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Thank you, Juneau, for making Earth Day 2008 at the Mendenhall Glacier a day of celebration, education and promise.

This year's emphasis on our efforts at a local level to help our community and our planet brought out the best in our neighbors, our businesses and our amazing local organizations. Festive music, dancing and story-telling provided by local talent helped us celebrate while pledging our efforts to lighten our load on the Earth.

Thank you, Cy Peck, for blessing our event, the glacier and "Mother Earth", giving our day a wonderful start. Thank you Rep. Andrea Doll and Acting Deputy Forest Supervisor Trisha O'Connor for presenting our opening ceremonies. Thanks to our incredibly talented entertainers who kept the festivities lively all day: the Heartstrings, Tim Miles, Liz and Leif Saya, All Nations Children Dancers and the Daughters of the New Moon.

Thanks to Turning the Tides for presenting their program on "Plastics in the Ocean," which helped us to learn why we need to curtail our use of plastics. Thank all of you who pledged to do without plastics for a designated time. You are the promise for change.

Thank you merchants who generously donated shopping bags, which we gave out to our pledges: Carrs Safeway, Fred Meyers, Wal-Mart, Alaskan and Proud market, SuperBear and Costco.

Thank you, our local organizations and individuals who repeatedly do an outstanding job of educating us in ways to really make a difference: Juneau Alaska Youth for Environmental Action, Southeast Alaska Guidance Association, Friends of Burners Bay, Southeast Alaska Conservation Council, Oceana, Turning the Tides, Juneau Raptor Center, Juneau Watershed Project, Alaska Biofuels Alliance, U.S. Forest Service Wilderness Rangers, National Weather Service, Friends of Recycling, Bill Leighty, Alaska Electric Light & Power, Dick Callahan, Sandy Harbanuk and the Juneau Commission on Sustainability.

Thank you, Lyndsey Edgar, for once again helping the children learn how to take care of the Earth and to have fun doing it. Thank you, Dave Coons, Amy Sherwin, John Schwinghammer, Larry Rickets, Laurie Craig and the Lamson family for holding the event together and helping everyone enjoy the day.

Thanks to the media for their generous support: Jeff Brown and KTOO, KINY, KSUP and the Juneau Empire. Good job, Juneau. See you next year.

Irene Morris, Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center

Ray Paddock, Central Council Tlingit & Haida

Juneau