The Waterkeepers
(2000), 47 minRobert F. Kennedy, Jr. leads the nation's fastest-growing grassroots environmental organization, the Waterkeeper Alliance. Like an environmental "Neighborhood Watch" program, waterkeepers take polluters to court, respond to citizens complaints about water pollution, identify problems that affect rivers, bays, lakes and streams; devise appropriate remedies and act as living witnesses to the condition of local ecosystems. Waterkeepers have helped to clean up and protect hundreds of water bodies around the world from pollution and dirty industries. THE WATERKEEPERS chronicles the heroic efforts of river, bay and soundkeepers from Alaska to North Carolina. Their hands-on public advocacy environmentalism has become a model for ecosystem protection: citizens defending the ecosystems in which they live.
Learning Questions
1. What is the specific aim of The Clean Water Act, and when was it instituted?
2. What did the revival of The Hudson River spark in the environmental world?
3. According to the film, what do most American’s not know about the bacon they eat in the morning?
4. How do unregulated hog farms contaminate surrounding water areas?
5. Explain the term “Urban Run-off”.
6. How do creeks and storm drains accelerate water pollution?
7. Explain how a river can be a valuable resource to a surrounding community.
8. What is happening to the turtles of the Hackensack river? Who is this affecting?
9. What is your sense of the water pollution in your area? Has water pollution ever significantly affected your life?
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