Tuesday, May 01, 2007

Uncle Sam's New Heroes

Washington DC

I met a new generation of young heroes last week. The Sierra Club has announced a 1.1 million dollar partnership with the National Military Family Association to sponsor their Operation Purple Camps in 2007-08 www.nmfa.org . This new generation of American heroes is dealing with thier parents who are active military personal being deployed for long periods of time. This deployment has a dramatic effect on children as they feel they are responsible for their parents being gone for long periods serving our country with honor and bravery. Operation Purple Camps strives to give these heroes a peer group where they have support to help them through ths hardship. The Sierra Club is proud to be a partner with the National Military Family Assocaition and help these young heroes get an opportunity to have fun outdoors. Carl Pope wrote a wonderful blog detailing the parnership http://www.sierraclub.org/carlpope/

We had a great success in Washington on John Muir's Birthday when Governor Christine Gregoire signed into law on April 21st the 'Leave No Child Inside Act' http://apps.leg.wa.gov/billinfo/summary.aspx?bill=1677 which puts in place funding at $1.5 million to help get at-risk children outside. This effort which was done in concert with the Cascade Chapter of the Sierra Club establishes Washington as a model for the rest of the nation on connecting children with the outdoors.

BBTO is excited about an event we have coming up in Los Angeles on May 16th. 'The Leave No Child Inside Forum' will bring together a cross section of leaders including Sally Jewell the CEO of REI and Richard Louv, author of Last Child in the Woods and Carl Pope, Executive Director of the Sierra Club to discuss community solutions on solving nature-deficit disorder.

We are on our way to leaving NO CHILD INSIDE!