Why should you volunteer for the International Coastal Cleanup on September 21?

Your help is needed to protect wildlife and water resources by keeping trash out of Lake Erie and local waterways.

This message from the sea is not in a bottle. It is found on and in whales, turtles, birds, fish and other wildlife. The message being shouted at us is that we must do something about the tidal wave of plastic waste that is killing and endangering marine life and damaging the water resources so necessary for our own survival.

Do you love fishing, boating or swimming in the Erie region? Is Lake Erie the source of your drinking water? Do you benefit economically from coastal resources or activities?

Should the Pennsylvania Coastal Resources Management Program’s Lake Erie coastal zone boundary include all Pennsylvania water that flows into Lake Erie?

Road crossing restoration work at Crooked Creek and an unnamed tributary in Girard Township will benefit recreationally relevant migratory fish and reduce non-point sediment and nutrient pollution into Lake Erie. When crossings like these were installed in the past, little or no thought was given to how these obstacles would impact water quality or quantity or how their placement would restrict the movement of fish and wildlife.

Plastikos Inc. and Urban Engineers partnered with Environment Erie and PA Sea Grant to use greener solutions for managing stormwater runoff to eliminate flooding and improve water quality in Lake Erie and its tributaries. Rain gardens were installed at the Plastikos headquarters on Hawthorne Drive in Summit Township and the parking lot at Urban Engineers at West 13th and Sassafras streets in the City of Erie.

How safe is the water you’re drinking? Whether your water comes from a public utility, a well on your property or you buy bottled water, read this page to find out. If you are a municipal water customer you can type in your zip code into the website listed and check your water supplier and others in your area for chemicals that exceeded health limits and which were detected over the legal limits for 2003-2009. A listing of violations and a pollution summary is included for each utility in the database.

Our quest to make life easier with disposable products isn’t so convenient when you consider that plastic pollution is circulating in the ocean, fouling beaches and even making it’s way into the food chain. When researchers sailed across the Great Lakes on the U.S. Brig Niagara last summer to document plastic pollution in freshwater, they expected to find plastic there, too.

“If you build it, they will come.” But will they?

Lake Sturgeon in Pennsylvania waters are endangered. Do you know what to do if you hook one locally?