COER Charitable Defending Community from Jet Noise

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A nonprofit fundraiser supporting

COER Charitable - Citizens of Ebey's Reserve
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Defending communities and our environment from unwanted military jet noise in northwest WA.

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$5,000 goal

4 months left




Where can we go to find silence? There is an increasing need to preserve and protect publicly accessible silent spaces. 

Citizens of Ebey's Reserve and its friends and allies are working to have quieter skies, healthier air, and cleaner water under the wings of the Navy's warfare jet training that has increased 400% over Central Whidbey since 2019.  Military jet noise is louder and travels further than noise from passenger jets, creating a painful and unlivable environment for anything on the ground.

Quiet public spaces like Parks, Reserves and National Monuments have been protected for future generations - but are being invaded by military jet noise for warfare training.

Help is needed in solving this relentless harm and trauma citizens are experiencing on historic Whidbey Island and its environs. Over 72,000 people are being impacted today by jet noise, at levels not recorded in any other location in the United States. Health is a growing concern.

Many factors contribute to health and the conditions that shape thriving, healthy communities.

Healthy communities require everyone to work together to benefit everyone’s health and well-being. Each person has a role to play and everyone should have a say in creating the rules and in determining how they are equitably applied.

The difference of a few decibles (dBs) might not seem like much, but for every one dB increase, the risk of developing cardiovascular disease climbs by roughly another percentage point, according to a preliminary analysis of more than 100,000 U.S. nurses. And as dBs climb, so do associations with death because of cardiovascular disease and heart attack.

Like many health issues, protection against noise would be economically advantageous. Economists who analyzed health care spending and productivity loss because of heart disease and hypertension have argued that a 5 dB reduction in U.S. noise could result in an annual benefit of $3.9 billion.

But unlike most other contributors to heart disease, noise cannot be addressed fully between a patient and a doctor. Protection requires changes in local, state and federal policy.  Because of COER's groundbreaking work over the past ten years, we are getting heard in Washington D.C. today. 

The military has little oversight, except for Congress, the FAA and the courts. They do not play by our rules.  This make our job harder and expensive lawsuits more necessary.  So far COER has raised almost 1M dollars in the past 10 years to protect communities and the environment in northwest WA.

We used to live in a cohesive, healthy and quiet place in Puget Sound with a pristine environment, sweeping vistas, cliffs and shorelines where you could watch eagles and orcas whales. A network of families shaped a vibrant cultural history and a unique historical reserve with an agricultural heritage that's still present today. The impacts of on-going jet overflights spanning hours during the day and night  have interfered with every aspect of daily life here.

The Ebey’s Landing National Historical Reserve, created by an act of Congress, is the first and only such Reserve in our nation. It includes 25 square miles of a cultural landscape in the heart of Whidbey Island. The Reserve's unique mission has become unattainable because of military overflights.

Within the fast-growing Puget Sound region, Ebey’s Reserve has quickly become the only remaining area where a broad spectrum of Northwest history is still clearly visible and intact within a large-scale and partially protected landscape.

 


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