ANSA NEWS!
Arkansas Natural Sky Association
ANSA is a membership-based 501(c)3 non-profit & the Arkansas chapter of DarkSky International.
✨Photo of the Month✨
April 2026
📷: Terry Harriman
"Shot Monday (April 20) at Kingston. Nomad tracker, shot at 800, 3.2, 90 seconds. Foreground 2500, 1.8, 10 seconds."
Here is our own Jeff Hoeper (who is also the North Central Arkansas Master Naturalists - NCAMN Astronomy Team Leader) giving a wonderful presentation about the Moon during a sky party at Fred Berry Crooked Creek Nature Center in late April. Great work, Jeff!NCAMN's astronomy team leader Jeff Hoeper presented “Our Marvelous Moon” at the beginning of a sky party at Fred Berry Crooked Creek Nature Center. He focused on current theories of the Moon’s origin, with viewing afterward in several Dobsonian telescopes. ASUMH science faculty and other members of the public joined NCAMN members in late April.
📰 Great News! Bad News, and Help Needed!
💡 As all here know, the world has been exploding with inappropriate, unnecessary artificial light, and one consequence is a lot of people are finding themselves and their property inundated with unwanted and unhealthy spill light. A great deal of this comes from utility companies eager to sell electricity during off-peak hours at night, which promote poorly designed LED dusk-to-dawn light fixtures as security devices.
✨ ANSA tries to help these victims.
⚖️ Matthew Fraser is one such victim. Carroll Electric maintains a way-too-bright LED fixture on a pole located on the corner of his front yard, paid for by a neighbor, which lights up his front yard and front bedrooms. Being unable to get it removed, he filed suit in the Benton Co. Circuit Court in Nov. of 2023. The case has been to the AR Supreme Court and back. We anticipate a jury trial later this year or early next.
💸 Getting where we are is a huge victory, and a favorable jury verdict will change how utility companies approach the use of these lights. But, despite deeply discounted fees, the process is expensive. So far, the case has cost $14,936. $3300 of that was raised through a GoFundMe campaign; the remaining amount has come out of Matthew’s pocket.
⚔️ Matthew is fighting this battle for everyone who is a victim of these irresponsible lighting practices.
🙏 Please help out by contributing to the effort.
Donate to Fraser vs Carroll Electric, organized by Matthew F
gofund.me
I bought a home in beautiful Bella Vista, Arkansas, only to discover that my front bedrooms, entr… Matthew F needs your support for Fraser vs Carroll Electric