The impact of climate change has seemingly never been more evident in Michigan’s Great Southwest than it has in the past year of a rapidly eroding waterfront along the shores of Lake Michigan and beyond. As a result, a group of local concerned citizens has formed a new local chapter of a national climate change organization.
Determined to empower ordinary people to make an impact on climate change, the new chapter of the Citizens’ Climate Lobby was formed over the weekend in St. Joseph.
St. Joseph Mayor Pro-Tem Laura Goos says, “It (climate change) is happening here in Southwest Michigan on a daily basis.” Addressing the group on Saturday, Goos pointed to lakeshore erosion, the flooding of local streets — including Main Street in Benton Harbor — and a flooded Riverview Park in St Joseph.
Citizens’ Climate Lobby volunteers work to lobby members of Congress in support of The Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act. That act would put a fee on fossil fuels that would be returned to the American people to cushion higher energy costs as fossil fuels are phased out. The group argues that fossil fuels are a major source of greenhouse gases linked to global warming.
In a statement published by The Wall Street Journal last year from 3,558 U.S. economists, including 27 Nobel Laureate economists and all four former chairs of the Federal Reserve, the argument contends that, “A carbon tax offers the most cost-effective lever to reduce carbon emissions at the scale and speed that is necessary.” That statement was published by The Wall Street Journal on January 17, 2019.
Citizens’ Climate Lobby is a world-wide, nonpartisan group. The newest chapter will meet in St. Joseph from 12:30-2:30 pm on the second Saturday of each month at the Berrien Unitarian Universalist Fellowship located at 4340 Lincoln Avenue. The next meeting will be held this Saturday, February 8th. For more information, you can email CCLsaintjosephMI@gmail.com.
The new chapter leader for St. Joseph is Sandy Walker who says, “Together we can make a real difference and in ways that can fit into already busy lives.”
