Public Issues Reporting
10/9/01 beat memo
Wen-Yu Chris Lang
Memo to Professor Woo,

I would like to cover issues related to environmental protection during the upcoming year, as I see them both interesting and important to the public.

Keeping our environment in a good shape is certain crucial to not only other creatures on the planet but also ourselves as human beings. Although I have seen a gradual boost in the awareness of environment-related issues, I think it is still a category that requires more public attention and exploration.

As what I see, environmental protection is a subject that associates with many layers of the society, including government agencies, political parties, civilian groups, industries, and common people.

There are also a lot of topics that is included in the category, such as recycling, government bills, budget structure, animal protection, water conservation, toxic regulations, conflicts between economic development and environmental conservation, and all kinds of effort and debates in the aim to preserve the planet.

The first story I am thinking of doing is something related to e-waste recycling. It should be interesting to explore how Palo Alto, as a key area in the silicon valley, handle the recycling of computer components. I already contacted Dan Firth, the city hall's environmental coordinator, and several local environmental protection groups. Further details regarding the story's scope will be available within a few days after I manage to collect further information from the sources. I also plan to talk to business sectors, and household computer users. I am not quite sure how deep I can dig into the story before the deadline comes, since I am still trying to establish my news sources network, but I will try to do it at my best.

As a back-up plan, I might check a city council meeting tomorrow evening. There are some environmental issues to be discussed during the meeting, such as "California mercury reduction act, mandatory minimum penalties for wastewater discharges, san francisquito creek joint powers agreement, and storm drain infrastructure improvements." http://www.city.palo-alto.ca.us/clerk/agenda.html

The attached file includes a collection of websites related to environmental protection issues. I roughly separate them into several categories, including environmental groups, political parties, government agencies, environmental education, water conservation, toxic, business and engineering.

I also found an environmental library run by Acterra, http://www.acterra.org/ , a local environmental group, in Palo Alto. I tried to visit it last Friday afternoon, but failed and returned halfway from Palo Alto due to transportation problems.

Looking forward to talking to you during tomorrow's class.