With a message of community involvement to solve environmental problems, Mayor Rocky Anderson spoke at the Earth Day celebration on Monday.
Anderson, invited by the on campus environmental organization Terra Firma, stressed the importance of students’ roles in protecting the environment.
“It is young people, especially students, who end up controlling agendas on these issues,” he said. “We need to reach out, network and bring in others so soon there will be hundreds and eventually thousands supporting this cause.”
The community’s involvement in protecting the environment is crucial to ensuring the preservation of the environment, he said.
“Earth Day is an important statement and day to remind ourselves, the nation and the world, that it is our responsibility to leave a better legacy of clean air and water and to preserve our natural resources,” Anderson said.
Using public transportation and stopping urban sprawl are beneficial for the environment.
“People feel entitled to live far away from where they work, and then expect us to pay for the roads they use, like the Legacy Highway” he said.
Anderson is impressed with the TRAX university line, and fully supports the extension up to the Health Sciences Center.
“Soon, with the expansion of light rail, we will all have the option of access to transportation without owning an automobile,” he said.
For now, he promotes driving alternative-fuel vehicles, such as his natural gas car.
Anderson also adamantly opposes the storage of nuclear waste in Utah, and hopes the community will rally against it.
“We need to leave the waste to those who have benefitted from it,” he said. “We need to tell the government once and for all that we do not want nuclear waste in our state.”
At the end of Anderson’s speech, Kevin Emerson, Terra Firma co-director, presented Anderson with the group’s first Environmental Leadership Award for his help in environmental issues both at the U and in greater Utah, Emerson said.