Web Links between national and local resources

[Fred Stoss <fstoss@acsu.buffalo.edu>]

There are sites that POINT to resources, but you have to do a lot
of digging around to get to the heart of things.

EnviroMapper, MapCruzin, Scorecard, HUDs new map are among a
surprisingly small number of Web sites that have maps (geographic)that
are used to search for geographic-specific data and information.

Fred O'Hara (technical writer/editor and fellow of the Society for
Technical Communication and from Oak Ridge, Tenn.) and I are putting
together a paper Fred O'H. will present at the 2001 Annual STC
Conference on this.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has what I think
might be the best our most comprehensive inventory of links to
state health agencies and other environmental quality agencies,
and some limited county health resources.

Creating a good comprehensive inventory to include county information
would be a mammouth undertaking. My article in _Toxicology_ will
cover a small tip of the ice berg.

There are some good directories that provide partial access to this
information base, but none to my knowledge that do it in a
comprehensive manner.

If EPA has $100K, I know someone who could assemble such a list in
about one year.

There is a barometer out there:

The American Library Association and Global Learning, inc are using
$300K to do a rather comprehensive out reach to librarians on the
topic of Sustainable Development. Pick the topics of Environmental
Health, Climate Change, Environmental Quality (air and water),
hazardous wastes, recycling, safe drinking water, safe food,
genetically modified crops, ecology and biodiversity and we are
looking at a $1+ million dollar project to reach out and inform
libraians as to and understanding of the topics and issues and the
resources available to them and the users of their libraries.

If EPA REALLY wants to affect change, it should give some serious
attention to providing funds to groups like ALA that have an existing
information infrastructure to reachout to the library community
and provide the necessary training and awareness- building programs.

I would suggest that programs directed to librarians be also directed
to the parallel groups of information providers, those persons who
are NOT librarians, but provide what librarians call reference and
referral services. These are the public affairs, public information,
and public relations personnel that answer the phones in state,
county, and municipal agencies; non-profit, community, and health
care agencies and organizations; the offices of elected officials;
and others to whom the "concerned citizen" turns to find answer
about the quality of our environment.

It is this group of information providers that I have my concerns
about the quality of information they provide (usually excellent
for the organization or group they represent; but extremely limited
beyond their own front doors). We can empower them with the same
knowledge with which we can empower librarians.

It boils down to a basic statement:

"SHOW ME THE MONEY!!"

Fred Stoss
University at Buffalo