Behind the Headlines

A recent study predicts that Great Lakes levels could drop dramatically in the years ahead due to climate changes.
U.S. Rep. John D. Dingell, D-Dearborn, and Michigan Department of Natural Resources Director Becky Humphries will be at Cabela’s in Dundee from 4 to 5 tonight to discuss the consequences of global warming for sportsmen during a public town hall meeting.
According to the recent “Seasons’ End” study on the threat climate change poses to hunting and fishing, by 2030 water levels in the Upper Great Lakes could drop nearly eight feet, leading to a regional decline of as much as 39 percent in the number of ducks in the region. Nationally, if the trend continues, up to 42 percent of the trout and salmon habitat could be lost before the end of the century. The town hall discussion will address what steps are currently being taken – both nationally and locally – to confront this issue as well as what more can still be done.

No, not for more politicians coming to town, but for an annual River Raisin clean-up scheduled for Saturday, Sept. 13 in downtown Monroe.
The City of Monroe Commission on the Environment is fielding volunteers to help scour the riverbed now that water levels are down in the wake of dam water-control gates being pulled.
Community volunteers will be retrieving litter, old shopping carts, discarded bikes and other trash and debris from the riverbed. The group will assemble at 9 a.m. on the Riverwalk west of the Monroe Street bridge, work until 11 a.m. and then be treated to a picnic in the park, with prizes, starting at noon.
More info is here.

By Stephanie A

With it’s somewhat spooky moniker, I’ve always been a little curious about this piece of land. I’d heard about its probable acquisition into the Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge awhile ago and now, it’s happened. Yesterday there was a little ceremony and official announcement that the 49 acres that once comprised the Lady of the Lake youth camp will now be part of the refuge.

Though I’m generally reluctant to link from one blog to another, I think it’s worth it in this case. Anyone who wants to get a sense of what the Lady of the Lake land looks like, check out Erie Hiker/Monroe Expatriate’s blog at www.blogsmonroe.com/expatriate/?p=1062. It’s very much like a virtual tour of the place.

You can look for more detailed info on the whole official aspect of the land acquisition in today’s MEN or check at the web site www.monroenews.com.

The Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge has more information too. Check out: www.fws.gov/midwest/detroitriver/.

Something that kept occurring to me, as someone who has never fully explored the land: what kind of camping experience was this for the kids? All I picture is overwhelming wetland and mosquitoes. Does anyone remember camping there?

Maybe they’re finally getting tougher and enforcing the laws set up to protect our resources here. What do you think? Would this or has this ever happened in Monroe County? Was this enough of a punishment?

From the DEQ:

Chippewa County District Court Judge Sentences Two Wetland Violators to Jail Time

Chippewa County District Court Judge Michael W. MacDonald recently accepted a guilty plea and sentenced two individuals to serve five days in jail and pay a fine of $2,500 plus $155 in court costs and fees in connection with illegal dredging and filling of state regulated wetlands. The defendants, Michael Edward Coon and Michael Donald Lucchesi, pled guilty to a misdemeanor violation of Michigan’s wetlands protection law as a result of their driving off-road vehicles through valuable Great Lakes coastal wetland areas on Drummond Island, destroying much of the wetland vegetation and disturbing the habitats of nesting Ospreys and other wildlife.
In addition to serving jail time, Judge MacDonald ordered the defendants to file with the court a plan to restore the impacted wetland areas to their original condition in accordance with DEQ requirements and to have the wetland restoration plan completed by no later than June 30, 2008.
This resolution is the result of the coordinated efforts between the DEQ, Department of Natural Resources, and the Office of Chippewa County Prosecuting Attorney Brian Peppler. These combined efforts have resulted in quickly resolving this case and ensuring that the coastal wetland area will be restored.
“It is critical that we protect our Great Lakes coastal wetland areas that provide a unique and valuable ecological habitat for Michigan’s fish and wildlife,” said DEQ Director Steven E. Chester. “We appreciate the support of the local community in helping to resolve this case and protect our environment.”
Judge MacDonald additionally required the defendants to provide a letter to the residents of Drummond Island through the local newspaper regarding the violation and terms of their sentence.

NASA has released one of the first close-up photos of Mercury.

This photo was taken this morning. Mine’s the one with the big carrot for a nose. See if you can find it.

By Charles Slat
Most of Monroe County woke up to a white blanket of snow Sunday, but it was a rarer storm than one might imagine.
Best estimates are that the Monroe area got from 5 to 8 inches of snow. According to the National Weather Service, the probability of Monroe getting 5 inches or more of snow on any Dec. 16 is 2 percent. That’s based on a span of about 45 years.
This 2 percent storm came in a series of weird waves. For reasons we won’t get into, I was up at 12:30 a.m., 2 a.m. 3:15 a.m. and 4:30 a.m. watching it.
If you were out on the roads after closing down a bar in the Monroe area, you probably were driving in a mix of rain, sleet and snow, all rolled into one. That’s when the real ugly part of the storm seemed to hit. Then it turned back into snow. That’s why underneath that mantle left behind on Sunday was a hoary crust of ice. It really is a wonder there weren’t a lot of widespread power outages.
The stats on this one might make some record book, if only because the amount of snow on Dec. 16 is so rare. In fact, the closer the official snowfall moves toward 10 inches, the rarer the version of the storm you got. The NWS says the chances of a one-day snowfall dumping 10 inches on the Monroe area on the 16th of December is 0 percent.
And just think, the official start of winter is only five days away.
Happy shoveling.

In this picture, if you look really, really closely, I’m the one in the bright orange cap sort of toward the left side.

By Charles Slat
I attended the state public hearing on new pollution rules for the Holcim cement plant Thursday night.
I’ve been covering public hearings of various kinds for years. I estimate I’ve covered maybe 100 in the area over the years and dozens before I came to The Evening News.
The Dundee hearing was unique in my experience because absolutely no one at the hearing spoke in favor of the anti-pollution rule the state was proposing for the cement plant. Even state officials at the hearing acknowledged the rarity of that.The state listened to nearly 40 commenters during the session, most of them Holcim employees.
Why is this?
There might be four reasons.
First, someone has convinced the employees that the state action will force the plant to shut down. Unless Holcim has already decided to do that for some other reasons, that’s probably not going to happen. But the threat is scary enough for the employees.
Second, the current state of the economy has enough people worried that the mere whisper of the possibility of job losses will move them to action.
Third, Dundee area residents aren’t as nearly as concerned about pollution from the plant as they have been in years past, and that might be because they’ve either learned to live with the pollution or it’s not nearly as bad as it once was.
Fourth, employees and managers genuinely believe that the plant is unfairly being singled out for enforcement. There doesn’t seem to be any compelling evidence of that. More than likely, much of what has been going on between the state and the company has been the result of a negotiating stalmate and each side has been trying to force the other’s hand — the company by trying to marshal employee and public pressure and the state by playing hardball with the rules.
Hopefully, they’ll soon come to terms that everyone can live with.

It’s a Lake Superior fall color tour.

Play around with green-ness. See how many points you can rack up by riding the bus, your bike or walking - without actually doing anything.
Planet green game, sponsored by (*sigh*) Starbucks is kind of an interesting way news and/or issues are increasingly being dealt with - play a game, maybe learn something, and hopefully apply one or two of the gleaned points to your everyday life.
You can play it here: http://www.planetgreengame.com/

P.S. Green also used to be significant when worn on Wednesdays and/or in the form of M & Ms. Does anyone else remember this?

Walkability is a buzzword in many communities today.

Whether you easily can walk from one place to another determines how easy it is to live in a town and whether it’s being afflicted by sprawl.

Here’s a cool Web site that let’s you plug in an address and it then gauges walkability based on proximity to restaurants, bookstores and other amenities.

I plugged in an E. Front St. address in downtown Monroe and found the walkability factor was very good. Check it out using your own address.

Since a coworker was just singing “Do you know the muffin man…” that’s all I could come up with.
But this is about Ozone. Even with the intense heat and glaring sun of the last few days, no Ozone Action days were called. SEMCOG explains why:

Heat wave, but no Ozone Action days

“Although Southeast Michigan is in the midst of the summer’s first intense heat wave, no Ozone Action days have been called in Southeast Michigan. Why?

According to SEMCOG, the Southeast Michigan Council of Governments, the good news is that the air in Southeast Michigan is cleaner! Even though it’s been hot, favorable winds have been mixing with clean air from the U.S. and Canadian border region, not allowing the air to become stagnant and produce the high levels of harmful ozone.

Historically, this time of year is the worst for ozone. In previous years, projected 90-degree temperatures, especially during this time of the summer, was a nearly certain call for an Ozone Action day. However, as pollution levels have been dropping over the past few years and changing the atmospheric chemistry, Ozone Action days are less of a “given.”
State meteorologists expect a cold front making its way through the state will keep pollution levels in the “good” range the rest of the week. No Ozone Action days will be called through Friday, July 13.

Air monitors in Southeast Michigan show that we’re in compliance with the national ozone standard. Last year marked the third straight year in which we’ve had no ozone violations. We need to continue our good habits.

Beginning this year, all gasoline sold in Southeast Michigan from June 1-September 15 will be lower vapor pressure. This fuel is less volatile than conventional gasoline and reduces evaporative emissions. It will help keep the air cleaner.

The region has had one Ozone Action day so far this summer on June 18. Last summer, two Ozone Action days were called. The average number of Ozone Action days per season is 10. In 2004, just one Ozone Action day was called; the highest was 25 in 1999.”Hmmm. Lower vapor pressure? What’s that all about? I’ll look into it.

Really, it’s what they do.

I was too wimpy to let one latch onto my palm, but I did stick one of my fingers into the lamprey’s sucker hole to see what the little ridges were like.

I just returned Saturday night from the Great Lakes Environmental Journalism Training Institute, run through the Knight Center for Environmental Journalism. We went up to the University of Michigan Biological Station on the outskirts of Pellston in the north of the Lower Peninsula.

It was pretty informational and fantastic.

Aside from the lampreys, we learned about diatoms, biofuels, wind power, farming operations throughout the state, how the forest breathes, shore birds and global warming issues.

I’m sure as stories come up I’ll be sharing anecdotes or things I learned along the way. In the meantime, if anyone has questions about the environment and the Great Lakes, I can try to answer them or at least knowledgably point you to someone who can.

Leaving here late Saturday night, I went to get in my car. Innocently, I unlocked the door and stepped forward to get in when I spotted it. I froze. I was hoping that they wouldn’t make it inland - that they would just float around happily mating over the water, spending their 24 hours of life out there in the world instead of clinging to the safety of a screen or the hood of my car. But there it was - the first fishfly of the season.

I stared at the little googlie-eyed thing before growling at it. It stared back, dumb, unshaken, impenetrable in its silence and will to live. I spotted another one on a rear window as I went to roll it down. The fishfly, apparently not wanting to give up its post, clung to the moving window until it wedged into the rubber edging. The window made a horrible squeaking noise as the bug met its demise.

I can sometimes be anxious and something I’ve learned to do when anxiety is setting in is imagine the worst possible situation. It sounds counter-intuitive, but when you peg what that is, it’s usually not as bad as it seemed when unnamed. I mention this because bugs make me anxious. The worst thing I could think of with fishflies was two-fold. One, trapped in the hair and flapping around near the ear (this drives me crazy about bugs) and two, stepping on a green slicker of the bugs, I slip and fall into a mass pile of them and end up surrounded. Yuck.

I understand how good they are for the environment and how harmless they actually are, but it doesn’t mean I have to like them.