Mr. Harder, it is our understanding that you, as vice president of Business and Operations at NIU, have the power to stop the unnecessary destruction of old trees around the NIU campus. You can also help assure that styrofoam is banned in the food services on campus.

Concerning the ten dead black willows in the East Lagoon, we were assured by you, verbally, that the initial plan to continue to slaughter old trees around campus was scrapped.

But after talking to several “seasoned” professors, we were warned that NIU has a history of quelling unrest about tree removal with promises that are broken as soon as students leave the campus for semester breaks.

Last spring, our styrofoam art mountain committee, in cooperation with the Student Association, spent the afternoon collecting all the polystyrene used in one day at the Pow Wow and Blackhawk cafeterias.

We built sculptures with the polystyrene to bring to light the incredible amount of land-fill waste generated from the Homes Student Center.

We also distributed literature which addressed the issues of toxic emissions of benzene in polystyrene production and collected nearly 1,000 student signatures that day. Our petition asked for the ban of styrofoam in both the Blackhawk and Pow Wow.

The food service board verbally agreed to completely stop using the polystyrene by the summer of 1990. Now they refuse to stop using it for carry outs.

As environmentally conscious students, we have learned of the hazards of accepting verbal promises at face value.

As such, we ask that you put your signature to the following agreements that will help NIU become a more beautiful and environmentally progressive university:

1. There will be no more removal of living trees on the NIU campus until the environmental committee reconvenes under the presence of a representative from each environmental and wildlife preservation group on campus.

2. I will assist representatives of Earth First! in their endeavors to restructure the Environmental Committee to allow representatives of each campus environmental group an actual vote on issues that affect the campus environment. Currently, only two students are on the ten-member environmental committee.

3. There will be a minimum of three trees planted for each of the ten black willows that were cut down at the East Lagoon.

4. There will be a complete ban on the purchase of polystyrene by NIU food services.

Jeffrey Smolla

Graduate student

English

Representative for DeKalb Earth First!