Blog posts by FLOW team and guest writers
Peter Sinclair is tall and brawny, and while the climate change communications expert looks like he could scale a mountain or scramble a glacier (and soon he will), he doesn’t look like a baseball player on steroids. What looks like a baseball player on steroids, he says, is climate change. While a baseball player on… Read more »
Ross Hammersely and Kate Redman, attorneys with the Traverse City law firm, Olson, Bzdok & Howard, have done a marvelous service for local government officials, planners, administrators, property owners, industry, and the public in publishing a cogent, objective article on the scope and nature of local government regulation, including zoning and police power ordinance tools,… Read more »
Click here to view on YouTube.com FLOW’s May 13th webinar hosted four speakers who provided their insight on nutrient pollution in Lake Erie. We were fortunate to hear from Dr. Don Scavia, professor from the University of Michigan Codi Yeager-Kozacek, correspondent from Circle of Blue Dave Dempsey, member from the International Joint Commission Jim Olson,… Read more »
Photos from the “Well May the World Go” Pete Seeger Community Concert FLOW Benefit in Benzonia, MI Credit: Liz Kirkwood, FLOW Executive Director
By FLOW intern Jonathan Aylward. Jonathan has been with FLOW since January 2014 and also works on food-related projects throughout the Grand Traverse region. There is an oil pipeline running through the Great Lakes underneath the Mackinac Bridge. The pipeline, called Line 5, is owned and operated by Enbridge, a Canadian energy corporation. Enbridge has… Read more »
Pursuant to his recent publication in The Vermont Journal of Environmental Law, the following are some thoughts from Jim Olson on the importance of the public trust doctrine at this time in history. Systemic Threats to Great Lakes Demand an Immediate Paradigm Shift to Water as Commons Protected By Public Trust “We forget that the… Read more »
“For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.” – Richard Feynman As a non-partisan policy and education center focused on protecting the Great Lakes, FLOW undertakes projects and programs based on the demonstrated reality of problems needing resolution. Unequivocally, FLOW’s mission and sole motivation is to protect… Read more »
The New York Times recently featured one of FLOW’s major funders, the Park Foundation, in an article about a group of philanthropic foundations that are collaborating to move their financial investments away from fossil fuels (divestment) in an effort to align their money with their missions to curb climate change. Among the groups involved in… Read more »
FLOW, along with a myriad of policy and environment groups throughout the Midwest led by Sierra Club, signed this coalition letter to Department of State Secretary John Kerry. The letter requests that the Department of State consider developing a supplemental environmental impact statement (SEIS) for the Keystone XL pipeline that also accounts for the Alberta Clipper… Read more »
From the desk of FLOW founder Jim Olson: thoughts on the recent Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruling on how municipalities can limit gas drilling in their community (you can also read the full text of the TribLive.com article at the bottom of this post). In a show of judicial analysis and sympathy toward the importance of… Read more »
