The Traveler

Issue date: 4/25/08 Section: News

Media Credit: Lael Simons Olivia Meeks, OMNI president, picks trash from Mullins Creek in honor of Earth Day. The cleanup was organized by the UA Sustainability Council and UA OMNI Center.

Volunteers conducted a cleanup of Mullins Creek in honor of Earth Day Tuesday.

Volunteers from the UA, Fayetteville High School and the Northwest Arkansas community worked together to clean Mullins Creek, which runs across the south side of the university campus, according to a press release.

The cleanup was organized by the UA Sustainability Council and the university chapter of the OMNI Center for Peace, Justice and Ecology, according to the press release.

The event lasted from 2 p.m. - 4 p.m. Tuesday, and cleanup crews worked along Mullins Creek from Leroy Pond to Sixth Street after meeting at the George Family pavilion in The Gardens.

The University OMNI chapter coordinated volunteers for the cleanup, according to the press release.

The OMNI Center - a grassroots group based in Fayetteville - is a learning community: an informally structured group whose purpose is to build a body of knowledge about the subject of its passion, which is a world of peace based on justice and an Earth restored, according to its Web site.

OMNI members staffed tables at the pavilion with posters and local environmental information, according to the press release.

The Audubon Society, Cooperative Extension Service and Arkansas Game and Fish Commission donated posters and information about the local watershed. 

Electric cars and photovoltaics were on display, according to the press release, and Chartwells provided snacks and drinks for the volunteers.

Events were scheduled at colleges and universities across the country to celebrate Earth Day.

Some events were centered on compelling colleges and universities to invest in renewable energy and purchase carbon offsets, according to a separate press release from the Environmental Defense Action Fund, while others were to pressure their university and college presidents to join the American College and University Presidents Climate Commitment, an agreement to help achieve a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent by 2050.

Founded in May 2002, the EDAF is at the forefront of educating legislators about developing new solutions that protect the natural world, according to the press release. 

Through grassroots and direct lobbying, EDAF champions laws that are based on science, economic incentives and the protection of the environment.

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