PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
ANN ARBOR AREA EARTH DAY FESTIVAL 2011 ON MAY 1 AT WASHTENAW COMMUNITY COLLEGE: JOE RILEY FREE CONCERT AT 2 P.M.
Ann Arbor, Mich. April 18, 2011––Come celebrate the Annual Ann Arbor Area Earth Day Festival on Sunday, May 1, 2011 from noon to 4 p.m. in the beautiful Community Park area of Washtenaw Community College, 4800 E. Huron River Dr., Ann Arbor. Program details are available online at www.a2earthday.org.
This free, family-friendly event features live music, entertainment, hand-on activities, and live animal demonstrations. Displays from over 40 local environmental, non-profit and governmental organizations will focus on outdoor youth education, energy topics, water awareness, sustainable agriculture, recycling, and more. Participants may also pick up a program at the event for a list of exhibitors, a map and a schedule of the day’s events.
Highlights of this year’s events include a concert of original music by Joe Reilly (www.joereilly.org) under the entertainment tent starting at 2 p.m. An All Species Dance is part of the his program with participants encouraged to wear costumes representing their favorite plants and animals and join Joe in song and dance.
The entertainment stage will also feature musicians from Washtenaw Community College from 12-2. At 3:15 a workshop on weatherization will be presented by the nonprofit Clean Energy Coalition.
Visitors may also enjoy free face painting provided by Ann Arbor Cohousing, and recycled-content crafts sponsored by The Scrap Box. Stop in to see the Bubble Man and be sure to make time for the Leslie Science and Nature Center’s Birds of Prey and Brian Cressman’s reptiles.
Food will be on sale from Silvio’s Organic Pizza, Pilar’s Traditional Salvadorian and Latin Cuisine, and Fabulous Foods.
The Earth Day Festival’s zero waste efforts are coordinated by Recycle Ann Arbor. With the assistance of exhibitors and food vendors, all waste will be composted or recycled and nothing will go into the landfill. Marked containers for compostable and recyclable material will be available throughout the festival.
Earth Day is a free event thanks to generous sponsorship from Whole Foods Market and support from Washtenaw Community College and the City of Ann Arbor. The Community Park area of Washtenaw Community College is the open green area with a year-round elevated stage nestled between the U-shaped configuration of WCC buildings bounded by Business Education, Technical and Industrial, Student Center, Crane Liberal Arts & Sciences Student Center, and Myran Library, marked on the campus map at www.wccnet.edu (specifically at http://www.wccnet.edu/global/media/documents/wcc-campus-map.pdf).
The 2011 Earth Day event was planned by the following organizations: The Clean Energy Coalition, The Ecology Center, The Environmental Education Network of Washtenaw (EE-Now), The Leslie Science & Nature Center, The National Wildlife Federation, Public Services/City of Ann Arbor, Recycle Ann Arbor, The Scrap Box, and Washtenaw Community College.
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