2003
NEWS ARCHIVE
EPA
Administrator Gov. Whitman learned about CR
March 28, 2003
|
St.
Joseph’s Elementary (Thibodaux) and some CR leaders
(David Bourgeois, Dr. Sophie Warny, Rachel Somers and Dr.
Rex Caffey) met with Gov. Christine Todd Whitman to present
the CR program to the EPA Administrator. |
On Friday,
March 28, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator,
Gov. Christine Todd Whitman, was the invited speaker at the annual
Center for Women in Government awards banquet at Nicholls State
University, in Thibodaux. The EPA is the federal administrator
for the 28 National Estuary Programs in the United States, all
promoting community actions to address complex environmental issues.
As EPA’s administrator, Whitman focuses on safeguarding
the natural environment and protecting human health through education
as well as regulation. When her office heard about Sea Grant’s
Coastal Roots program, it contacted Sea Grant to learn more about
it. During her brief visit, Whitman visited with four CR students
and their teachers from St. Joseph’s Elementary (Thibodaux),
giving the students the opportunity to share some of their best
CR moments. Whitman then visited with some of the Coastal Roots
leaders for a short informal presentation of the program.
Because Louisiana is
losing 30 square miles of land per year, and, without some action,
is projected to lose about 1,000 square miles by 2050, projects
such as Coastal Roots really have the ability to impact the future
of our coast. Gov. Whitman was impressed by the collaborative
effort between federal partners, state agencies, and the Louisiana
school system, and by the fact that over the past two years, science
classes in the schools in several parishes have planted over 3,970
trees.
For more information,
go to http://www.lamer.lsu.edu
and follow the Coastal Roots link.
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