Earth Day Reaches 50-Year Milestone Amid COVID-19 Lockdown

Haley Carney
TheStatehouseFile.com

INDIANAPOLIS—As environmental organizations marked the 50^th anniversary of Earth Day with stay-at-home activities because of the COVID-19 lockdown, Dr. Woody Myers, the presumptive Democratic nominee for governor, released his plan to combat climate change.

“Hoosiers are suffering from a climate pandemic they can’t yet fully see, but whose effects we already feel,” said Myers. “We must take the lessons learned by our failed response to coronavirus and immediately apply them to tackle climate change in order to save our environment and improve Hoosier health before it’s too late.

Myers released his plan on Wednesday, the day when 50 years ago people across the country rallied for policies and changed behavior to protect the environment. His proposal includes increasing the number of forest acres from five million to 7.5 million, restore the Division of Forestry budget to past levels, strengthen a state conservation program, speed up the retirement of coal plants, update Indiana’s renewable energy standards and establish more renewable energy rebates, among others.

He criticized his Republican rival, Gov. Eric Holcomb, who is seeking a second term and said his commitment to planting one million trees isn’t enough.

Jesse Kharbanda, executive director of the Hoosier Environmental Council, said there are many things legislation can do to improve our environment and better our economy.

“[We need to] permanently protect forests, wetlands, and prairie’s from needless new ‘greenfield’ development such as new funding mechanism for land conservation, make rooftop solar more accessible and affordable, protect Hoosiers from the pollution that could contaminate their drinking water wells and air, and take better care of our rivers and lakes from stormwater runoff,” he said.

Kharbanda said that although the pandemic has been challenging for families across Indiana, it has considerably expanded opportunities to learn, engage, and act. When in-person Earth Month events and workshops got canceled, the HEC put together seven-days-a-week of programming, including calls-to-action on pressing environmental issues.

“The serious content of our online Earth Month programming has empowered our viewers to take action to advance public policy change on issues ranging from wildlife habitat protection to factory farming,” he said. “Our more light-hearted content, such as recipe-sharing of planet-friendly foods, has provided opportunities for people to bond with one another over food that leaves a much lighter footprint on the earth.”

The Indiana Forest Alliance also encouraged Hoosiers to take part in several stay-at-home outdoor activities.

On Wednesday, the alliance offered an online premiere of a film that explores the northern long-eared bat. The group also encouraged social distancing but suggested visits to wilderness trails in Indiana’s state forests, take part in their clean up the challenge on Saturday by collecting trash outdoors, document the biodiversity around them, and submit comments in response to a logging plan in southern Indiana.

FOOTNOTE: Haley Carney is a reporter for TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students.