The recent Green Streets, Green Jobs, Green Towns Forum in Silver Springs, MD in April is still generating a ‘buzz.’   How wonderful that this same place, Prince George’s County,  which gave rise to low impact development practices, has sparked a renewed investment in creating healthy, livable communities, through the approach known as “green infrastructure”. 

The two-day forum hosted many of the leaders in low impact development (LID) and green infrastructure.  We were genuinely impressed by the number of  local mayors and town officials, planning directors, state and federal partners, and non-profit organizations training young adults to design and build rain gardens and green roofs, who attended and shared their  ‘boots on the ground’ experiences.  We in Region 3 are poised to respond, along with our partners, to expand the Green Streets, Green Jobs, Green Towns (G3) Academy to deliver the tools and funding opportunities to these green innovators (and converts) who ‘rocked us’ at the forum with their enthusiasm and desire to build green streets and green infrastructure practices into their overall town plans.

One outcome of the forum is the overwhelming interest in a LID design competition.  We all were inspired by the keynote speaker, Mr. Robert Adair, who described the City of Houston’s LID Design Competition.

OK, Texas, we’re ready to take on the challenge, too!  As part of the G3 Academy, we will move forward.  Look for a LID Design Competition coming to your area!

Interested in greening your street and your town?  Come join our G3 Academy and visit http://www.greenhighwayspartnership.org/index.php and click on “G3 Initiative.”

About the author: Susan McDowell joined the EPA family in 1990.  Her work on community-based sustainability throughout her career includes the award-winning Green Communities program which has traveled across the United States and internationally.  She brings her ‘ecological’ perspective to most of her work including the G3 Initiative.

The summer beach season is in full swing!

Although we’re not buff lifeguards perched on lookout stands, EPA and the coastal states play a critical role in making your day at the beach a safe one.

There are three basic ways EPA and the states keep you safe from pollution at the beach:

 1.    preventing pollution from getting on the sand and in the water,

2.    measuring beach water to learn how clean it is, and

3.    telling people about actual beach conditions.

The U.S. enjoys some of the world’s best beach quality.  For the past six years, America’s beaches have been open and safe for swimming more than 95 percent of the time.

For that other 5 percent, EPA provides the states with beach grants to monitor beach water and make sure to notify you if conditions are unsafe for swimming.

In a single year, an estimated 96 million people visited a U.S. beach. Are you among that group?  How many times do you visit a beach during the summer?  What’s your favorite stretch of sand?

For more information, visit our site about Mid Atlantic beaches, oceans, and estuaries.  You can also listen to this recent Environment Matters Podcast to learn more about the deep blue sea and the ways it’s being protected.

And check out these posts we had earlier this summer about Adopt-A-Beach programs and BEACON notifications.  And finally, make sure you don’t fry at the beach – for ways to protect yourself from the sun, check out EPA’s SunWise tips.

See you at the beach!

We’re all part of the solution.

That was one of the messages at this week’s gathering of state and federal leaders coordinating the cleanup of the Chesapeake Bay and its vast watershed.

On the agenda at the Chesapeake Executive Council’s annual meeting on Monday were updates on the “pollution diet” for the Bay watershed and the first set of two-year milestones of cleanup activity.

But the theme of the high-level meeting was how you and I can help in the restoration effort.

One of the initiatives showcased was the Chesapeake Bay Program’s “Plant More Plants” campaign.

The campaign encourages us to plant native trees, shrubs and perennials to help slow down and filter the rain water that charges from our roofs, driveways and sidewalks during a storm.  Unrestrained, that rain water picks up fertilizers, dirt, oil and other contaminants as it rushes into storm sewers and out into our favorite streams and rivers.  The pollution not only affects our local waters, it eventually creates problems downstream in big bodies of water like the Chesapeake Bay.

The Plant More Plants website offers free, downloadable landscaping plans as well as tip sheets for watering, fertilizing and mowing with conservation goals in mind.  They’ve also got a blog that we really dig.

So grab your trowels and shovels, put on your gardening gloves and pitch in to improve water quality.  Your lawn and your local stream will thank you.

And share with us your best tips on good gardening!