Hillcrest Town Council Meeting

By Anne Haule

One of many things causing me angst about Trump is his belief that climate change is a hoax – never mind the scientific community’s consensus to the contrary.

So, rather than sit on my sofa and continue to wallow in post-election depression, I joined my daughter and attended two local climate action events this past week and came away feeling empowered to take action.

The first event was the Hillcrest Town Council monthly meeting – this one featured “sustainability” as its theme. Representatives of San Diego 350 (Lindsay Richardson) and Surfrider San Diego (Roger Kube) discussed their respective programs and focused on practical things we can each do to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions (the stuff that causes global warming and could lead to the destruction of the planet).

Tom Steyer addresses Coastkeeper

The second event was the Coast Keeper annual fundraiser with keynoter, Tom Steyer. climate activist.  Among Mr. Steyer’s remarks, he talked about his parents’ generation and how they felt it was their obligation to make the world safe for democracy both during and after WWII. This caused me to focus on my generation and our obligation to secure the planet for future generations through climate-friendly actions.

These two events took only about 4 hours of my time and I came away with an action over angst mindset – an example of which is the following four “R” sustainability mantra that we can remember and practice its related actions.

1 – Reduce – waste (with a particular focus on plastic bags and packaging); meat consumption (try plant-based eating a couple time per week); gasoline use (walk, bike, bus, carpool); energy consumption (unplug, use high-energy light bulbs, lower/raise thermometer); general consumption (less stuff is better than more stuff).

2 – Reuse – products for more than one use (either the same use or a new use) by going “thrifting” for clothes, household stuff, and the occasional art treasure and when in the office, reuse paper and binder clips and the flip side of one-sided printed pages for scrap paper.

3 – Recycle  – waste materials such as paper, plastics, and metal so that the material can be used again.

4  – Refuse – to eat in restaurants that do not offer “farm to table” food options and when dining out refuse straws for your drinks and Styrofoam for your leftovers.

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Anne Haule

Anne Haule came of age in the 60s – marched against the war and for women’s rights. She is a semi-retired attorney – a single mother of an awesome, 30-year-old woman activist. A city mouse from Chicago now living in San Diego, she keeps busy with writing, charities, travel, and politics. Anne wants to share her stories about what it was like to be at the front end of the Baby Boom and experience first-hand the incredible societal changes that have occurred over the past 50 years.

Latest posts by Anne Haule (see all)

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