NELPAG Circular No. 31 — 2008 February 27

Editor: Daniel W. E. Green green@cfa.harvard.edu

Secretary: Eric Johansson esj@harvee.org

Contributed information for this Circular concerning outdoor lighting problems in New England (or pertinent info from outside New England) are always welcome. Please circulate this newsletter to all interested parties.

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MINUTES OF NELPAG MEETING HELD ON SUNDAY, 2008 January 27

by Bernie Kosicki

Location: Sky & Telescope offices, Sherman St., Cambridge, MA. Present: Kelly Beatty, Dan Green, Mike Hansen, Bernie Kosicki, Mario Motta, Leo Smith, Paul Valleli, Eric Johansson

1. Website Kelly demonstrated the website that he has set up so far. Several NELPAG members agreed to be the contact persons for various issues: Kelly; environmental and legislation issues. Mario; medical issues Bernie; local and advocacy issues

Dan gets several notes per month asking for help. Some of these he answers himself. Others he forwards to someone else who might be able to help. He will send these to the Council email in the future.

The resources area of the web site needs attention. Kelly encouraged the council members to look at the area and contribute. For example, in the reference area, we need to make copies of valuable links in case these are lost in the future. Other needed references?

Kelly asked others to either make the changes themselves, or if they preferred, send him the material and he would post it.

We discussed the potential logo for NELPAG. Bob Crelin and a former designer from S&T (Lauren Darby) have independently created possible designs. The point was made that the logo should work in both color and B&W. We discussed Lauren’s logo; comments were to change the light distribution to be more evenly spread out vs. concentrated mostly down. Everyone liked this logo, including the colors used, with the changes suggested.

For those who want to make changes to the web site directly, Eric will create an account. One can edit in either text or WYSIWYG formats. Text mode is better in that changes are more predicable. Members can upload files by choosing the “attachment” link at the bottom of a page, and then uploading the file.

We are about ready to post the new web site- that is, the new one will take the place of the old site. Dan will look into what critical elements on the old site need to be included on the new one before the change can take place. The past NELPAG Circulars and Good Neighbor pages are already included, as is Massachusetts legislation information.

2. NELPAG Email lists The plan is to have three email lists on the server: NELPAG-discuss, NELPAG-announce, and NELPAG-Council. About ¾ of existing NELPAG members are outside New England; all these people will be rolled over to NELPAG-discuss once Eric has it ready. Leo brought up the possibility that he might notify all past and present IDA members in NE of the fact of the new NELPAG site for their information. He can do this as an IDA board member, but cannot give NELPAG the email addresses. If NELPAG were an IDA section, this list would be available.

3. Massachusetts light-pollution bill Kelly tried to contact Marzilli, both in his old (Representative) office and also in his new (Senate) office, and was unable to make contact. Kelly was able to make contact with the bill co-sponsor, Steven J. D’Amico, whose office gave him a report of the status (still in committee).

An obvious strategy would be to include the lighting bill as a part of the new Massachusetts energy bill. This bill has been reported out of the House, but not yet out of the Senate. Kelly and Mario will work to add the lighting bill as an amendment to the energy bill.

4. IDA sections Leo reported that the IDA has a Connecticut section now (he is the head), and Susan Harder is working to begin a New York section. Currently, NELPAG is an affiliate, but not a section, of IDA.

The advantage of being a section is that there is then another organization to support legislation. Leo proposed that there be a section in every New England state. There would need to be a person willing to be the head of each state section. Kelly proposed that it would be most important to get sections in Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont and Rhode Island and NH before Massachusetts, which has NELPAG already. There was previously an independent active advocacy group in NH; Leo knows the people involved there. It would be more credible for Maine residents, for example, to advocate Maine lighting issues than for someone from out of that state.

There was some discussion of whether or not it was sustainable to create a “one person” section. If and when that person withdraws, who will take over? It was argued that there needs to be a critical mass of support before forming a section.

Advantages for a section include access to IDA membership information for contacts in that state (and elsewhere).

5. Announcements Leo mentioned that the IDA is proposing lighting standards for the International Code Council (www.ICCsafe.org). If these are accepted, then 27 states will automatically adopt them. The proposed standard would be to require that all lights brighter than the lumen-equivalent of a 150W incandescent bulb be Fully Shielded.

Leo also mentioned that the Ceres.org building organization would be meeting in Boston April 28-30. IDA will have a booth there. NELPAG may be asked to furnish support for this booth.

Kelly mentioned an email from Bob Gent that Mass Audubon is interested in what IDA dark sky cities there are in Massachusetts. IDA hasn’t tried to tap into environmental groups like Audubon yet, but this will happen in the future. There is also a note from a person at the Boston office of EPA who thinks that this organization should start to be concerned about light pollution. She may be able to start a program within the Northeast Region without requiring Federal approval.

Kelly also mentioned that March 29th will feature Earth Hour. This program was started in Australia, and was very successful in Sydney, where many lights were turned off for one hour. http://www.earthhourus.org/ About 15 cities are signed up to participate so far (Boston is not one of these yet). Kelly will work to bring this to the attention of the Boston leaders, and try to get them to commit. If Boston commits to this, there may be another meeting of NELPAG before March 29th to help coordinate activities. The World Wildlife Fund is coordinating the event for the US.

Leo reported that he is actively seeking to be included on the IESNA Roadway Lighting Committee, which is scheduled to bring out a new standard within a few years.

Leo is also active on a sub-committee to warrant roadway lighting. This committee is considering when it is and when it is not appropriate to light streets.

6. Next Meeting The date for the next meeting was not set. There may be a need for a meeting in mid-March if Earth Hour is adopted by Boston leaders.