Weekend Holds World of Events for Earth Day

Those with shovels can plant trees.

Those with children can take them to beach cleanups and eco-fairs.

And those who wish to celebrate Earth Day but lack the time or fortitude can still act ecologically by buying a new license plate that features the work of a Laguna Beach artist and is designed to protect the California coast.

With the annual Earth Day approaching Monday, environmental groups across Orange County are gearing up for a weekend jampacked with earth-friendly fairs, exhibits and concerts.

Events run the gamut from arboreal to glitzy, in settings from an oak-shaded county park to Newport Beach’s Hard Rock Cafe.

The variety reflects just how much this celebration of the planet has evolved since its inception in April 1970, when it was the creation of ‘60s-era young people swept up in the environmental movement.

Once dominated by bottle cleanups, plantings and teach-ins, the latter-day Earth Day has become something for everyone: reason to hold a fair, throw a fund-raiser, walk a 5K or even visit an exhibit inside a mall sponsored by the California Forest Products Commission.

In fact, one of Orange County’s most popular Earth Day events--a celebration at Upper Newport Bay Ecological Reserve and Regional Park--will underscore more hands-on activities for children, in an effort to give them a sense that they can make a difference.

Organizers decided that last year, “we did not do enough for kids to take away,” said Nancy Bruland, an Upper Newport Bay ranger.

So children attending Sunday will be able to make an Earth Day promise to be more environmentally conscious. They can also plant milkweed seeds in mud balls, a step toward growing the milkweed plants that provide food for monarch butterfly larvae.

Schoolchildren will spend Saturday morning scooping up trash from Salt Creek Beach, and more beach cleanups are scheduled for next Saturday.

Some groups will use this “eco-weekend” to drum up money for environmental causes. Green Networking of Orange County will hold a benefit concert at the Galaxy Concert Theatre in Santa Ana.

Also hunting for funds is the California Coastal Commission, which has chosen Earth Day to launch its campaign to get 5,000 people to sign up for its new Adopt-a-Beach Coastal Protection license plate. The commission must pre-sell 5,000 plates by the end of 1996 under a deadline set by the state.

The plate will raise money for coastal education programs and cleanup efforts throughout the state, including Orange County, commission officials said.

It features a whale’s tail illustration donated by Laguna Beach artist Wyland. Applications will be available at local Earth Day events, planners said. The first-time filing fee for the plate is $50 more than the usual registration fee; renewal is $40.

Some Orange County environmentalists said the plate helps draw in people who might not otherwise contribute to Earth Day.

Ed Neely of Dana Point, for instance, who is helping organize an Earth Day-related beach cleanup in southern Orange County, says that though he prefers to volunteer for such activities as cleanups, others lacking the time might be willing to pay for the plate.

“Everyone contributes the way they can,” Neely said.