viewpoint Mrs. Donald E. Clusen League of Women Voters of the US.
Toward an environmental partnership A great deal of attention currently is given to the role of the informed citizen in the fight for environmental quality, but it is mostly directed to what he can do and should do, individually or as a member of an organization. But very little attention is given to the fact that he represents an untapped resource for the environmental technology professional. The engineer can design the ultimate system for handling waste water treatment, but he has no way to carry it beyond the planning group to which it is submitted. He can construct on paper the most effective means for controlling emissions from the plant stack, but he cannot coerce an industry into doing more than is absolutely required by existing regulations. The professional can seek out the most highly desirable method of dealing with the management of solid wasce, hut he cannot convince the housewife to change her life style. The citizen, alone or in his organized group, can, does, and will do all of these things-if he is regarded as an integral part of the planning and decisionmaking process. Unless a public demand exists for change-in attitudes, in understanding needs, and in willingness to accept new goals-there can be little perceptible improvement in the quality of this nation’s environment in this generation or the next. The care and feeding of this public demand, its nurture, its sustained drive, its focus are in the hands of the nonprofessional. I t is the public which must create the demand for the new treatment plant, which will force the governmental body to bond itself to a lengthy, expensive process. It is the people who must be willing to bear the costs and the inconvenience of applying new technology to old problems. Only broad, vocal citizen support has made the difference in the level of funding by the Congress for waste treatment and enforcement. We should be your most valuable resource, and yet we sense a lingering feeling on the part of many scientists of all disciplines that these are technical matters which the general public cannot understand and should not decide. Citizen groups engaged in lobbying on all manner of environmental issues have found professionals an indispensable resource for the scientific and technical information they need to be politically effective. Any number of coalitions formed scientific and technical advisory groups as they participated in the standard-setting process on both air and water.
But it is a two-way street, and the same individuals and citizen groups do have something to offer the professional-a constitutency. If you want 11s to back your plans and explain them to others, you will need the patience and the insight to help us understand. Don’t downgrade the efforts and knowledge of the layman and then expzct him to be willing to work for the money and the personnel to do the job you think should be done. People are sensitive to any suggestion that the environment is an area too complicated for the average person. Vital public support for environmental management can be enhanced by a combination of bringing the ideas of the experts down to the level of the citizen’s grasp and bringing the sentiments of the citizens up to the plane of the technological possibilities. We need each other if there is to be change in our time. There is no time for parochial attitudes on the part of the professional or false humility on the part of the citizens. No scientific procedure can tell us how much irreversible damage we ought to tolerate and no scientific principle can tell us how to make the choice. Nevertheless, science can tell us what will happen if we make certain choices, what the costs will be, and what the short-term and longrange effects are. This is what the professional can do for laymen. And what can we offer in return? We can be a channel for communication, a vehicle for translating plans into action, and a viable force undergirding your efforts-if you let us. But we want to be equal partners in the struggle.
Ruth Clusen has 1Jeen a naticmal director of the 1,a g u e since 1966 and I‘s chairman of its Envi ronmenfal Qualify Commitfee
Volume 5, Number 9, September 1971 741
