Great Lakes Connecting Communities Communications Toolbox CD-ROM Released
November 2004

The Great Lakes - Connecting Communities Communications Toolbox provides FREE, focused, ready- to-use content and communications products related to water quality and quantity issues, habitat protection and invasive species in the Great Lakes Basin.

The Toolbox CD-ROM includes hundreds of organized royalty-free images, up-to-date media contacts for each Great Lake state and Canada (thousands of targeted names in print, radio, television and Web publications); communications tips, audience research, and more!

Why are we offering all of these tools for free? Because many community-based groups lack the staff and funding needed to develop comprehensive communications of their own. The Great Lakes Aquatic Habitat Network and Fund (GLAHNF) and Biodiversity Project are working together to help your organization raise public awareness about key local issues, as well as draw attention to issues that plague the Great Lakes and their associated aquatic habitats and watersheds. Your participation will help your community see how their local aquatic habitat issues are linked to the broader Great Lakes, as well as to environmental concerns in communities throughout the basin.

More than 100 groups are already participating. The collaborative effect of groups, like yours, in the Great Lakes Basin talking about aquatic habitat issues and their relationship to the Lakes in the same manner will raise the public profile of the Great Lakes' value and their threats. Increased public concern for the Great Lakes will lead to increased public involvement in the protection of both the Lakes and the aquatic resources in their watersheds.

With support from the Great Lakes National Program Office (GLNPO) of the Environmental Protection Agency, GLAHNF and Biodiversity Project are making a limited number of Great Lakes Connecting Communities Toolbox CD-ROMs available to groups, like yours, working throughout the Great Lakes Basin. The combined value of these professionally developed tools is nearly $25,000, therefore we ask that you make an effort to use one or more of these products in 2005. The Great Lakes Connecting Communities Toolbox CD- ROM is free of charge and available today.

To apply, please see the PDF application linked here. You can print and mail this to GLAHNF in Michigan. Preference is given to groups working in the basin on grassroots initiatives to protect the Great Lakes and related aquatic habitat - the December 2004 deadline has been extended.

Click here for information about other Great Lakes Forever program initiatives