Saturday Short Subjects: Healthy City/Healthy Climate

Collectively we caused the percentage of carbon dioxide in our air to rise. Collectively we can work to bring it down.

That is the premise behind New Haven’s Healthy City/Healthy Climate Challenge, launched last Wednesday in a public event at ArtSpace.  

Healthy New Haven/Healthy Climate Challenge is a collective effort of local organizations including the New Haven Bioregional Group, Neighborhood Housing Services of New Haven,Common Ground, CT Fund for the Environment, Yale Office of Sustainability, and New Haven/Leon Sister City Project. 

To respond to the challenge of climate change and to improve the health of the New Haven community, the groups propose a challenge of their own — pledge to take action that will have immediate positive impacts on local quality of life, and will help mobilize local institutions to create more sustainable, efficient infrastructure.

The pledge requires a commitment to take five steps:

1. Two days of walking, biking, or public transit a month
2. Choosing the 100% renewable option on his/her electricity
3. Two meat-free days a week
4. Recycling all glass, cans, paper, and plastic and composting
5. Joining an environmental action alert list

The site suggests websites and other resources to help achieve these goals. 

The organizers urge everyone to “take a lead in creating a healthier lifestyle and community…be realistic, make a plan, and celebrate moving ahead.” They predict we'll all save some money and become healthier as we work to make the world a better place.

I signed on today, and I hope you'll join me on this journey, wherever you live.

Let’s do this thing, together.

Why Saturday Short Subjects? Some readers may recall  being dropped at the movie theater for the Saturday matinee — two action-packed feature films with a series of short subjects (cartoons or short movies, sometimes a serial cliffhanger) sandwiched in between. Often the short subjects were the most memorable, and enjoyable, part of the morning. That explains the name. The reason behind these particular posts is that we are all short on time. My Short Subject posts should not take me as long to write or you as long to read (or try).