Students, local environmentalists meet with Visclosky
On Friday, March 22nd, local students and environmentalists met with
Congressman Pete Visclosky in his Merrillville office to discuss a couple
major environmental issues to be voted on in the House in the near future.
Joshua Martin, Midwest representative for the American Lands Alliance
in Bloomington organized the meeting for national forest protection.
Claude Chandler and Steve Gil of the IUN Student Environmental Action Committee,
and Purdue Calumet sophomore Cindy Drescher, all members of Visclosky’s
district, attended the meeting to share their concerns on environmental
issues with Rep.Visclosky.
Their focus was to get Rep. Visclosky to take a stronger position
on the protection of national forests, such as supporting the Roadless
Area Conservation Rule and the National Forest Protection and Restoration
Act, which would ban logging and road construction on national forests.
Today two-thirds of America’s ancient forests and one-quarter of America’s
endangered species are found in national forests. The Bush administration
is looking to increase logging, mining, and road construction in national
forests despite annual losses and strong public support for more protection.
The national forest logging program alone loses $1 billion in taxpayer
money each year.
The attendees also used the meeting to thank Rep. Visclosky on his
pro-environment voting record this past year, and asked for his continued
support in the future. Rep. Visclosky was awarded high marks by the League
of Conservation Voters, saying he supported their position 64% of the time
on 14 major environmental issues in 2001. Rep. Visclosky did, however,
vote in favor of the energy bill which would open the Arctic National Wildlife
Refuge to drilling. |
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