Los Angeles, CA – On Friday, April 22, Robina Suwol, founder and executive director of California Safe Schools, with great pride presented the 2016 Earth Day Environmental Hero Award to 5th grade Larchmont Charter student Daniel Randall, the son of Mary Zakrasek & David Randall of Sherman Oaks, California, for his outstanding efforts to protect human health and the environment.
Articulate and passionate, Daniel was selected for this distinguished Award for his ongoing efforts to encourage students and adults to recycle and reuse containers, plant organic gardens, create pollination habitats for bees and butterflies, and protect our, air, water and soil from being contaminated by toxic chemicals.
Daniel, an environmental advocate since pre-school, also volunteers at a local animal rescue and describes the day he helped a bird that was trapped in plastic netting get free and fly away as the "best day of my life.”
Daniel added, “Kids are the change. We know species are going extinct everyday but we can help change that. We need to protect our air and water and keep the environment free from toxic chemicals so all species including kids, can grow up safe, healthy and happy.”
Mary Zakrasek , Daniel’s mother said,“ His love of nature and all living things is so deep, I know Daniel is going to have an enormous, life-affirming impact on our environment wherever he goes.”
In presenting the award, Robina Suwol, of California Safe Schools added, “Daniel’s desire and efforts to make our world a better place began in pre-school, which only proves that you are never too young to make a difference.”
California Safe Schools, founded in 1998, is a celebrated children’s environmental health and justice non-profit coalition known for spearheading the Los Angeles Unified Integrated Pest Management (IPM) Policy, the most stringent pesticide policy in the nation for K-12 public schools and the first to embrace the “Precautionary Principle” and “Right to Know”.
The success of the policy led to California’s Healthy Schools Act. Today the LA Unified IPM policy serves as an international model for school districts and communities.
On October 6, 2005, Governor Schwarzenegger signed AB 405 (Montanez) sponsored by California Safe Schools. The bill bans experimental pesticides, whose health effects are unknown, from California k-12 public schools. As a result more than 6 million California children and hundreds of thousands of school children are protected from experimental chemicals whose health effects are unknown.
California Safe Schools has facilitated changes at the policy level as well as at the grassroots which creates a lasting institutional protection.
For further information:
California Safe Schools 818.785.5515 www.calisafe.org
