April is a Time to Celebrate
Earth Day 2010 Promises to be Great Fun

YEA! April 22, 2010 is Earth Day's 40th Anniversary!!

Sadly, forty years after the first Earth Day, Spaceship Earth is in greater peril than ever. The good news is that while climate change is the biggest challenge of our time, it also presents the biggest opportunity -- an unprecedented opportunity to build a healthy, prosperous, clean energy economy now and for the future: Earth Day 2010 is a pivotal chance for individuals, corporations and governments to join together and create a healthy, prosperous, and green global economy.

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Happy Birthday SPAWNERS
Local Creek Group Celebrates Ten Years

On Earth Day of the year 2000, over 75 volunteers joined together to remove invasive ivy and trash from the creek banks of the El Sobrante Library. This month, many of the same motivated citizens, along with new friends, neighbors and volunteers, are gearing up for their tenth Earth Day creek clean up. Their story is an inspiring example of the lasting impact that grassroots creek groups are making throughout the Bay Area.

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What's in Your Watershed?
The Dancing Western Grebe

The San Francisco Bay Area is a diverse and vibrant community. Not only is it home to nearly seven million brilliant and unique individuals, but it also supports an equally impressive array of wildlife. From birds to butterflies to cougars to deer, many animals are permanent residents of our bay shorelines and rich watersheds. As humans, we are lucky to live in a place where bird calls can be heard over car horns, where we can spend our Saturdays at a local park, losing track of time as we watch a Great Blue Heron silently stalk its prey. We celebrate these animals for their beauty, for their behavior, for the effect they have on our psyche. The Western Grebe marries all the qualities we celebrate as well as any other bird we can readily spot.

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Clearcutting Levees Across the State
Army Corps Proposal Stirs Debate

"This is one of the most serious environmental issues to come along in some time," wrote A. L. Riley of the San Francisco Bay Region Water Quality Control Board. She was referring to a recent addition to the Federal Register that would change the way vegetation is managed on all levees built with federal support. The notice appeared last month with little forewarning, and proposes a severe maintenance standard that would radically change how levees are groomed. 

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