CALL FOR SUMMIT ON CLIMATE CHANGE

The Ecological Society of America has joined the Society for Conservation Biology, the American Meteorological Society and three other scientific societies in a letter to President Obama, requesting that the White House convene a national summit on climate change.

"A considerable number of organizations have now called for a climate change summit and the recent draft report of the National Climate Assessment underscores the need for high-level attention to this issue," the letter says.

Several media outlets reported on the communication, including The Hill, E&E Daily, and climatecentral.org which ended with a quote from ESA's president: "We're ready to help," said Scott Collins, president of the Ecological Society of America and a professor at the University of New Mexico. "Just let us know what [we] can do." 

The climatecentral.org story is here: http://www.climatecentral.org/news/science-groups-push-obama-for-national-summit-on-climate-change-15571

 The letter to Obama is available here: http://www.conbio.org/images/content_policy/2013-2-8_Presidential_Climate_Science-Policy_Summit_Letter.pdf

There also apparently was an effort last fall to ask Obama to convene a climate change summit, and there is information about that here:

http://www.climatesummit2013.org/home

This earlier petition effort has apparently closed, and I see no way in the online information to endorse the most recent call by the six scientific societies for a climate summit, so anyone wanting to tell the president, "I agree! Do it!" would have to write an individual email to the White House. The address is here:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/submit-questions-and-comments

bob