Water for Rio Bosque Wetlands Park on Agenda for Open Space Meeting on May 9 - General Public Urged to Attend

El Paso environmental advocate Judy Ackerman is encouraging citizens to attend the Open Space Advisory Board (OSAB) scheduled for Wednesday, May 9 at 1:30pm in the 8th Floor Conference Room of City Hall.

Discussion and Action:  Timeline of the EPWU feasibility study that would provide a long term, sustainable supply of water to Rio Bosque.  Contact:  Ruby Valdez, rvaldez@EPWU.org . ”

Ackerman said in a email promoting the meeting that she believes that "this study is about an option to “build a direct connection between the Bustamante Plant and the park” as described in John Sproul’s White Paper– Rio Bosque Water - page 8, item 1 under “Strategies for Meeting Park Water Needs”. 

"A big public turnout at this OSAB meeting would demonstrate interest in getting water to the Bosque.  Please attend if you can and spread the word."

Decision makers need to consider ecosystem services and how they relate to public health when working on development projects

To varying degrees humans have already altered nearly half of the earth’s land surface.  If current land development trends continue this number could easily reach 70% in the next thirty years. Scientists around the world are concerned about the many complex ecosystem services and natural cycles that will be affected including purification of air and water, decomposition of wastes, recycling of nutrients, and pollination of crops and the regulation of climate.

Natural areas surrounding cities provide vast arrays of ecosystem services benefiting people including clean air, drinking water and recreational activities.   These lands also sequester significant amounts of carbon, thereby reducing atmospheric greenhouse gases.  Many species of wildlife depend on these wildlands for survival.

When urban development projects address air quality it is largely when looking at ways to lower vehicle emmisions by encouraging the development of biking and walking trails. Rarely is attention directed to the a value of air quality ecosystem services provided by plants that filter our air. Why is this so important to a community's well being? Take the problem of dust storms in El Paso, Texas as an example. According to a study of the respiratory effects of dust storms in El Paso County from 2000-2005 residents were 10.3% more likely to be hospitalized for a respiratory illness on a day with a synoptic-scale dust event than on a day without a dust storm.  People who may be more vulnerable than others during these dust storms include infants, children and adolescents, the elderly, people with respiratory conditions, such as asthma, bronchitis and emphysema, people with heart disease and people with diabetes.  According to the CDC from 1997-1999 an estimated 7.4 million people ages 15 and up reported an episode of asthma or an asthma attack with an estimated cost of $7 billion.   Here in West Texas a 2007 report by the Texas Department of Health Services reported an 11.5 % (per 10,000) rate of asthma related hospitalizations.  

Many urban development plans mention health concerns and how air quality emissions can be lessened by reducing vehicular emissions and their underlying cause, but there is often no mention of the value of natural vegetation in not only filtering our air, but also in capturing CO2 if large areas of natural vegetation and associated microbes in the soil are removed for development. Speaking of microbes a single tablespoon of healthy soil might contain over a billion beneficial soil microbes!!!  How many microbes live in one acre of natural open space is anyone’s guess.  The number is too big for most of us to fathom.  Microbes provide amazingly complex ecological services.  In addition to decomposing organic waste materials into organic humus, microbes in the soil fix atmospheric nitrogen and help plants to grow in areas where nitrogen is scarce. Other minerals like sulfur and phosphorus require microbial transformation in the soil that surrounds the roots to make them more available to plants.  They also improve aeration by loosening dense and compacted soils.

All across the country many cities take for granted the value of these services when making environmental decisions.  To help cities address this critically important issue the Environmental Protection Agency is currently developing an Ecosystem Services Research Program that seeks to “effectively measure and communicate the type, quality and magnitude of services that humans receive from ecosystems in order that their true value is considered in decision-making.“ (EPA National Atlas for Sustainability, 2012)
Policy makers can also read a United Nations Environment Program report entitled The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity - for National and International Policy Makers.

I was very pleased to read in the recently approved Plan El Paso report on sustainability, a very hopeful sign that the Plan El Paso effort will help El Paso move towards more sustainable development. The report states that “the City should produce or commission a plan for biological corridors and habitat that identifies existing habitats and corridors and candidate sites and routes for restoration.” This statement alone supports the current citizen effort to protect natural open space along the Trans Mountain Road and if Plan El Paso is funded and implemented, a biological corridor plan would also help the city achieve important goals of the El Paso Liveable City Sustainability Plan adopted by City Council on September 15, 2009. Goals yet to be achieved in that plan include: 1. Achieve international recognition for successful preservation of our Chihuahuan desert natural heritage for all time, 2. Complete a biodiversity inventory by 2011 and 3. Identify and prioritize habitat that will be protected by 2012. All of the above will also help El Paso do something that is more than likely not a big agenda item in leadership and planning board rooms, protect ecoystem services essential to the survival of humanity.

Planners do a great job planning roads, walkways, parks, utilitiy easements, schools and more. But how often to you see an analysis of the impact of a development on ecosystem services? The answer is rather dissappointing, you don't see it. Why, because city planners are rarely required to understand or implement strategies to protect ecosytem services when working on development plans. Environmental impact studies are not required by law when developing many public lands and even rarely when it comes to private lands. What we need in this country is a national mandate for smart development, one that calls for ecosystem services to be considered at the same level of importance as safe roads and walkways and other critical development goals.

by Rick LoBello, posted March 19, 2012

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