Environmental activist Beverly Duperly Boos appeared at the Ballard Public Library to present a downsized, but poignant, version of Al Gore's global warming "slide show" to a small audience.

The lecture, called "Climate Change: The Time is Now," was co-sponsored by the Climate Project, and Climate Solutions. Representatives from Sustainable Ballard, and Seattle's Climate Action Plan, were also on hand to add local perspective and "green tips" for solving global warming.

Gore's slide show, the backbone of his award-winning documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth," offers images of dried out lake beds, receding glaciers, and worst-case-scenerio graphs, which he calls "business as usual projections," designed to persuade us to lay off the carbon. Otherwise, he warns of a turbulent future to include more Katrina-force hurricanes. Like her mentor, Boos warns that if we continue to pollute at current levels, polar bears, and people, will be walking on thin ice.

Boos was selected with about a thousand others to train with the former vice president in Nashville last January to spread his mantra of "Our Planet Has a Fever," a term he uses in his film, and on his own lecture circuit. Their backgrounds ranged from climate experts to concerned citizens.

Boos says she falls into the latter catagory and calls herself "an ordinary person," founded 'Opening of the Heart,' a non-profit organization that, according to that website, "Brings communities together for tough topics." Topics mentioned in the website include global warming, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and discussion forums on the Iraqi war.

A Bainbridge Island resident, Boos volunteers her power point lecture at Seattle Public Libraries, and combines statistical data gleaned from Gore in Nashville, with a personal emotional plea.

Boos explained to the audience, about half of whom acknowledged not seeing the movie, that "America has 5 percent of the world's population, yet emits over 30 percent of all greenhouse gases. We directly contribute to extreme weather events, like the terrible flooding in India." She is referring to the record-breaking 37 inch downfall in Mombai, in July, 2005, which stranded over four million of its residents, mostly children.

"This is not acceptable, not moral," said Boos, who added, "As a mother I personally have a willingness to wake up."

In hopes of "waking up" others in the Northwest to the climate crisis issue, her presentation includes a cartoon short borrowed from "An Inconvenient Truth." It depicts a frog that leaps into a jar of cold water positioned on top of a burner. Slowly the water heats up. The frog, we are told, would remain in the water "until it is too late." Luckily for the frog, a human hand scoops it out of the near-boiling water just in time. Gore remarks, "It is very important to remove that frog."

Echoing Boos' plea, Andrea Faste and Kathy Pelish, of Sustainable Ballard, suggested Ballard residents turn down the heat to save that frog, so-to-speak. In addition to laying off the gas peddle, recycling, and other practical household tips, they urged that we gather our food supply within a hundred miles of Seattle, and to eat what is in season. Their point out that while a pear appears green, it really is not, if it is shipped from Peru.

Pelish mentioned the Ballard Sunday Market as a resource, while Faste suggested "reading jars and labels at the area supermarkets as clues to where items were grown, and when. "Complain to the store if you don't see something local," she said.

Eden Tranor, the Climate protection Project Manager, representing the Department of Neighborhoods, with the Seattle Climate Action Plan, is publicising a new initiative, "Tree Fund," which gives matching grants to those qualified to plant trees along neighborhood medians. "Sustainable Ballard, the Fremont Solstice Parade, and Phinney Ecovillage have shown interest in similar programs in the past," said Tranor at the conclusion of Boos' presentation.

Steve Shay may be reached via bnteditor@robinsonnews.com