Happy Earth Day!
Chicago is a beautiful city. It boasts one of the top five greenest universities in America from The Sierra Club Magazine. It is also one of the greenest cities in America, a forefront goal of former Mayor Richard M. Daley and of current Mayor Rahm Emmanuel. Local groups like Chicago Open Gov Hack Night have projects, such as MyBuildingDoesNotRecycle.Com, to identify apartment buildings with 5 or more units without recycling. It’s how I found out my building didn’t have recycling.
The truth is that Chicago struggles environmentally. Just look at the river that cuts through the city, or try to swim in Lake Michigan during the summer. One of the saddest realizations of summer is lying next to the lake, but not swimming in it. I gave it a chance, but it wasn’t long before I swam breast-stroke into empty beer cans. Earlier this month, Slate tweeted, “Good Lord, What Is Happening to the Chicago River?,” as they highlighted a DNAinfo article of “rust and dirt” protruding in the Chicago River.
UPDATE: We finally have an answer on what the brown stuff was in the Chicago River http://t.co/3OnLQTvoww pic.twitter.com/10AzQsB4o6
— DNAinfo Chicago (@DNAinfoCHI) April 9, 2015
To celebrate Earth Day, consider these activities tonight:
- “Just Eat It” Film Showing and Panel Discussion
Time: 6:00-8:30 PM
RSVP: Eventbrite
- Tweet Your Way to a Night Stay at Hotel Felix
Time: April 22nd until 5:00 PM
Details: Tweet about your sustainable ways to @HotelFelix and include #GreenFelix
Time: 9:00 AM – 8:00 PM
Details: See live desert animals from 4 pm to 7 pm, music in the Palm House from 5 pm to 6 pm, environmentally themed family puppet shows by Golden Feather Productions with 5:30 pm and 6:15 pm performances, and the Slow Roll Chicago family bike ride from 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm.
Amanda Elliott is a writer and speaker and a relationship builder. She believes that meeting people in person is important. After attending numerous fashion, startup, and creative events, she founded Windy City Cosmo is 2015 to help people make connections in the city as they build their businesses, start and end relationships and see and be seen. Over the past three years, the entrepreneurs she’s interviewed have become the most successful in Chicago and Windy City Cosmo won an award in 2017 for her work for female entrepreneurs.
