Last Saturday was Annual River Clean-up Day where teams of volunteers clean up litter and trash from area waters and lands. Pictured is the Chenango County Environmental Management Council team with some of the trash and litter they removed from W

CHENANGO COUNTY – As a community goes, so goes its environment, says a member of the county’s Environmental Management Council.

That’s why the EMC has gone online with a new website, www.ccemc.org, to give members of the community and their elected officials an outlet to examine local environmental issues and a resource to better understand them.

“Our goals is to help educate the community and advise county government on current and future environmental issues and problems,” said EMC chair and Evening Sun Outdoors Columnist Bob McNitt.

From burning garbage and litter, to wood boilers and land management, McNitt say he’d like to see community members and government officials get more involved in facing the issues that face Chenango County.

“The county is changing,” he said, pointing to the economy, demographics, and the landscape itself. “There’s more open spaces and vacant properties now, combined with the ongoing problems of pollution and land misuse. And I think there is a fear of taking measures to advance or improve on the conditions here. But the same ideas we’ve always had on the environment locally are not going to work anymore. We can’t push these problems aside.”