Ideas and Concepts Seemingly Long Forgotten
They Paved Paradise
They Paved Paradise By Frank Schiavone I know, I know – this is a lyric from a 1970 Joni Mitchell ditty. I always thought it was a pleasant little tune but never realized just how prophetic it was. Sprawling land development is gobbling up America at an alarming rate – around 365 acres per hour according to government figures. In most communities the amount of developed land is...Drill Our Way Out?
We Cannot Drill Our Way Out By Frank Schiavone With less than three percent of the worlds oil reserves (21 billion barrels on shore), our nation simply doesn’t have enough oil to impact the global market or drill our way to lower prices at the pump. Lacing the Arctic Refuge and our spectacular coastlines with oil rigs would boost oil company profits, but it would impoverish our natural...Reducing Environmental Impacts
Reducing The Environmental Impacts of Development By Frank Schiavone The State Legislature passed the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) in 1970. The legislation was enacted to provide public agencies with the tools they need to regulate development, minimize environmental damage, and provide each of us “a decent home and satisfying living environment”. The law explicitly states...Man’s Impact
What We Do To Our Planet We Do To Ourselves By Frank Schiavone When it comes to the footprint we leave on this ever-shrinking globe, we humans wear some pretty big clodhoppers – size 13, triple wide. From space, man’s impact on our world is clearly visible. Bill Mckibben in his book, The End of Nature, writes that there is nowhere on Earth that man’s reach is unfelt. Even our aerial...Value of wilderness parks?
Why can’t policy makers see value of wilderness parks? By Frank Schiavone Recently, I visited an old friend. Well, actually it’s a place, a very special place called the Santa Rosa Plateau. It’s just north of Murrieta. The last time I was there was about 12 years ago or so. Now an ecological reserve, it could easily have become a hodgepodge of mini-mansions and tract homes. A...
