Environment web exercises 1

Every four months, an area the size of Rocky Mountain National Park is leveled in order to produce the 100 million trees worth of junk mail that invades the mailboxes of millions of Americans each year. This production and disposal of junk mail consumes more energy than 2.8 million cars and costs citizens and local governments hundreds of millions of dollars per year in collection and disposal fees.
Currently, the Center for a New American Dream is campaigning to create a national Do Not Junk Opt-Out Registry that is modeled after the widely popular Do Not Call Registry.

All direct mailers will remove your name and address from their lists if you make the proper request, but contacting just one mailer (like the Direct Marketing Association), will not get you removed from all direct mail lists. You can create personal, automatically generated forms on the New American Dream website. After completing these forms, you’ll notice a substantial reduction in direct mail, but it won’t be eliminated completely because there isn’t a way to remove yourself from all lists.
there are most likely millions of Americans willing to pay a dollar or two a year to remove themselves from the direct mailers’ lists and keep things running smoothly at the USPS. No one wants to see a neighborhood postal worker lose her job, force an entire office to close or reduce postal service.

Three years later, Americans are still waiting for a simple, companion registry in order to reduce the quantity of unwanted junk mail from direct mailers.


Contact to STEVEN KRIEGER is the grassroots coordinator and community liaison for the Center for a New American Dream. He can be reached at steve@newdream.org.