in america. because at the that time the first thing you did if you happened to unfortunately fall off your boat into the river, would be to go to your doctor for a hepatitis shot and heaven knows what. and at that time, high sulfur coal was being burned. pollution controls were, "well, don't worry about it too much because you'll notice how tall that smokestack is, so that it's sending the smoke
high in the atmosphere so you don't have to worry about it getting down to human consumption." of course, that was gaga land. let me just tell you, that in early 70s if you went out to your car and you rubbed your fingers across the front of your car, it was covered with soot. those were very distinct pollution products. i think in general on so many issues we were actually clueless. things like hazardous waste were a problem then, nobody even talked about them. we had no bottle bill then, we were still tossing things into dumps. we took our waste to a pile of garbage that was accumulated during the week and typically on the
weekends for some reason they would set fire to this thing and you would have an open fire burning not just garbage but whatever industrial waste there was, whatever anybody had to throw out. smoggy cities and polluted rivers were all too common a sight. toxic chemicals were killing off fish and wildlife. connecticut, new york, and new jersey where the heaviest concentrations of ddt in the food chain were, were losing the osprey population big time. the bald eagle was in serious trouble and was gone from connecticut. we had some terrible fish kills and we discovered and realized that we had to deal with the issue. connecticut has a long history of active conservation efforts, some of which go back to the 1880s.
but it was the widespread pollution problems of the 60s that motivated more people to get involved, ultimately making connecticut a leader in environmental policy. john dempsey is the governor, he calls a big meeting in his office and says you know, the public is really getting riled about this whole environmental situation and we should do something about it. they came out with a big report about a year later that called for all kinds of changes in connecticut environmentally. we'd had in the 60s a wonderful report called the whyte report that really anticipated a lot of issues that became national issues after earth day. earth day was the brainchild of wisconsin senator gaylord nelson who was troubled that the
environment was a non-issue in the politics of our country. in september 1969, he announced that there would be a nationwide grassroots demonstration to show support for the environment and he invited everyone to participate. on april 22, 1970, 20 million people held protests, teach-ins, and organized events such as clean-ups and tree plantings. at the time, earth day was the largest public demonstration on any issue in our nation's history. the corporate response was in my judgment, small potatoes. what really was the response was the youth, and well people across the country, particularly the youth. the guy, most responsible for that within our group was a man named denis hayes. and denis was terrific. he organized a very, very effective response nationwide on that day. and if nothing else, that woke up a number of
people before who had been asleep. the people of connecticut, energized by earth day, acted on the issues raised in governor dempsey's report. they advocated for groundbreaking environmental legislation, including the creation of the department of environmental protection. we have a large community of people who enjoy the outdoors and want a healthy environment. that's translated politically into some innovative laws that have improved the environment in connecticut. and we were doing some really interesting cutting-edge stuff that made me feel very proud. connecticut has a proud and lengthy history as a national leader in water quality management. in 1967, we passed the state clean water act, which required improved treatment of sewage and industrial
wastewater. this act became a model for the federal clean water act of 1972. the willimantic river was a fairly polluted river because of that sewage pollution coming in from stafford until that point. that sewage treatment plant went on line and the water quality changed dramatically. and they stocked trout in the willimantic river for the first time in a long time. to this day, it's just a very popular recreational river in eastern connecticut. i certainly think there has been a difference in the whole issue that swirls around long island sound. because long island sound is such an asset to the people of connecticut, it's not only a wonderful place to swim and boat and do all that good stuff, but really from an economic development point of view, it's very important. and boy, it's worth protecting.
as we cleaned up the rivers in connecticut, we also recognized the important role of wetlands in protecting water quality. in the past, wetlands were used as dumps or simply filled in. connecticut passed the tidal wetlands act in 1969, followed by the inland wetlands and watercourses act in 1972. these laws placed our state in the forefront of wetlands protection efforts. in the early 70s, connecticut began monitoring air quality and adopted regulations to reduce emissions from the combustion of fuels. we were doing some of the easier things to tackle air pollution. we were beginning to tackle particulates in the air, soot, and dealing with that and it was making a difference. one of things that was leveled against me in the 70s was, what are you trying to do with 0.5
percent sulfur content in fuel burned for electricity because it doesn't make any difference what we do, we're still going to get dirty from our neighbor states. now the air quality in connecticut has improved and we were first on that, not very popular, but first. open burning of waste was another source of air pollution that was addressed in the mid 70s. regulations helped replace open burning of garbage with burial in landfills. the days of landfills were numbered however, because they threatened to contaminate our drinking water. instead of burying our waste, connecticut developed a system of recycling and trash-to-energy plants. when it comes to waste, out of sight, out of mind doesn't work. there is no away, that stuff is going to be there and it's going to impact the environment. it's so important that we safely
dispose of all those things. in order to address the mismanagement of industrial waste, connecticut adopted hazardous waste regulations in 1983. however, because of the state's history as a leading manufacturing center, there are still hundreds of former industrial sites that are contaminated. a neighbor down slope from a very, very responsible company was having skin problems. we looked into the history of this company and we discovered that predecessors had used acid vats and when they were through with these vats, they went into their own backyard, they dug a hole and they put the spent vats in the hole, covered it over and they were gone, nobody knew about them. this was not yet understood problem at the time of the original earth day and it's something that we are
still dealing with today. it pays to do it right in the first place. clean up is always five times, ten times, twenty times as expensive. connecticut passed landmark legislation in the 1990s to encourage clean up and redevelopment of contaminated sites, known as brownfields. there are success stories throughout the state and we continue to work on challenging issues facing our urban landscapes. in connecticut, i think that one of our biggest successes was passing the environmental justice law and there is nothing like it anywhere in the country. in environmental justice we define environment as the places where we live, work and play. in north hartford, they wanted build on this
a contaminated brownfield site and we were very concerned particularly because they wanted to put the playground on an area that had been one of the most contaminated areas. it's very difficult to get the people involved, especially in urban neighborhoods because they're just looking at it like there's nothing we can do. no, there is something you can do. we were able to suggest that they move the playground and daycare to a part of the property that had never been contaminated before. so we are oftentimes able to come to good solutions and they agreed to do that. connecticut has recently focused on incorporating smart growth principles in the state's plan of conservation and development. as we plan for the future, redeveloping brownfields is just one of
the ways to encourage economic growth while protecting our open spaces. forty years ago, one of the things that people got involved in the environmental movement over was the protection of open space. but over the forty years, the whole notion of land and land use has really evolved. open space is part of a large sustainable environmental system where we put the development where it belongs -- that you're going have development, but for goodness sake, put it where the infrastructure already exists. the big issue is where we develop and how we develop not whether we develop because we all know we do need to develop. when development is poorly planned and pushes into the state's remaining natural areas, it can have
far reaching impacts on our land, air, water and wildlife. although clean-up and conservation efforts have to brought back wild turkeys, bald eagles and other species, sprawl continues to pose a threat to wildlife. there are a whole group of wildlife species that are declining that we don't see every day. this is a box turtle. as we expand our roads and as we develop the landscape into more of a patchwork, these turtles tend to get in trouble because they are moving across the landscape. and when we see problems that these individual species are having and especially when we look at them as a group, and we see that its not just the turtles, we know that there's something larger happening to that ecosystem and that obviously has ramifications for us as humans as well because we share that
ecosystem. i do remember that from earth day, that we're part of that ecosystem. as we celebrate earth day 40, connecticut is facing more complex environmental issues. it will take everyone's help to continue protecting connecticut's environment for our enjoyment and that of future generations. there are big challenges ahead. how we're going to move the planet towards real sustainability. there's been a lot of focus on climate change and the need to control greenhouse gas emissions and that is important. that's a big challenge for the next decade and beyond. but there's also a big challenge around things like protecting our water, protecting local airsheds, ensuring reduced toxic exposures, ensuring the safety of our food supply and protecting natural resources, our parks
and our open space. so it's a big agenda. how we heat our homes, how we design our homes, how we design communities, we have for so many years have designed entire communities around the automobile and we have to really start rethinking that. one thing we think about is cars being a big source of greenhouse gases and get people to try to walk and use bicycles. well that has healthful benefits. we started a little organization called little people, big changes. we try to raise awareness to help the environment. well, we started by doing a no idle campaign to get people to stop idling their cars, which wastes gas and puts harmful emissions into the atmosphere.
in three years we've done a lot for the clean energy signups and we've gotten 250 signups. saving energy is great for the environment. we all kind of can be reminded of how it is great for our wallets to save money every month. but if were able to reduce the amount of energy we use, we reduce the amount of energy that we need to generate. here in connecticut we have fabulous opportunities. we're leaders already in a lot of aspects of clean energy. there are increased opportunities to invest in energy efficiency in every aspect of our lives, in our homes, in our businesses, in our schools. this is a zero energy house. we don't burn any fuel so we don't have any pollutants going out into the world. and since we're making all our own electricity, we're not even taking our power
from power plants. houses don't need to be zero energy. we kind of wanted to meet the extreme so that everybody could see --well, gosh if this is the extreme; i can do less than that and have a wonderful house, right? --yes absolutely. for the next couple of years, one of the most important links is from environment protection to jobs and economic growth. we can actually grow jobs in connecticut, we can help the bottom line in our expenditures, how much we have to spend on energy in buildings by thinking green. emsar is a company that thinks green and has been manufacturing in connecticut since 1955. it recently received environmental awards for improvements in the way it does business.
they have definitely added up. we are a much more efficient facility than we were and our operating costs have been reduced. we did it because we just feel it's the right thing to do. businesses, communities, individuals, families, we all have a role to play. so while we pause to celebrate the forty years since the original earth day, let's look ahead and commit ourselves to making even more progress in the next generation. the kids of today need to know what they can do for the future generations. we're the next generation and it's up to us. i think the environment's definitely worth protecting. it's where we live basically.
we're two six-graders and we've done a lot in three years. one or two people can make a big difference. there's an endless list of things you can do to help the environment. to learn about ways you can help connecticut's environment, visit the connecticut dep's website.
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