Ideas for Celebrating Earth Hour

On March 28, 2009 at 8:30 pm, tens of millions of people around the world will turn out their lights for one hour — Earth Hour — to demonstrate concern for our living planet and send a loud message to our leaders that they support action on climate change.

Several Ogden Dunes residents have asked for suggestions for things they can specifically do that night. Here are a few ideas for things to do in the dark…by yourself or with others:
1. Enjoy a romantic candlelit dinner with someone special using organic or sustainably grown food items.
2. Invite friends and family over for a "lights-out" party and serve green-themed snacks and drinks—green tea or apple martinis anyone?
3. Turn off the lights and power down the computer and cell phone. Use the quiet time to take a break from a "plugged-in" world by meditating or resting.
4. Take a bubble bath by candlelight.
5. Use the hour for practical tasks that you never seem to have time for. Test essential items in your emergency preparedness kit like flashlights, radios, and cell phones. Change out all your light bulbs to energy-efficient CFLs. Change the batteries in your smoke detectors. Think about how you would evacuate your house in an emergency in the dark.
6. Read a book set in an era without electricity. Marvel that the Romans conquered much of the world without a single cell phone and that Shakespeare wrote masterpieces without a laptop or the Internet.
7. Turn off the computer and write a letter by candlelight the old-fashioned way using pen and paper.
8. Invite friends over to play charades or Scrabble by candlelight.
9. View the night sky via telescope--the reduced "light pollution" may make some stars more visible.
10. Take photos of how you spent Earth Hour and upload them to the Earth Hour pages on Facebook, Myspace and YouTube. Keep it clean please!

Earth Hour is not about how much electricity we can save in one hour. The idea behind Earth Hour is that by working together, each one of us can make a difference on the issue of climate change. By doing something as simple as turning off the lights, we send a visual symbol to the world’s leaders that we are counting on them to work together to find solutions to climate change.

Participate in Earth Hour 2009 on March 28!

The ODEAB announced at the March Town Council meeting that it is officially supporting Earth Hour 2009, a global climate event led by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). More than 240 cities around the world have already committed to go dark for one hour on March 28, 2009 at 8:30 p.m., as tens of millions of people from all corners of the world unite in a call for global action on climate change.

From Amman to Warsaw, city and town skylines will go dark for one hour as individuals, businesses, government buildings, schools and major landmarks turn off non-essential lighting in what will be the largest climate event in history. (Don’t worry: the streetlights will remain on!)

“World Wildlife Fund is pleased that Ogden Dunes is taking part in Earth Hour 2009. As lights go out in cities around the U.S. and the world on March 28th, Earth Hour will provide world leaders with an unmistakable mandate to take action,” said WWF President and CEO Carter Roberts. “The climate crisis threatens the ability of our planet to support its inhabitants. We want the world to know that Americans care about saving the planet and stand united in seeking to find solutions to climate change.”

During Earth Hour 2008, more than 50 million people in 400 cities on all seven continents turned off their lights as major icons also went dark, including the Sydney Opera House, the Coliseum in Rome, Stockholm’s Royal Castle, the Empire State Building and the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. Google turned its homepage black for an entire day in tribute.

We look forward to your participation. Please comment below if you plan to participate, and visit http://www.earthhourus.org/ for more information. Don’t forget to urge your friends and family to participate through email and on Facebook too!

Still Waiting Approval on Dredging Permits

Permits to dredge the Burns Small Boat Harbor and entrance channel are still waiting approval from the Indiana Department of Natural Resources (DNR) and as well the Indiana Department of Environmental Management (IDEM). The disposal location into the littoral drift or beach also still has yet to be determined.

We will keep you apprised as soon as the permits are approved. A recent article in the Post Tribune indicated that stimulus funding has been appropriated. According to DNR, the earliest any dredging can begin is in July when the fish spawning season ends.

The Town Council has expressed an interest in initiating efforts to install a sand bypass system around the Port of Indiana that would continuously or seasonally pump sand onto the beach from the NIPSCO intake. Previous efforts to pursue this have indicated that this would be an expensive undertaking if it just benefitted Ogden Dunes. However, with the establishment of the Portage Lakefront Site, combined with other factors, more Indiana residents would now benefit from the establishment of such a system.

• If you added up the dollars that need to be spent on dredging yearly in Michigan City, the Port of Indiana and the Burns Small Boat Harbor, you’d realize that a bypass system is not an unreasonable cost.
• In Porter County, a bypass system around the Port of Indiana would save dollars being spent dredging the NIPSCO intake and the Port of Indiana. These are costs that are passed on to all citizens in the coastal area, either through federal taxes or through their NIPSCO bills.
• Having a seriously eroded beach impacts usage of the Ogden Dunes beach as well as the Portage Lakefront site. When the beach is eroded, walkers have difficulty walking the beach all the way to Lake Street in Gary if they chose to do so.
• Sand starvation and erosion affects structures at the Portage Lakefront site taxpayers paid to enjoy. Portage and the National Park will constantly need to monitor and protect the hardened structures on the beach at the Portage Lakefront site.
• There is a cost to the public when homes threaten to fall in – or actually fall in – Lake Michigan. Property values are affected. Beach usage is affected. Taxable property is lost making fewer people bear the tax burden.
• There is also a cost to biodiversity when unnatural material is placed on the beach that can affect ecosystem and dune-building dynamics.
• Finally, there is also a cost associated with placing potentially contaminated sediment on our beaches. That cost is unmeasurable – the cost to human health.

The Town Council is urged by the ODEAB to band with other lakefront communities to convince the Army Corp of Engineers to initiate a study on such a system. A similar study of a bypass system around the Michigan City port area that would benefit Mt. Baldy and Beverly Shores may be released this fall.

Precipitation Running 239% of Normal

“Water, water everywhere – where is it all coming from?” is a common phrase in Ogden Dunes right now. A peek at the Precipitation chart below speaks volumes. (click on image to enlarge it)

For the last three years, precipitation has run ahead of normal. Making matters worse, much of this precipitation has come at times when it can do nothing more than accumulate on the ground or in Long Lake. For example:

• Look at the levels of precipitation received each fall since 2005 – coming at a time when plants are not transpiring and evaporating water into the atmosphere.
• Consider the winter precipitation as well – some as rain on frozen ground – others as snow and ice. For the past three years, we have had above average precip and ice in the winter when there is little or no evaporation.

It all adds up, and then is complicated by a messed up hydrology scientists still don’t fully understand. What we see, and have witnessed, is a cumulative effect of many factors.

Bioblitz Coming in May!

A unique, high-profile event will be held May 15-16, 2009 at the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore (IDNL) – with West Beach being at the nexus of activities. That's when the IDNL teams up with National Geographic to comb the park, observing and recording as many plant and animal species as possible -- with the help of hundreds, maybe thousands of volunteers and scientists. No experience is required and there will be many different kinds of help needed. (See http://www.nps.gov/indu/supportyourpark/bioblitz2009.htm for more information.) General volunteer sign-ups will begin at the end of March.

National Geographic selected the IDNL because it is the 5th most biodiverse National Park in the country. Many people are surprised to hear that statistic.

If you still don’t understand what a Bioblitz is, take a few minutes to view a video of the one held last year at Santa Monica Mountains National Park:
http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/specials/in-the-field-specials/santa-monica-bioblitz.html.