City of St. Charles’ Frontier Park. (Holly Shanks)
Steve Reed, a Sunset Hills resident, recently sent commentary about the severe flooding in our local areas. Please take a moment and read about his concerns.
By Steve Reed, Sunset Hills (Guest Commentator)
What’s with the weather?
Galatians 6:5 “For each one will bear his own load.”
I once heard a sermon about a man who awakes in the middle of the night feeling uncomfortably chilled. To get warm he needs to rouse himself, grasp the blanket at the foot of his bed, and pull it over him. And yet he does nothing. Half awake, and with dim awareness that any movement will expose him to cold room air, his mind turns from the effort to act, and he snuggles deeper into the blankets for warmth.
We have had recent severe prolonged flooding in the Mid-west causing multiple damage: crops destroyed and spring plantings missed; buildings and equipment destroyed; loss of livestock and human lives. Damage cost estimates are $ 5 billion and above, most of which is uninsured. The floodwaters which flow to the Gulf of Mexico carry farmland fertilizer which results in an enormous, oxygen depleted “dead zone” in the Gulf, killing fish and causing fishermen to seek disaster relief along with farmers.
This flooding is not unprecedented. Comparable flooding occurred in 1993. But what should concern us is that the frequency of severe flooding rises higher and higher. Why?
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This is an interesting article by Modern Farmer about the items labeled “organic” that we purchase at our local grocers and markets. It seems there is a battle on the menu between the “Big Ag version of organic agriculture” and the “organic purists.”
