The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

6 stouffville suntribune saturday march 24 2007 fstouffville suntnbune 6290 main st stouffville on l4a7z5 wwwyorkregioncom publisher ian proudfoot editor in chief debora kelly business manager robert lazurko director interactive media technology johnfuthey director advertising distribution barry black director circulation systems lynn pashko york region printing general manager bob dean letters to the editor weekly pickup could be answer coverage well rounded re recycling no longer in the bag stouffville march 10 i find it upsetting to read about rejected plastic bags full of recyclables being left at curbs by the recyling pickup employees we are all trying to do our bit to save the envi ronment i understand the need to make the changes however would it have been diffi cult to dump the recyclables into the truck and leave a note about the change i have two blue boxes and i have used plastic bags for the rest with the amount of recycling everyone does perhaps the town should consider pickup on a weekly basis kathleen armstrong stouffville community spirit alive the members of the silver jubilee club would like to thank the stoufrville lions club for the generous donation of a spring flower arrangement thanks to the stouffville business improvement area for arranging a visit to the club by its leprechaun complete with irish hats and buttons to our annual bazaar on st patricks day this is just a further indication our com munity spirit is alive and well wilfmorley stouffville re team of reporters editors take home prestigious hardware jan 25 on behalf of york region residents york regional council and staff i wish to congrat ulate york region media groups team of reporters and editors on winning five awards in the suburban newspapers of america 2006 editorial excellence competition for community and daily newspapers across north america these five awards show residents are well served by the news and information provided by yrmg including consistent and quality coverage ofyork region issues and initiatives i would like to extend my congratulations to the awardwinning writers who took first place for the indepth growth series growing home caroline grech simone- joseph patrick mangion michael power chris traber joan ransberry teresa latchford and serena willoughby the impact of the provinces places to grow legislation on our communities is real i would also like to commend chris traber for his series below the line about poverty in our neighbourhoods congratulations to debora kelly for win ning an award for her column your coverage is well rounded aspects your readers appreciate and count on billfisch york region chairperson and ceo just think howmuflh those ok mwws ornmm ll appreciate our m were hungry for s phew that is all i can say now that i have finished a 30day crosscanada road trip to listen to canadians concerns about the envi ronment it has been exhausting and at times bewildering but i now know the concern for environmental issues were reading about in the polls isnt just a surface anomaly its real and its palpable canadians are hungry for sustainable solutions and frustrated by what they see as a lack of political leadership on these issues it frustrates me as well governments should make it easy for consumers to choose environ mentally sustainable products and services worldrenowned econo mists such as sir nicholas stern are telling us greatly reducing our energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions is critical to having a healthy economy in the nottopdis tant future air and water pollution is already costing our economy billions of dol lars every year due to increased health care costs and lost work days its only sensible sustainability should be a top priority of every gov ernment at every level yet as i wrote in a recent column about the designed obsolescence of cellphones and other gadgets dis- posability seems to be winning over sustainability on many fronts that battle with cellphone chargers wasnt the only time on the tour we werent able to make our first choice from a sustainability perspective another was with our fuel we specifically chose to lease a bus with a modern superefficient diesel engine many people may not be aware but diesel has a lower car bon footprint than gasoline this is why there are so many diesel cars in fuelconscious europe we needed a big vehicle such as a bus because it would be packed with an entire months worth of office sup plies gear clothes and food for up to a dozen people a bus was by far our best option to have the lowest car bonfootprint possible but we knew the tour would still david suzuki have a footprint and it was very important to us that the tour be car bonneutral so we decided to calcu late the globalwarming emissions from the tour and purchase interna tionally regulated credits to offset those emissions these credits are similar to a self- imposed carbon tax money spent on these goldstandard credits goes toward reducing an equal amount of emissions through energy efficiency and renewable energy projects replacing an old dirty coalfired power plant with a wind farm for example since climate change is a global problem it doesnt matter where we reduce emissions so long as we actually reduce them for us the icing on the cake would have been to also showcase an alternative fuel in this case biodiesel this is a fuel made from vegetable matter such as vegetable oil or even used restaurant grease as opposed to fossil fuels its nontoxic and when burned produces less carbon dioxide and fewer of the most common air pollutants biodiesel is now available as a blended fuel in some major canadian centres its much more readily available in europe biodiesel is not without contro versy a largescale conversion of forested land to grow crops for biodiesel could result in a huge net release of carbon into the atmos phere and there are widespread concerns about using land to grow fuel that could be growing food still biodiesel has many advan tages and could be an important part of a sustainable future it certainly warrants more attention which is why we wanted to use it in the end however the decision was made for us when the buss engine manufacturer warned our leasing company running biodiesel in the new engine would void the warranty our bus company was supportive but said they couldnt take the risk from small things such as dis posable electronic goods to bigger items such as the fuels we use to get around or heat and cool our homes making the most sustainable choices can still be much harder than it should be consumers cant very well embrace the best choices if they dont know what they are or if they arent even available to break down those barriers andhelpguideour economy to a sustainable future we need gov ernment leadership and thats what my tour was all about take the suzuki challenge at wwwdavid suzukiorg letters policy the suntribune welcomes your letters all submissions must be less than 400 words and must include a daytime telephone number name and address the suntribuncrcserves the right to publish or not publish and to edit for clarity and space letters to the editor the suntribune stouffville on l4a7z5 jmasondyrmgcom editorial editor jim mason jrmtsonyrmgcom interactive media marketing advertising manager dawna andrews dandrewsyrmgcom advertising retail manager staceyallen sallenyrmgcom classified manager ann campbell acampbellyrmgcom production team leader sherry day sdayyrmgcom distribution manager megan pike mpikeyrmgcom awi4tt fdsaw canabn otoixxm tea bond mender ccab editorial 9056402612 kuc 9056408778 advertising 9056402612 classified i8007433353 fax9056408778 distribution 9056402612 suntnbune a york region media group community newspaper the suntribune published every thursday and saturday is a division of the metroland media group ltd a whollyowned subsidiary of torstar corporation metroland is comprised of 100 community publications across ontario the york region media group includes the liberal serving richmond hill andthomhill vaughan citizen the erabanner newmarketaurora markham economist sun georgina advocate york region business times north of the city yorkregioncom and york region printing