Environmental Progress - Fall 2001

Decisions, Decisions....
We Make Choices Every Day

Agency's State Fair exhibit urged thinking "green" when making daily choices.

Young players ponder their options as they cross the Bog of Choices at one of the IEPA's State Fair exhibits.

The IEPA's display at this year's Illinois State Fair showcased a number of changes from previous years. While the location at the northeast corner of Conservation World was the same, the site certainly wasn't what volunteer staffers and the public had come to expect. Over the uneven terrain that drops sharply across its length, Bill Walkenbach and the Agency's maintenance crew constructed an elevated "stage" which provided a level surface for a new environment-oriented game.

Adapted from the "Bog of Habit" game the Agency helped fund at the Brookfield Zoo near Chicago, the State Fair version allowed up to five players at a time to act as their own game pieces while they combined their environmental savvy with the luck of the spin to try to be the first across the finish line.

The Watershed park area, partially funded by the IEPA, was a new attention magnet at teh 2001 State Fair.

In the past, the fair displays focused on the activities of one of the three Bureaus that make up the IEPA - air, land and water. This year, all three combined their support and the display looked at environmental choices and decisions that affect all of daily life. The exhibit recognized that everyone is faced every day with many choices that determine the environmental health of our planet and that not all the "right" choices are obvious. "Environmental Choices" was the theme of the exhibit.

The IEPA tent housed a giant game board mat made of recycled tires. Players made environmental choices in response to random questions, then hopped from stepping-stone to stepping-stone as they crossed the bog.

Visitors also had a chance to view and read posters and prose created over the years by elementary school pupils from across the state, illustrating the importance of keeping land, air and water clean.

Fair-goers could pose for a photo taken with the IEPA's Envirofun web page heroes, Captain Redbird, Captain Bluegill and Captain Earthworm and kids had a chance to win a tie-dyed tee-shirt that displayed the three pollution fighting super heroes.