Three Things: Updating you on legislative progress and an opportunity for action, sharing an Earth Day event from Sustainable Woodstock, selling tickets for our Wild & Scenic Film Festival
Stay informed, connected, and engaged—three things.
Legislative Progress Continues on VNRC Priorities – and an Action Opportunity!
In exciting news, yesterday the Vermont Senate advanced the Flood Safety Act (S.213) on a 24-4-2 vote, to better protect river corridors, wetlands, and improve dam safety; and the Vermont House advanced the modernized Renewable Energy Standard (H.289) on a vote of 99-39-11!
Today, we anticipate a vote on a bill to protect Vermont’s pollinators by banning harmful neonicotinoid pesticides, H.706. These harmful pesticides are applied to seeds that are widely used by farmers, despite research showing they provide little to no benefit to those who use them. Meanwhile, the evidence continues to mount that these chemicals are contributing to pollinator loss and pose potential risks to public health. Unfortunately, more than 30% of Vermont’s native bee species are “critically imperiled or imperiled.” Pollinator health is crucial to our broader ecosystem health and food security, so we must act now.
Tickets Now Available for VNRC’s 2024 Wild & Scenic Film Festival in Woodstock & Burlington!
We are excited to announce tickets are now available for our two, in-person screenings of the 2024 Wild & Scenic Film Festival at the Woodstock Town Hall Theatre in Woodstock on April 4, 2024, and at Main Street Landing in Burlington on April 18, 2024. We hope you will join us for an evening of eight inspiring short films about stewardship, recreation and the resilience of our communities and natural areas. Film topics include addressing deforestation to protect wildlife, tackling food security, dam removal and river reconnection, and turning toxic runoff into art – amongst others. We hope to see you there!
Celebrate Earth Day with Sustainable Woodstock: Inundation District Film Screening and Q&A with Filmmaker David Abel
Join Sustainable Woodstock virtually for a special Earth Day event, on Friday, April 5th at 6:30pm. In a time of rising seas and intensifying storms, Boston, one of the world’s wealthiest, most-educated cities, made a fateful decision to spend billions of dollars erecting a new district along its coast — on landfill, at sea level. Unlike other places imperiled by climate change, this neighborhood of glass towers housing some of the world’s largest companies was built well after scientists began warning of the threats, including many at its renowned universities. The city, which already has more high-tide flooding than nearly any other in the United States, called its new quarter the Innovation District. But with seas rising at an accelerating rate, others are calling the neighborhood by a different name: Inundation District.
Following the film, there will be a Q&A with award-winning reporter, documentary filmmaker, and professor of journalism, David Abel.
P.S. VNRC’s 2024 Member and Activist Survey will be live through the end of March, and your feedback is important! The survey should take no more than 10 minutes to complete, and all respondents will be entered to win a $100 gift certificate to Onion River Outdoors. Thank you for weighing in and helping to shape the future of our work.