The Miami Herald from Miami, Florida • 280

Who is Annie Ackerman and Why Is She Talking to Ted Kennedy? A pint-sized grandmother who got the phosphates out of Dade's detergents is now taking on the White House A de forts It was a heady experience for citizens long aecustomed to government that seemed to operate by remote control They were ready for more "It is a fact that because the Miami community is smaller than many of the Northern cities political 'representatives are much more available to the people" Mrs Ackerman says "Citizens can meet them on a more personal basis make their point and win That's what we did with the STOL port too "They told us originally that that part of the Interama site would be used for an addition to public transportation But the STOL port would be used for planes to take tourists on short hops to the islands "That's idiotic When the county held a public hearing on it up here we packed a room meant for 300 or 400 people with 3000 and the commissioners listened They turned down the STOL port" Mrs Ackerman says her activities are motivated by concern for her adopted state which is undoubtedly true but it is perhaps equally true that she is motivated by habit: one wall in the crisp black and white family room of her apartment is covered with awards for her civic and social work in Chicago If there is a difference between then and now she says it is that she is concentrating on environment in Miami In Chicago her children were small and it was only natural that she should focus on issues that would affect them fair employment education human rights (Besides she admits there isn't much that can be done for the Chicago urban environment) She does not concede another difference though it is equally striking: in Chicago she worked through existing organizations In Miami she began her own with more than a little help from her friends as she'd be quick to note Dade Countians first heard of her organization the Pollution Revolution when Mrs Acker- man showed up at a Metro Commission meeting accompanied by an army of 250 sign-wavers She spoke and they cheered What they wanted she said was a ban on detergents containing phosphates and the adoption of a countywide sanitary sewer plan If the detergent manufacturers next day were Point East is where it all started this citizens' movement that has begun to make itself heard as far away as Washington A moderately plush complex of 1266 condominiums Point East is occupied by more than 2000 persons most of them retired senior citizens and transplanted Northerners as are the Acker-mans Located on the banks of "beautiful Lake Mau le" one of the larger man-made bodies of water dotting North Dade's condo communities it is a small quiet world lying a hedge and a flowerbed away from Biscayne Boulevard "People who have lived in the South all their lives" Mrs Ackerman says "can't imagine what it's like to be a Northerner and experience coming down here where you actually see the sun every day see the water out there It's intoxicating "And then to see this magnificent water suddenly covered with algae with fish dying It was a travesty!" She sweeps an arm toward Lake Maule glittering beyond her screened tiled fourth-floor balcony She is hissing the words between her teeth now "It is a travesty when anything happens to that which is a natural resource and which belongs to the peopleWe couldn't let that continue" The algae is gone now and dead fish are rare in Lake Maule The reversal began shortly after the phosphate ban went into effect Mrs Acker- man says 0 Ca 4 -4 With it came something she believes is equally important: the residents of Point East who had rallied with her saw the change and recognized that it had occurred because of their ef By Sarah Elder Anne Ackerman has the stature of a buxom Minnie Mouse the voice of a refined Fred Flint-stone and the determination of Wonder Woman She has been called a pest a do-gooder a miracle worker and a couple of names too obscene to print She's a doer a thinker an organizer a people-rouser She's a grandmother who dyes her hair and wears low-necked dresses and looks as good as a lot of women half her 60 years Since 1969 when she and her husband Irving a retired insurance executive moved to Miami from Chicago she has: Initiated and won the battle for a Dade County ordinance banning sale of detergents containing water-polluting phosphates Fought off legislative attempts to weaken the Dade ban by bringing it into line with a less strict state phosphate law Organized a successful crusade against location of a STOL (short take-off and landing) airport on the Interama site at the edge of one of North Dade's most heavily populated areas Defeated a plan to locate an already technically obsolete secondary sewage treatment plant and outfall line on the Interama property Organized the North Dade meat boycott promotion last year following it with flights to Washington for the national meat price conference and lo Chicago to help organize the National Consumer's Congress both of which grew from grass-roots protests Ignored a deluge of threatening and obscene telephone calls to lobby successfully for a Dade County gun-control law Now she's organizing opposition to President Nixon's health-care plan and looking forward to a campaign for a Dade ordinance outlawing throwaway bottles and cans Anne (her friends call her Annie) Ackerman pickets Pollution Before It Kills You" "Deflate the Protests (a 300-word telegram to Sen Ted Kennedy berating him for compromising on the original draft of the health-care bill he drew as an alternative to Nixon's) Packs a clout (Ralph Nader's office called her on the Monday after Watergate Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox was fired to ask if she planned to urge impeachment of the President) She has a hell of a nerve as demonstrated when Sen Kennedy's health adviser called in response to the 300-word telegram: she told him she would be back in touch and would call him collect because as volunteers she and her friends have no operating funds beyond their own pockets He said he'd accept the charges and gave her his private number And she's generous reluctant to be interviewed without Mollye Lovinger cochairman of the Pollution Revolution they organized together to fight that first battle against phosphates constantly mentioning the name of one person or another "without whom we couldn't have done it" praising the residents of Point East where she and her husband live SARAH ELDER is a Herald Staff writer who is currently working on the staff of Tropic B3 mi stol act( pril pie and a I( a fror Cot tair the stri tior por Noi call an( pro Wa enc Cor gra5 scei Da( Nix can way pict "De Ker orig alte on tor to whe spoi she colli havi ets his vies the to fi stan ot he prai! her ookk 4 --iytfir'li4' 1 's: ti" '1 l'- -7-1414-4 --f i II I) 4--- ''14 I it07-----'-: 1 -0 1 4 t-' 't 1 1 7 7'' '42i-t! 0 -A "-wd- ''-'4 1 5 ---i 1 :5 7 i' co "Voi- V' 7-1 -ri o-' 4 7 2: A I 36 3.