Earth Day 2026 tips

Well, it’s Earth Day 2026 and what shall we do to handle climate change on Earth now that we’re 26 years past the millenium year of 2000?

Recently we attended a City of Tucson heat summit & climate accountability town hall at Donna Liggins neighborhood center. We heard from politicians like CD 7 Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva, Mayor Regina Romero, Ward 1 Councilmember Lane Santa Cruz and others about what they were doing to combat climate change. The City of Tucson is providing cooling centers, encouraging planting of more trees, recycling pickups and utility assistance, etc. Dr. Teresa Cullen of Pima County Health Dept. talked about body temperature and the lower rate of heat related deaths here, but rising # of ER visits due to problems with extreme heat & lack of reliable air conditioning indoors. Thankfully Sun Tran buses and Sun Link streetcar are air conditioned and running FREE for people to cool off and get to those cooling centers. Splash pads are now open.

Sun Tran is hosting an Earth Day event today at Ronstadt Transit Center downtown (see our calendar), 2 to 4 p.m.

What more can we do? Think about on the personal level from the Household checklist above. One of our friends/neighbors is recycling his grey water from the laundry machine to water his trees. Others including Ward 6 Councilmember Miranda Schubert joined me in our yearly Earth Day trash pick up in our neighborhood. Children are learning about recycling in elementary schools. Others are discontinuing their pools and grassy lawns for desert plants. The slogans say “Reduce, Recycle, Reuse” and now “Repurpose” and “Refuse”(i. e. plastic straws, single use plastic bottles).

Ward 3 Councilman Kevin Dahl has a free table next to his house on E. Spring Street in his ward. There’s a 3rd Saturday Really Really free market at Himmel Park for people to share some fresh food, and to repurpose/reuse household stuff. And there’s a lot of merchandise there at 8 am. during the hot months, 9 am. during the fall/winter months. It’s located at the north end of Himmel Park, east of the tennis courts along E. 1st St.

For info, here’s a list of some of the eco-friendly groups in town:

Coalition for Sonoran Desert Protection, https://www.sonorandesert.org/

Community Gardens of Tucson, https://www.communitygardensoftucson.org/

Living Streets Alliance, https://www.livingstreetsalliance.org/

Sonoran Institute, https://sonoraninstitute.org/

Sustainable Tucson, https://sustainabletucson.org/

Tucson Clean & Beautiful, https://tucsoncleanandbeautiful.org/

Tucson Food Share, https://tucsonfoodshare.org/en/

Tucson Peace Calendar, https://www.tucsonpeacecalendar.org/ (Tucson Peace Center)

Watershed Management Group, https://watershedmg.org/

I recently attended on March 31 a University of Arizona Southwest Center on Resilience for Climate Change and Health (SCORCH)  presentation on the importance of Greenspaces for people’s mental heatlh. They displayed photos of parks and other greenspaces around Pima County. And they wore tshirts which stated “Trees are Cool”.

Any suggestions are welcome in the comments below, on how to best serve our desert climate & community’s needs during Earth Day 2026. Temperture expected to be up to 87 degrees today.