Swarm Albany - Action for Pollinators
Date and time
Join us for an exciting day of raising your voice to protect New York’s pollinators, water, and people against neurotoxic neonic pesticides.
About this event
Join us for an exciting day of raising your voice to protect New York against neurotoxic neonic pesticides! This meet-up will center around the Birds and Bees Protection Act and focus on a new report on how neonics contaminate New York's soil and water—threatening birds, fish, deer, other wildlife, and even human health.
We will gather at Prime at the Plaza Café in the Concourse of the State Capitol at 10:30am. Around 10:50am, we will walk over to the Well for the press conference and mural reveal. The event will have several speakers, listed below, and a special mural reveal by Good of the Hive artist, Matt Wiley!
SPEAKERS:
- Senator Brad Hoylman, Birds and Bees Protection Act bill sponsor
- Assemblyman Steve Englebright, Birds and Bees Protection Act bill sponsor
- Rich Schrader, New York Policy Director, NRDC
- Katherine Nadeau, Deputy Director, Catskill Mountainkeeper
- Dan Raichel, Staff Attorney, NRDC
- Hanna Ring, CNY Program Coordinator, Citizens Campaign for the Environment
- Matthew Willey, Artist and Founder of The Good of the Hive
- Jeremy Cherson, Legislative Advocacy Manager, Riverkeeper
- Jason Davidson, Food and Agriculture Campaigner, Friends of the Earth
After the event, please join us for group meetings with legislators!
*Schedule subject to change, please check back regularly*
— MORE DETAILS —
In New York, beekeepers have lost more than 40 percent of their bee colonies nearly every year for the past decade, and future bee losses could jeopardize farmers’ livelihoods and the state’s economy. Neurotoxic neonics pesticides are a leading culprit, but these chemicals’ harms go beyond bees. Neonics have been found in surface waters across New York State and a growing body of science links neonics to losses of birds and fish, and harms to other wildlife. Health experts also agree that neonic exposures could cause elevated risk of developmental or neurological damage in humans, particularly in infants and young children.