On June 24, Hudson Riverkeeper and President Alex Matthiessen appeared on the O'Reilly Factor with Bill O'Reilly to discuss GE's decades-long resistance to cleaning up its Superfund site on the upper Hudson River – the largest in the nation. Now that GE is set to begin the first phase dredging – removing about 100,000 pounds of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) of the 1.3 million pounds it dumped into the river between 1947 and 1977 -- Matthiessen called on GE to commit to the full cleanup of the Hudson and approximately 75 other Superfund sites nationwide. GE's failure to commit to completing the Hudson River cleanup and many of its other superfund sites is a black stain on its "Ecomagination" campaign. "GE has a wonderful opportunity here to match the Ecomagination venture with cleaning up these communities around the country. And if they don't do that, then I think groups like ours are going to remind the public that it's not all that it [Ecomagination] looks like," Matthiessen said.

On Wednesday, June 11th the New York State Assembly took a strong stand on the increased consumption of non-carbonated beverages and the litter left behind, by passing the Bigger Better Bottle Bill. The bill will expand the current bottle deposit law to include a deposit on non-carbonated beverages. Any unclaimed deposits will be transferred to NYS by the beverage companies. These funds will go toward environmental protection of our air, water, and lands. Thanks to all our members who participated in our action alert this week! Your voice was heard and counted! Stay tuned for the next battle: passage in the NYS Senate!

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) and partner groups, including Riverkeeper, were awarded a federal forestry grant of $362,000 to test new models using green infrastructure to reduce combined sewer overflows.