June 21, 2010
Gulf Coast Oil Disaster: How You Can Help
Audubon is inspired by the many people who have contacted us to find out how they can help the birds and other wildlife threatened by the Gulf oil spill. Your commitment to their health and safety during this crisis is greatly appreciated – and it underscores how much you value the natural world.
Audubon is working with many other public and private conservation organizations to coordinate volunteers and connect them with oiled-wildlife response leaders to help in the recovery effort. Hands-on work to protect and save birds and other wildlife will be a complex and potentially dangerous process, and first and foremost it is important that only trained volunteers participate on the front lines. Untrained volunteers can pose a risk not only to themselves, but to the birds and wildlife they are trying to save. If you would like to receive updates on Audubon’s response efforts and be notified when volunteer opportunities arise, please fill out our volunteer registration form.
Attention, Gulf Coast Birders! Your help is needed to help document bird distribution at Gulf coast sites, and the effects of the oil spill. Learn more.
Here’s another way you can help. Urge Congress to fully fund restoration efforts in Coastal Louisiana. Restoring habitat is key to the survival of that region and the people and wildlife that depend upon it.
Your donation will support Audubon as we address the oil spill disaster affecting birds and other wildlife in the Gulf Coast’s already-fragile ecosystem. Your gift of any amount helps provide important resources for our volunteers and for the vital work being done on the ground. Thank you for your support!
Kids Are Already Helping! The spreading Gulf oil spill threatens birds and wildlife on Louisiana’s coast. Save Them! Help Audubon rebuild the healthy habitat they need.
Other Ways to Help
To report oiled wildlife, call 1-866-557-1401 and leave a message. Messages will be checked hourly.
Even if you don’t live in the Gulf coast region, you can provide healthy habitat for birds, especially migrants, by taking some of these simple steps from Audubon At Home.
DONATE
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June 20, 2010
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June 19, 2010
Father’s Day is a celebration inaugurated in the early twentieth century to complement Mother’s Day in celebrating fatherhood and male parenting. It is also celebrated to honor and commemorate our forefathers. Father’s Day is celebrated on a variety of dates worldwide and typically involves gift-giving, special dinners to fathers, and family-oriented activities. The first observance of Father’s Day is believed to have been held on June 19, 1910 through the efforts of Sonora Smart Dodd of Spokane, Washington. After listening to a church sermon at Spokane’s Central Methodist Episcopal Church in 1909 about the newly recognized Mother’s Day, Dodd felt strongly that fatherhood needed recognition, as well. She wanted a celebration that honored fathers like her own father, William Smart, a Civil War veteran who was left to raise his family alone when his wife died giving birth to their sixth child when Sonora was 16 years old.
The following year with the assistance of Reverend Dr. Conrad Bluhm, her pastor at Old Centenary Presbyterian Church (now Knox Presbyterian Church), Sonora took the idea to the Spokane YMCA. The Spokane YMCA, along with the Ministerial Alliance, endorsed Dodd’s idea and helped it spread by celebrating the first Father’s Day in 1910. Sonora suggested her father’s birthday, June 5th, be established as the day to honor all Father’s. However, the pastors wanted more time to prepare, so on June 19, 1910, young members of the YMCA went to church wearing roses: a red rose to honor a living father, and a white rose to honor a deceased one. Dodd traveled through the city in a horse-drawn carriage, carrying gifts to shut-in fathers.
It took many years to make the holiday official. In spite of support from the YWCA, the YMCA, and churches, Father’s Day ran the risk of disappearing from the calendar. Where Mother’s Day was met with enthusiasm, Father’s Day was often met with laughter. The holiday was gathering attention slowly, but for the wrong reasons. It was the target of much satire, parody and derision, including jokes from the local newspaper Spokesman-Review. Many people saw it as the first step in filling the calendar with mindless promotions.
A bill to accord national recognition of the holiday was introduced in Congress in 1913. In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson went to Spokane to speak in a Father’s Day celebration and wanted to make it official, but Congress resisted, fearing that it would become commercialized. US President Calvin Coolidge recommended in 1924 that the day be observed by the nation, but stopped short of issuing a national proclamation. Two earlier attempts to formally recognize the holiday had been defeated by Congress. In 1957, Maine Senator Margaret Chase Smith wrote a proposal accusing Congress of ignoring fathers for 40 years while honoring mothers, thus "[singling] out just one of our two parents" In 1966, President Lyndon Johnson issued the first presidential proclamation honoring fathers, designating the third Sunday in June as Father’s Day. Six years later, the day was made a permanent national holiday when President Richard Nixon signed it into law in 1972.
In 2010, the Father’s Day Centennial Celebration occurs in Spokane with a month of events commemorating the day.
In addition to Father’s Day, International Men’s Day is celebrated in many countries on November 19 for men and boys who are not fathers.
The Associated Men’s Wear Retailers formed a National Father’s Day Committee in New York City in the 1930s, which was renamed in 1938 to National Council for the Promotion of Father’s Day and incorporated several other trade groups. This council had the goals of legitimizing the holiday in the mind of the people and managing the holiday as a commercial event in a more systematic way, in order to boost the sales during the holiday. This council always had the support of Dodd, who had no problem with the commercialization of the holiday and endorsed several promotions to increase the amount of gifts. In this aspect she can be considered the opposite of Anna Jarvis, who actively opposed all commercialization of Mother’s Day.
The merchants recognized the tendency to parody and satirize the holiday, and used it to their benefit by mocking the holiday on the same advertisements where they promoted the gifts for fathers. People felt compelled to buy gifts even though they saw through the commercial façade, and the custom of giving gifts on that day became progressively more accepted. By 1937 the Father’s Day Council calculated that only one father in six had received a present on that day.[8] However, by the 1980s, the Council proclaimed that they had achieved their goal: the one-day event had become a three-week commercial event, a "second Christmas". Its executive director explained back in 1949 that, without the coordinated efforts of the Council and of the groups supporting it, the holiday would have disappeared.
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June 12, 2010
SANCTUARY NEEDS DONATIONS for a possible impact on Florida’s beaches from the Gulf Oil Spill: The Suncoast Seabird Sanctuary and Avian Hospital’s trained staff is on stand-by to assist with the Gulf Oil Spill Crisis, with over 700 volunteers on call if needed. We are asking for more volunteers to be on emergency call and donated items made to the avian hospital at 18328 Gulf Blvd., Indian Shores, Florida.
The sanctuary is the largest wild bird hospital in the U.S. based on the admission of over 8,000 injured birds each year. It is set up to immediately triage, stabilize and administer fluids to oiled, malnourished, or injured birds. The birds would then need to be transported to a hazardous materials cleaning site. The Sanctuary has received thousand’s of emails and calls from around the world from concerned groups and individuals.
The Sanctuary staff and volunteers were a significant workforce in the disastrous Tampa Bay 1993 oil spill and has experienced avian care staff on standby to assist Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research. To report oiled wildlife affected by the Gulf oil spill please call the Wildlife reporting hotline at 1-866-557-1401.
Needed donations of kennels, towels, gas gift cards, paper towels, and bottled water would help volunteers and the Sanctuary treat injured birds. Please bring the items to the sanctuary at 18328 Gulf Blvd., Indian Shores, 33785. Thanks! – (Media: please contact Michelle Simoneau – michelle@seabirdsanctuary.com or 727-391-2473.)
To volunteer, please email jessicag@seabirdsanctuary.com or call 727-392-4291. Oil Crisis Flyer
The nonprofit Suncoast Seabird Sanctuary, Inc. is the largest wild bird hospital and bird sanctuary in the United States, based on the admission of up to 8,000 birds per year. For over 38 years, the Sanctuary has helped injured wild birds. The Sanctuary’s mission is dedicated to the rescue, repair & rehabilitation of injured birds and then their release back into nature.
Founded in 1971 by zoologist Ralph T. Heath, the Sanctuary is world renowned for its innovative rehabilitation techniques, and was the first facility to breed Eastern Brown Pelicans in captivity. The Sanctuary is staffed by experienced professionals and dedicated volunteers. Similar to a human hospital, it is equipped with emergency facilities, a surgical center, bird injury recovery areas, and an outdoor wild bird recuperation area.
BLACK SKIMMERS ARE BACK – HUGE COLONY ON BEACH IN FRONT OF SANCTUARY. Story from last year
Watch Volunteers Help Release Rehabilitated Brown Pelicans
Display areas feature permanently injured birds that have been given a home at our bird sanctuary. Any offspring they produce are released into their natural environment. At any given time, visitors can view in excess of 600 wild birds. So come our wild bird sanctuary and see how we help injured birds.
The Sanctuary is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) corporation which depends solely on the financial support of caring individuals.
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June 9, 2010
BP Oil Spill – Wildlife Emergency
Wildlife and wild places are facing the worst ecological disaster in U.S. history. Help protect the over 400 species of treasured wildlife that stand to lose so much from this devastating tragedy.
Donate now
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June 6, 2010
Help the Gulf Birds
Click here to find out how….
IBRRC In Action: Saving Oiled Wildlife in the Gulf
A team of bird rescue specialists from International Bird Rescue Research Center (IBRRC) has been deployed along the Gulf Coast to help with an all-hands-on-deck effort to rescue seabirds caught in the Mississippi Canyon 252 – Deepwater Horizon uncontrolled oil leak.
IBRRC is working with Tri-State Bird Rescue, the lead oiled wildlife organization on the ground, to set up and staff rehabilitation centers in Louisiana, Alabama Mississippi and Florida, where the growing oil slick is expected to impact birds. We now have more than 20 members of our Oil Spill Response Team working on the Gulf Oil Spill.
See:With proactive capture, oiled birds CAN be rehabilitated
HOW TO HELP
While those responsible for this well blow out are covering the cost of the Gulf of Mexico clean-up, you can support the ongoing work of the non-profit organizations currently on the ground preparing to respond to oiled wildlife. You can support International Bird Rescue’s ongoing programs to rescue and rehabilitate aquatic birds by donating, becoming a member or adopting a bird.
Please also remember our friends at Tri-State Bird Rescue & Research who we are partnering with in this ongoing effort on the Gulf Coast.
Read more about how to help
OUR OF TEAM OF EXPERTS
Director Jay Holcomb is leading the Mississippi Canyon oil leak response team. He’s worked on over 200 spills around the world.
Read more about our bird rescue experts
WE’VE BEEN HERE BEFORE
IBRRC isn’t a stranger to Louisiana oil spills. In 2005 we assisted local groups following Tropical Storm Arlene.
Read more about the Louisiana 2005 response
MEDIA INFORMATION
News from Oiled Wildlife Rescue Team. Contact info, daily briefings and rescue center directions. Oiled Bird Numbers provided by Unified Area Command
Read more in the Media Center
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS: HOW WE TREAT OILED BIRDS
IBRRC’s important answers to common questions regarding the treatment of oiled birds and other wildlife. With video and photos. Read it here
Posted in Helpful Hints, Pet Stories, Things of Interest No Comments »
June 5, 2010
There has been a substantial loss of households and overcrowding in existing homes over the past five years. Many jobless young individuals and families have moved into homes of their parents or close friends.
About 1.2 million households were lost from 2005 to 2008, despite the population increase of 3.4 million as Americans experienced one of the deepest recessions in decades, according to a study by the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA). This decline in households is likely what contributed significantly to the excess supply of apartments and single-family homes on the market.
The study, titled "What Happens to Household Formation in a Recession," was sponsored by the Research Institute for Housing America. It analyzed the impact of economic and housing conditions on household formation and how the recent recession has affected Americans’ propensity to form new households, mobility trends, and changes in the rate of overcrowding.
"With such a significant drop in households nationwide, it is clear the most recent recession impacted individuals’ decisions to move out on their own and caused many Americans to join already formed households," said Gary Painter, Associate Professor in the School of Policy, Planning and Development at the University of Southern California.
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June 4, 2010
The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) is now accepting electronic signatures on "third party documents originated and signed outside of the lender’s control, such as real estate contracts," it was noted by FHA. The ruling became effective April 8.
This change is the first in a series of changes that eventually will permit more real estate transaction documents to contain electronic signatures, thus improving the efficiency of FHA mortgage transactions, according to FHA.
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June 3, 2010
Cash is a key element when purchasing a distressed home. This is great news for buyers, often investors, who have substantial cash to offer in their bid for a home. It’s not so good for traditional buyers, especially first-time buyers who must rely on mortgage financing to acquire their dream home.
Bank-owned distressed properties are particularly targeted by cash-loaded investors. Cash offers are usually clean transactions that seldom present problems to the bank. Because the money is collected much more quickly, these transactions can often close in 10 days, as opposed to about 45 days for those that are financed. Therefore, banks will often accept a cash offer even when other offers on the same property may include a higher price.
Jed Smith, a researcher with the National Association of Realtors, made this comment: "Even though a first-time buyer may be offering the same price as an investor, or a higher price, the investor has the edge. The investor may actually pay less, but it’s cash, right now."
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June 2, 2010
The year is still young, but we’ve already seen many natural disasters, such as hurricanes, floods, and earthquakes. They are devastating for communities and individuals, and are costly to insurers, and state and federal governments. Insurers have responded to the costs of recent natural disasters by raising premiums or declining to write policies in disaster prone areas.
Without a greater government role in property insurance, many homeowners and potential home buyers may not be able to obtain insurance coverage, it was noted by the National Association of Realtors.
As a result, there may not be sufficient resources or coverage in many parts of the country to help homeowners and their communities recover from future natural disasters. NAR is pushing for federal legislation to control such costs.
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Loving the San Diego Coast!
