On Saturday April 20th, the South Windsor Parks and Recreation Department hosted the second annual Earth Day celebration at Rye Street Park. The celebration had a plethora of vendors and activities, both educational and enjoyable to teach South Windsor’s residents about their beautiful town.
The event ran from 10:00 am to 1 pm, with booths from various town programs that preserve South Windsor’s nature. One booth was the Pollinator Pathway, a nationwide organization that recently opened a local chapter.
“Our town’s pollinators are in a state of constant stress and without pollinators, we can’t feed ourselves, ” chair of the Greater Hartford Sierra Club, Stephen Lewis, stated. Pollinator Pathways teaches how to maintain a pollinator-safe environment in residents’ backyards.
Another booth was hosted by the Parks and Recreation Department, where sustainable recycling was taught both to kids and adults. This booth provided the opportunity for kids to join a local recycling club. Adults were also given educational pamphlets, and the opportunity to win a composting machine valued at $100 in a raffle.
The event also found other ways to include the younger generations, by educating them in an entertaining way. The South Windsor Public Library held a booth for the kids, where a fun storytime was held along with nature related crafts. The Nature Storytimes were held 3 times throughout the entire event, and Senator Anwar even joined to read to the children at 12:30.
Many of the Earth Day programs were entirely local, and brought on by South Windsor residents who took initiative to help their environment. Local residents were selling birdhouses they had made in their own garage with incredible creativity. Additionally, the Open Space Task Force held a booth where they shared their history, and the work they do for the town. Open Space is a task force of residents who are approved by Connecticut and South Windsor legislature to approve open land spaces in the town before they can be turned into parks or nature reserves.
“We began the project in ‘94, simply out of a desire to give back to our town and ensure the safety of our parks. In 1996, we got approval and a grant from the state to tour any space and report back to the CT General Counsel regarding the state of these areas. Our program is essential to the creation of town parks and nature reserves,” the chair at-large of this program. Patricia Botteron, said.
At its core, the Earth Day event was meant to teach South Windsor residents about our town’s hidden beauty, something they accomplish even with the location. “Every year, we plan to host the Earth Day event in different town parks, to really raise awareness of the secret wonders in our town” Parks and Recreation representative, who was in charge of planning this event, Shauna Damon commented. The programs shown are also essential to South Windsor, not only in preserving the environment but also their beauty. The Earth Day event brought all these programs and more together and highlighted them to the South Windsor community.
Living in a town as beautiful as South Windsor is a privilege, and these programs truly bring to light how essential it is to preserve our town’s beauty.
