Watch our Wallets

by Carolyn Chase

For obvious reasons, this year’s San Diego EarthFair theme is: VOTE EARTH! And yes, we mean to shout about it. And it’s not just because it’s an important election year. It’s because everyone votes every day with all the choices they make – as well as the ones they don’t make.

This Earth Day edition of the San Diego Earth Times covers a range of topics, from how to reduce the unwanted catalogs in your mailboxes to offering up the “Clean Dozen” list of the really hard things you can do. You can support local food and farming and use the sun to heat your water.

As for politics, voters will have their next chance at the polls June 3rd. Councilmember Donna Frye will give opening remarks at the EarthFair at 11am at the Organ Pavilion. She will report about her vital crusade to get the fox out the henhouse by requiring an independent auditor for the City. (No on Prop C). Then, candidates for City Council, the Mayor and City Attorney will take questions.

Our region is at an important juncture when it comes to the big-picture issue of growth. Will we grow smarter? Will we head more in the direction of Portland, or more in the direction of L.A.? Will we grow more like Vancouver and Curitiba, or more like Mexico City? The difference between one or the other is whether we figure out how to get enough San Diego car-lovers to take transit.

Then there’s the power politics of energy. Will we take control of our own local resources and grow more sustainably? Or will we bow to the out-dated, big utility paradigm of monopoly, centralized control and increased exports of money for increased imports of foreign fossil fuel?

Whatever the issue is, you can help. So get busy!

Carolyn Chase is editor of the San Diego Earth Times, past member of the City of San Diego Planning Commission, and a founder of San Diego EarthWorks, host of the EarthFair in Balboa Park.