The Daily Orange

Media Credit: Stephen Dockery

Media Credit: Stephen Dockery [Click to enlarge]

About 200 Syracuse University students and community members rallied in Thornden Park Saturday to raise awareness of global warming and local environmental issues.

Children dressed up in recycled newspaper for a fashion show, planted seeds in plastic bottles, had peace signs painted on their faces and kicked around planet Earth beach balls while learning about the environment through games and speakers, including Syracuse Mayor Matt Driscoll.

"It's wonderful to have the students and children and the community working together to advocate about environmental awareness," said Dana Hill, project coordinator for the New York Public Interest Research Group, the state's largest student-run advocacy organization, who co-sponsored the event.

The Earth Day celebration, held in the park's amphitheatre, was one of more than 1,300 events organized Saturday for a national campaign called Step It Up 2007. These efforts urged Congress to pass a bill that would demand an 80 percent cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

"It's easy to be numbed out by climate change," said Stacey Smith, who spoke on behalf of Step It Up. "We need to be working every day to create a world that is a lot better."

Organizers described Step It Up as the largest environmental demonstration in the United States since Earth Day in 1970, a gathering that helped initiate the modern environmental movement.

Smith encouraged adults and children alike to use their voices to make a difference at every level of government by writing letters to representatives advocating change in their communities. Currently, two bills are being debated in Congress with the intentions of lowering greenhouse gas emissions below 1990 levels.

"Young people are facing the most serious future," Smith said. "The data is there. There's no fuzzy math that should be ignored."

Driscoll, in a short speech, described his own push to make Syracuse a greener city.

"We are adding bike lanes for the city, the children and for all, because we need to stop relying on fossil fuels," he said. "We've gone a long way to reduce our city's greenhouse gases."

Don Hughes, an environmental activist, led a group of about 40 bicycles from the Edward Smith Elementary School to the park, where the riders joined in the rally's festivities.

"If you take a bike out," he said, "you're not using greenhouse gases. It's actually healthy."

NYPIRG, the Citizens Campaign for the Environment and Syracuse Peace Council volunteers have worked since January to bring the event together, hoping to open people's eyes to a world in need of help.

"It's important to see what's right in front of us," said sophomore Lynnette Agostini, an event organizer. "Everything is happening, right here, right now."

Events like this help people realize the reality of global warming, Agostini said.

"Awareness is becoming a trend," said Agostini, an environmental studies major at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry. "There will always be people coming around. There will always be people being stubborn." Some of the environmental causes being advocated at the rally included the Bigger Better Bottle Bill, a campaign to add bottles from non-carbonated beverages to New York state's recycling refund program.

Another group, called Charity Global, collected money to build one freshwater well in Ethiopia. A $20 donation for buying a single bottle of water could provide one person with water for 15 years, organizers said.

Other highlights included Smith's organization of a "wave of voices" around the amphitheatre, where people shouted out - from whales to wetlands - what they would like to protect.

Diane Swords of the SPC talked about how military pollution in nearby cities like Seneca and Plattsburgh affect the health of the environment. She said the U.S. military owns 430,000 square miles of land in the United States alone that could be used for more Earth-friendly activities.

Though a significant number of people came out to support the local environmental groups, not everyone was pleased with the turnout.

Patrick Friedrich, who lives close to the park, came with his dog, Headley, but said he wanted to see a larger audience involved with the cause.

"There could have been more community support," he said, "but there's a lot going on today."

He also suggested that future rallies advertise more reasons for people to come, such as a can and bottle drive that would do even more for the environment.

Agostini said despite the average-size crowd, she was very pleased with the Syracuse community support.

"It's exciting to see everyone coming together to educate each other and have fun," she said. "This is better than I could have ever hoped."

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