Views from readers: trees + homeless population + fish farming
Fish farming
Fish farming near Mississippi’s barrier islands was proposed 30 years ago with the idea of installing net pens in barges south of Horn Island.
In response, the Bureau of Marine Resources hastily published marine aquaculture guidelines that were criticized by scientists for their poor approach to sampling pollutants and monitoring water quality and sediments near the pens. The barge fish farm idea was abandoned after it drew criticism from the National Park Service and the Gulf Islands Conservancy, an advocacy group created to defend the integrity of the wilderness qualities of Mississippi’s barrier islands.
Recently, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration proposed Aquaculture Opportunity Areas in the Gulf of Mexico. Industrial fish farms, anchored in shallow Gulf waters, would release feed pellets, disease treatment pharmaceuticals and fish waste, like ammonia, directly into the water.
Even though discharge permits are required from the Environmental Protection Agency and Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality, there’s no way to treat the water and remove the waste products in an open net-pen. The currents simply flow through and carry the waste away to become someone else’s problem, like the pollution flowing into the Mississippi Sound from the Bonnet Carre Spillway during floods in 2019-2020, creating harmful algae blooms, killing oysters, and sickening dolphins.
Mississippi has seen enough pollution and algae bloom problems and should ban net pen fish farming in state waters and oppose industrial fish farming in federal waters.
Andrew Whitehurst, Healthy Gulf, water program director
Terese Peresich Collins, Board, Gulf Islands Conservancy
Respect the trees
We must recognize the importance of trees. Trees must be given rights.
Some countries are agreeing to the rights of nature. I believe its just the beginning.
Trees are more than what you may think.
Trees lower the temperature in hot summer months. Trees create moisture, which means water by the gallons are produced. Trees are plants that must be kept alive and need not be chopped down.
Miguel Nicholson
Gulfport
Federal program
As a volunteer with the ONE Campaign, I went to Capitol Hill to meet with Congressman Mike Ezell’s office and ask them to reauthorize the US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief – or PEPFAR.
The 20-year-old program has helped save 25 million lives from HIV/AIDS, put 20 million people on life-saving antiretroviral drugs, and ensure 5.5 million babies were born HIV-free.
But far too many people still die of this preventable, treatable disease. Some 650,000 people died of AIDS-related illnesses in 2021 and the virus infects someone new every 30 seconds.
Congress has an opportunity right now to move us closer to the end of HIV/AIDS by supporting one of the most effective disease-fighting tools in our global health arsenal. The United States must continue playing a vital role in global health policy are we risk losing decades of health care infrastructure investments.
It is imperative that Congress reauthorize PEPFAR in 2023 so it can keep up its work. I thank the staff for the meeting and urge Sen. Wicker to continue PEPFAR’s success and support America’s commitment to fight the global AIDS crisis.
TJ Harvey
Biloxi
Start a conversation
The whole country is experiencing a rise in homelessness.
Prior to 2018 I was very good at ignoring the homeless population, but during that year I almost became homeless myself and started interacting with the population in a 1-on-1 basis.
I want you to know that as afraid of them you are, most of them are much more intimidated by you. If for any reason law enforcement were to become involved in your interaction with them, they are the ones that would end up being cited, arrested, or worse.
Our friends without homes have no intention to harm you. Please do not think less of these people, because that is what they are ... people. They are no more or less a person in the eyes of God than you or I are.
While I am not asking you to give them money, food or anything else, what I do ask of you is to have a conversation with them. You’ll discover that you most likely have more things in common with them than you do differences.
Josh McGee
Biloxi