Protecting Sisters Country's dark skies

For many years Central Oregon has been the destination of many Oregonians who live on the west side of the Cascade mountains (and from elsewhere, too) seeking to recreate in an area with clear skies, less rain, and abundant natural beauty.

And it's cleaner today than it used to be. Before the Oregon bottle bill, passed in 1971 that required cans, bottles, and other containers of soft drinks, beer and water sold in Oregon to be returnable with a minimum refund value, roadside litter throughout the state was a more common sight than it is now. The people of Oregon got serious about cleaning up their act.

But not all forms of pollution have been getting better. Light from outdoor lamps continues to get directed skyward, brightening the darkness of night. Photographs taken over time by satellites show the spread of more and brighter lights. Much of this light is wasted in illuminating the atmosphere as it heads into open space. In many cities and towns, the Milky Way can no longer be seen. Closer to home, many community members have observed that the light domes over Bend and Redmond have grown noticeably in the past 10 years.

Many people are drawn to Central Oregon to enjoy the stars of our dark, clear skies. The City of Sisters advertises itself as a dark-sky-friendly town, and as such, it has a real opportunity to ensure outdoor lights are efficient and direct light downward, lighting areas that need to be illuminated, but not wasting energy shining into the atmosphere or causing safety hazards with the glare shining into people's eyes.

The City of Sisters and Deschutes County Dark Skies ordinances have guidelines to help maintain safe and efficient lighting without illuminating the sky. However, it seems that many people are not aware of the ordinance requirements - or they chose not to comply. While Sisters still has amazing stars at night, many individuals and businesses have installed light fixtures that contribute to light pollution. When such light fixtures are replaced by lamps with shields, glare into the sky is reduced, money and energy are saved, and the light is directed where it is needed.

The International Dark-sky Association (IDA) is a United States-based non-profit organization whose mission is to preserve and protect the nighttime environment and our heritage of dark skies through quality outdoor lighting. IDA's approach is to raise awareness about the value of dark, star-filled night skies and encourage their protection and restoration through education about the problems and solutions. The IDA website (http://darksky.org) is a great place to learn about creative and effective ways to light your property that do not send light into the sky but do illuminate where it is needed, creating a win-win situation.

While many members of the Sisters community value being able to view the multitude of stars in our dark skies, our community is growing. With new developments occurring in the area, it is important to recognize the resource our community has in our dark skies, and that we need to be deliberate in the engineering of our lighting.

A small group of dark-sky advocates, mostly members of the Sisters Astronomy Club, has been actively trying to maintain dark skies here.

But no one really knows how much the Sisters community at large values being able to view the stars, or whether minimizing the light dome (the amount of light projected up into the atmosphere) over our town is important.

Sisters High School teacher Rima Givot and her astronomy students intend to find out. They have developed an online survey and invite all interested community members to fill it out. They are hoping the whole community will respond.

Here is the link to that survey: http://bit.ly/darkskiessurvey

Givot's students are also working on a map that will identify regions that have more and less light pollution in the Sisters area. They are intrigued to learn really how well we can see the stars from various locations around our community. They hope to encourage the community to remember to look up at the stars and recognize what an amazing resource we have in our dark skies.

If enough members in the community continue to make efforts to use well-shielded lights that shine where the light is needed, we will be able to reduce light pollution and keep Sisters dark for a long time.