Ecosystems, Urban Forests Valuable to Communities
EDITOR'S NOTE: These are excerpts from Dr. John Wear's lecture at the American Forests National Conference on Nov. 17, 2005.
Ecosystems and urban forests offer significant value to communities.
Salisbury's tree canopy, for example, affects both our quality of life and our pocketbook. Catawba College's 189-acre ecological preserve is a case in point. It is not only a valuable educational resource; it also saves the city of Salisbury money by helping to purify the air and water. The total stormwater savings for the city is $3,479,301, according to an American Forests analysis.
In addition, the preserve improves our air quality. In fact, the analysis estimates that the preserve removes annually 641 pounds of carbon monoxide, 6,573 pounds of ozone, 1,122 pounds of nitrogen dioxide, 4,809 pounds of particulate matter and 2,084 pounds of sulfur dioxide, for a total dollar value of $35,343.
For more, visit www.centerfortheenvironment.org and click on Clean Air Initiative/Development & Air Quality.
Director Interviewed about Ecosystem Services
for International Broadcast of 'Earth & Sky'
Dr. John Wear, director of the Catawba Center for the Environment, was recently interviewed about ecosystem services for the syndicated science radio program "Earth & Sky" in February. The series is broadcast globally on 1,000 radio stations and has 10 million weekly listeners.
Wear's interview, which will air in February, will be part of the "Interviews with Scientists" program, which has featured such notables as Jane Goodall, the world's foremost authority on chimpanzees, and Nobel laureate Wangari Maathai.
For more, visit www.centerfortheenvironment.org and click on News.
A Tax Opportunity for the Generous
New legislation allows donors to deduct qualified gifts up to 100 percent of their adjusted gross income until Dec. 31. If you are considering a significant contribution to the Center for the Environment, this is an excellent time to make your gift.
For more information, please contact Willa Mays at 704.637.4295.
Clean Air Lecture Series Prompts Airkeeper Award
The Carolinas Clean Air Coalition presented Dr. John Wear an Airkeeper Award Nov. 14 in Charlotte. Wear, director of the Catawba Center for the Environment, was cited for his leadership in developing the Clean Air Lecture Series, which focuses on the causes of air pollution and ways to mitigate it. The center will also host a regional Air Quality Conference in March of 2006.
The awards were presented to three individuals and two organizations for their contributions to "restoring clean and safe air for a vibrant community."
The Carolinas Clean Air Coalition is a non-profit group with a mission to serve as the citizens' voice for air quality in the bi-state 15-county Charlotte metro region.
For more, visit www.centerfortheenvironment.org and click on News.
Changing Lives to Change Communities: Environment Matters on Campus
 Home from Nowhere: Catawba Students Learn about Effects of Sprawl
Sprawl affects more than the environment. It affects our physical and mental health, our level of civic engagement, our local economies and even our charitable giving habits.
That's what 16 students at Catawba College are learning in a first-year seminar called "Home from Nowhere." The course, taught by Dr. Sheila Brownlow, is named after one of the course's primary texts, Home from Nowhere by James Howard Kunstler. The students find its content troubling because they are coming to realize that a paradox exists between what they value and how they live. "We believe that families and communities make us happy," says Brownlow, "but we seem to have traded them away for sprawling [subdivisions] and a car culture."
For more, visit www.centerfortheenvironment.org and click on News.
Momentum Building for Green Technology
 Catawba Students Witness Growth at Greenbuild Conference
The message was clear: The market for green technologies and products is growing by leaps and bounds.
The number of participants in the annual conference of the U.S. Green Building Council has grown tenfold in just three years. "There were more than 10,000 people at the conference," says Dr. John Wear, director of the Center for the Environment. USGBC membership stands at over 5,700 companies and organizations – a growth of more than 1,000 percent over the past four years.
"Green technology is filtering into all walks of the building trade," Wear says. "We are seeing a definite shift toward sustainability in the way we build."
Five Catawba College students witnessed this unmistakable trend recently when they attended the Atlanta conference called Greenbuild.
For more, visit www.centerfortheenvironment.org and click on Campus & Community Greening.
Save the Date: March 22, 2006
Clean Air: Community Strategies for Action
The conference's mission is to engage communities in finding reasonable solutions to their air quality challenges. It is designed for local government employees, school system administrators, health care educators, teachers, Chamber of Commerce members, real estate professionals, developers, builders and interested citizens. Partners for the event include the Centralina Council of Governments SEQL, Environmental Protection Agency, Land-of-Sky Regional Council, N.C. Conservation Network, N.C. Division of Air Quality and City of Salisbury.
Sponsors for the event are F&M Bank, SunTrust Bank, Wachovia Bank, Bank of North Carolina, Power Curbers Inc., County of Rowan, City of Salisbury, Fred & Alice Stanback, Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation, Blanche & Julian Robertson Family Foundation and Catawba College.
For more information, contact Willa Mays at wcmays@catawba.edu or 704.637.4295. You can also view the flyer.
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