Welcome to WebWatch, a short, monthly roundup of features posted on the Sierra Club website during the past month. We'll also give updates on any new technical changes we've made on the site, and fill you in on upcoming features we've got in the works. In the future, WebWatch will be posted on the last day of each month. Your feedback is welcome! Please send it to: Mailto:[log in to unmask] _______________ JANUARY HIGHLIGHTS Based on an exchange between Oregon firefighter Ed Hall and President Bush, we posed the question, "If you had five seconds of face time with the president, what would you say?" Visitors can submit an answer, read an interview with Ed Hall, and learn more about the Arctic and Bush's energy plan. http://www.sierraclub.org/currents/facetime/ The new Take Action system launched in mid-December 2001 has generated lots of online activism! In fact, as of Jan. 31 there were 5,442 members of the Action Network. Of those, 3,242 signed up after getting an email from the Club that asked them to do so; 127 signed up as a result of the "tell a friend" option; and 2,073 signed up while surfing the web, or when they realized that, though they were a member of the old action alert system, they needed re-up on the new system. Thousands of faxes and emails have been sent on topics ranging from factory farms to the Bush energy bill to human rights. The index page is http://whistler.sierraclub.org/action/actionindex.jsp A Sierra Club legal victory forces the state of Michigan to obey the Clean Water Act and issue pollution-protection permits for animal factories. http://www.sierraclub.org/currents/water_permits.asp Reacting to dogged efforts by the Croton Watershed Clean Water Coalition, of which the Sierra Club's Atlantic Chapter is a founding member, New York Gov. George Pataki took action to protect the city's drinking water supply. http://www.sierraclub.org/currents/cleanwater.asp We featured success stories for the year 2001 from nine states: Arkansas, Florida, Indiana, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Mississippi, West Virginia, Wyoming. http://www.sierraclub.org/currents/states.asp Caring for Creation is the first joint project by the Sierra Club and National Council of Churches. The web page includes a history of the Christian enviromental movement. Ads were run in Georgia, Arizona, North Dakota, Indiana, Missouri and Delaware. http://www.sierraclub.org/currents/caring_creation.asp We announced the Sierra Club's lawsuit against the Vice President Cheney's Energy Task Force http://www.sierraclub.org/currents/enron.asp and we responded to the administration claim that the Bush Energy Plan and the Sierra Club plan were the same on 11 of 12 points. http://www.sierraclub.org/currents/math.asp Something new: A directory for Sierra Singles groups around the country. Send us your chapter/group link! http://www.sierraclub.org/singles/index.asp. We'll be also be creating a directory for Gay and Lesbian Sierrans, so send us your links to those pages, too. Mailto:[log in to unmask] In February: Road trip #1: From Feb. 4-8, two Florida staffers -- Darden Rice and Joe Murphy -- are driving around their state, one in a hybrid car and the other in an SUV, to call attention to promote "driving clean." We're posting daily updates from the duo. http://www.sierraclub.org/roadtrip/ Road trip #2: Later in the month we'll highlight updates from Ken Midkiff -- the Club's key staffer on animal factory issues -- as he cruises through Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Utah, and California, sniffing out bad actors and organizing activists. Olympics: Watch this week for coverage of our Salt Lake City campaign to "Let clean air be our Olympic legacy." It starts on the home page http://www.sierraclub.org/ __________________ Have you posted something new and different on your website? Tell me about it: Mailto:[log in to unmask] ##### Erin Jordahl Director, Iowa Chapter Sierra Club 3839 Merle Hay Road, Suite 280 Des Moines, IA 50310 515-277-8868 [log in to unmask] [log in to unmask]