BATON ROUGE (Aug. 13, 2007) – The annual conference of the Louisiana Environmental Action Network, the state’s largest and oldest organizations devoted to environmental and conservation issues, will conduct its 21st annual session beginning at 9:15 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 15 at the Sheratown (downtown) Baton Rouge.

BATON ROUGE (Aug. 13, 2007) – The annual conference of the Louisiana Environmental Action Network, the state’s largest and oldest organizations devoted to environmental and conservation issues, will conduct its 21st annual session beginning at 9:15 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 15 at the Sheratown (downtown) Baton Rouge.

“It’s a great meeting. Environmentalists from across the state come to town to discuss many issues that affect the health and well-being of the citizens of the state,” says Marylee Orr, executive director of LEAN. “We’ll have the usual great mix of educational activities, opportunities to share strategies and success stories, and chances to reconnect with old friends and colleagues.”

The meeting is open to all who are interested in the environmental issues of the state and region. There is no charge to attend.

Speakers at the meeting will include the following.

Ben Cohen is one-half of the most talked-about, and least conventional, success stories in American business - Ben & Jerry’s Homemade. Cohen helped build a store front venture into a $300 million ice cream empire by making social responsibility and creative management strengths instead of weaknesses. Cohen has been recognized for fostering the company’s commitment to social responsibility by the Council on Economic Priorities which awarded them the Corporate Giving award in 1988 for donating 7.5 percent of their pre tax profits to nonprofit organizations.

John Maginnis is an independent journalist and author on Louisiana politics. He wrote The Last Hayride in 1984, the story of Edwin Edwards' comeback to power, and Cross to Bear in 1992, the tale of the Race from Hell between Edwards and white supremacist David Duke. Maginnis publishes a newsletter, Louisiana Political Fax Weekly and a weekly syndicated newspaper column.

C.C. Lockwood, wildlife photographer, naturalist, and lecturer, has published many books of photographs, including Around the Bend: A Mississippi River Adventure; Beneath the Rim: A Photographic Journey Through the Grand Canyon; and The Yucatán Peninsula. His work has appeared in more than 100 books and magazines, including National Geographic, and in 1978 he received the Sierra Club’s Ansel Adams Award for conservation photography.

Ivor van Heerden is the deputy director of the Louisiana State University Hurricane Center. He is also the director of the Center for the Study of Public Health Impacts of Hurricanes. For the last decade he has been one of the most persistent voices warning of the inevitable effects of a major hurricane on the Louisiana coast. In 2006 his book "The Storm" offered his analysis of Katrina and the levee disasters. Ivor will give us an update about where the state stands post hurricanes Katrina and Rita and where it needs to be headed.

David Neleigh, an administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency, Region 6, will discuss recent innovations in air monitoring, including passive air monitoring and the use of infrared camera to detect release of organic vapors.

Stuart H. Smith practices law in the areas of mass torts, class actions, environmental law, toxic torts, litigation, maritime law, and personal injury. Grefer v Alpha Technical, a case he worked on in 2001, was named by Lawyers Weekly as one of the Top 10 Jury Verdicts of that year with a $1.06 billion verdict. He is the recipient of the American Jurisprudence Award, Criminal Procedure.

Dr. Griff Blakewood is an assistant professor of Renewable Resources at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, as well as a part time Ecotheologian and a Singer of the Hymns of Sublime Uncertainty with his band: The Heresy. . . His lecture is titled "there ain't no easy way out"/Human Choice and the Climate Conundrum.”

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The Louisiana Environmental Action Network is a statewide coalition of more than 100 groups and several thousand individual members. LEAN provides its members with the support and resources required to accomplish their environmental goals. LEAN works to improve the environment for the benefit of all citizens of Louisiana. For more information go here.