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New Budget to Boost Parks Spending

Philadelphia parks advocates are celebrating an increase in Philadelphia Parks & Recreation funding, $4.99 million above what Mayor Jim Kenney had requested for fiscal year 2023. Philadelphia’s park system has been chronically underfunded for decades, and as City Council worked on a budget deal for 2023, advocate groups such as the Philadelphia Parks Alliance have

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1 min read
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The dispute over Edgely Field highlights systemic failures in park maintenance

The Parkside Saints finally found a home. An October 4, 2019 announcement from Philadelphia’s Rebuild initiative announced the completion of a practice field for the youth football club at the Parkside Evans Playground in West Philadelphia. The Saints, founded in 2010 by Coach Cliff Smith, had practiced in whatever open space they could find in

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14 mins read
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Rat poison causes a slow, cruel death, and kills wildlife too. Better sanitation and upkeep of homes — easier said than done — controls rat populations effectively

On march 19, 2019, Mom, the red-tailed hawk matriarch of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, disappeared. A post by Carolyn Sutton on the Franklin Hawkaholics Facebook page described how, over the previous weekend, Mom had been looking unwell, sitting listlessly on a branch and showing no interest in a dead rat delivered by her mate, T4

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9 mins read

Tree Regulations Bill Advances (but Amended)

Philadelphia City Council’s Committee on Rules voted on June 15 to advance Councilmember Katherine Gilmore Richardson’s bill to close some loopholes in Philadelphia’s tree regulations. As Grid has reported, highlights of the bill include a community notification process for tree clearing, expanding tree replacement rules to public land, and fees in lieu of replacing cut

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1 min read

EPA Updates “Forever Chemicals” Guidance

Does the thought of drinking toxic chemicals that linger in your body and in the environment for decades freak you out? Well, good news: the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has lowered the recommended limits for two types of “forever chemicals” (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances or PFAS) and created limits for two others. PFAS

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1 min read

Want a Low Carbon Footprint? Travel on Two Wheels — or Two Feet

Do impending global disaster and (if that’s not enough) high gas prices have you itching to buy your first electric vehicle (EV)? Before you do, think about investing in a bicycle or a comfortable pair of walking shoes. A new study of the lifecycle emissions of various forms of transportation found that walking and cycling

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1 min read

Schuylkill Center entertaining proposals for land sale

The Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education reported on its blog that two local civic associations, the Upper Roxborough Civic Association and the Residents of the Shawmont Valley, met last week to discuss news of a possible sale of the Boy Scout Tract, a section of the Schuylkill Center’s property. The Boy Scout Tract is a

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1 min read
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Resistance Garden engages through art (and food!)

The Painted Bride Art Center has announced Resistance Garden: Cultivating Abundance, a programming series including five community dinners, five artist residencies, and four zine releases. “When you’re making a radical effort like beautifying and reclaiming land, the best way to engage people is art. Our artist residencies are how we bring an element of creativity

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1 min read

Glue traps off Target shelves after PETA push

Target has agreed to stop stocking glue traps in response to advocacy by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). Glue traps are small boards with a layer of adhesive, placed sticky side up, that are meant to trap mice. The mice, with all feet stuck on the glue, die slowly from exhaustion and

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1 min read
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