PUBLIC LISTENING SESSIONS ON THE PRESIDENT’S AMERICA’S GREAT OUTDOORS INITIATIVE TO COME TO THE HUDSON VALLEY ON AUGUST 5TH AND 6TH, 2010
Two Sessions Allow Local Residents a Chance to Discuss Conservation, Water Protection and Reconnecting Communities to the Outdoors
In April at the White House Conference on America’s Great Outdoors, President Obama signed a memorandum creating the America’s Great Outdoors Initiative. The Initiative’s goals are to develop a conservation agenda worthy of the 21st century and to reconnect Americans with our great outdoors. In this, the President underlined the importance of protecting and restoring the lands and waters that we love and reconnecting communities, especially youth, to the outdoors must happen at the local level.
President Obama instructed the senior leaders of the Initiative to travel across the country to sit down at a table with people directly involved in utilizing grassroots solutions to conserve our lands and waters and reconnecting Americans to the outdoors. The President indicated that the sessions should engage the full range of interested groups, including tribal leaders, farmers and ranchers, sportsmen, community park groups, foresters, youth groups, businesspeople, educators, state and local governments, and recreation and conservation groups.
First Session to Focus the Youth Voice in the Valley
The first of two, a Youth Listening Session, is to be held on Thursday, August 5th from 3-5pm at the Henry A. Wallace Visitor and Education Center at the Home of FDR and Presidential Library in Hyde Park, NY. The session will afford the youth of the Hudson Valley to the chance to participate in round table discussion with their peers and senior representatives from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and other federal agencies. The public listening session for youth will focus on conservation, recreation and reconnecting youth to the outdoors. Important: Click here to follow RSVP instructions on the DOI site.
General Session to be held on the 6th
A general session open to members of the public will follow the youth session on Friday August 6th from 9am-12noon at Marist College in Poughkeepsie, NY. It too will include a chance for members of the public to voice ideas, concerns and solutions to senior officials from the Obama administration. Important: Click here to follow RSVP instructions, including listing your choices for concurrent breakout listening sessions.
These listening sessions should take place in the evening or on the weekend, so that working people will be able to come. How can a President who is committed to job-creation plan public hearings durring workday time??
Secondly, will there be similar listening sessions on Long Island, NY? We have a multitude of public parks and waterways that are constantly being threatened by pollution from street runoff, grafitti and drug use. The youth here could also be connected with the environment, and many young people here already are! We have several environmental organizations that would gladly help host these sessions (PeaceSmiths, OperationSPLASH, and others.)
Please do not reply with a standard form-letter response. I am serious about this and I want to hear back from you personally in order to get this started.
Warren Woodge
Obama Campaign worker/volunteer
Hi Warren-
Here at Clearwater we appreciate passion like yours– in fact, we live it!
Unfortunately, Clearwater has no say or control over where these listening sessions did occur or where they could occur. They are organized by the federal government. We were simply trying to do what we always do– get the word out and get people activated and engaged!
Should you like to request that the Listening Sessions come to your neck of the woods, I would suggest you contact your local congressman or woman and ask them to submit a request. That’s what our congressmen in our area did– and it worked!
Thanks again for your passion and committment,
Clearwater