With warmer weather finally pushing into the Hudson Valley, give thanks this Sunday on Earth Day. Join the folks at ROSA4Rockland and celebrate in Suffern, NY, during the 5th Annual Wild & Scenic Earth Day Film Festival at the Lafayette Theater , April 22. Doors open at noon.

ROSA 4 Rockland initiated the Wild & Scenic film fest a few years back as a way to partner with other local environmental and other community groups and as a way to raise funds for the group and raise its profile.

Remember the fight against United Water’s Haverstraw Bay desalination plant? And the push back against Patrick Farms in the Town of Ramapo along Rt. 202 and 306. ROSA 4 Rockland is involved in a constellation of local issues, from fresh water and the aquifer to taxes and over development. The Wild & Scenic film fest is ROSA’s big fundraising effort for the year — this year funds will help pay for ROSA’s Patrick Farm legal effort that saw the Rockland County Supreme Court set aside Patrick Farm site plan and subdivision reviews by the Town of Ramapo.

The 12 short Wild & Scenic films cover topics that are timely in terms of the environment, diverse, run relatively short and are damn interesting. There’s the story of Straws which details the environmental problems caused by these ubiquitous plastic spikes that mostly end up in landfills and make their way to the oceans.

There’s a film on light pollution in the night sky, one on the impact a wall on the Texas/Mexico border would have on wild life, and a very brief short on the History of National Parks.

Everything gets underway at the beautiful Lafayette Theater in Suffern around noon on Sunday. The festival officially kicks off at 1 p.m. Tickets at the door cost $20 but the price of admission is well worth the return you’ll get on finding friends and a community that is invested in local issues.

The Wild & Scenic festival is a sort of epicenter for the Ramapo/Rockland environmental activists, politicos and members of the community who care about improving the quality of life in Rockland County.

ROSA has also partnered with the Suffern Chamber of Commerce and Lafayette Theater to present Dine in the Theater, which offers a number of local restaurant foods, already packaged and ready for you to dine right there in the theater.

Tickets and other Wild & Scenic information can be found here.