Air Date: Week of January 24, 2003

New developments in stories we’ve been following recently.

Transcript

CURWOOD: Time now to follow up on some of the news stories we’ve been tracking lately.
The cities of Arcata and Oakland, California have joined the city of Boulder, Colorado in the global warming lawsuit against two federal agencies. The complaint alleges that the government’s Export/Import Bank and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation finance energy projects abroad without assessing their impact on the U.S. environment, as called for by the National Environmental Policy Act. Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown explains why his city signed on.
BROWN: We want clean air. We don’t want greenhouse gasses, and we also don’t want sea levels rising, because we’re a coastal city. Or climate disruption.
CURWOOD: Co-plaintiffs in the case include the activist groups Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace. The Bush administration has filed a request to move the case from San Francisco to Washington D.C.
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CURWOOD: The final rounds of U.S. Navy live fire training exercises on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques are underway. By May 1st of this year, the Navy says it will leave the island for good. Navy Ensign David Luckett says the evacuation will pay attention to the environment that will be left behind.
LUCKETT: Basically, we’re going to go ahead and follow the previously established standards in the turnover process. We’re going to protect and conserve the natural environment, visually inspect and perform surface clearance based on historic use and records of the training conducted there.
CURWOOD: Ensign Luckett says the Navy will relocate its training exercises to already existing sights in Florida and North Carolina.
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CURWOOD: Local authorities have removed the suburban tree sitter from his perch in a centuries-old valley oak in Santa Clarita, California after 71 days. John Quigley chained himself high in a tree known as Old Glory to protect it form developers. Even though he’s back on the ground, he says the fate of the tree is not yet sealed.
QUIGLEY: Our main focus is to get the issue of Old Glory onto the agenda for the full board of county supervisors. We believe if we can do that and have a public hearing on all of the options, that we have a chance to save the tree where it is.
CURWOOD: Some want a new road to go around the tree so it doesn’t need to be uprooted and relocated, a move they don’t think the tree would survive as it is 70 feet tall and 16 feet around.
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CURWOOD: Ever wonder at the amazing regularity of Old Faithful? Proctor and Gamble would have you thanking the company’s laxative, Metamucil. A new TV ad shows a park ranger giving the punctual geyser its daily dose. The tongue-in-cheek spot is eliciting an outpouring of indignation that took Proctor and Gamble by surprise. A spokesman said, clearly ,when you try humor, not everybody gets it.
And that’s this week’s follow-up on the news from Living on Earth.
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