≈ Smith Mill Creek ≈ Notes

2011 Permaculture Convergences (draft)

2011-02-23T14:33:00.003-05:00

2011 USA Permaculture Convergences
(draft list in formation)
If you hear of another, please send word to SmithMillCreek
* at * gmail, or better yet, leave it in the comments section.

I have cut and pasted the 2010 list in here as a placeholder.
Obsolete 2010 entries should be in orange color.
Thanks!
*******************

NORTHEAST
http://northeasternpermaculture.wikispaces.com/Summer+Gathering
Fri- Sun, July 2-4, 2010
Unity, Maine USA $60- $120 ish
• Suggest a Convergence session here: http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?hl=en&formkey=dGFPSUlxdnV5MjRLT19GZEJIMEJMSGc6MA
twitter.com/NEConvergence

SOUTHEAST 2011
http://www.southeasternpermaculture.org
17th Annual Gathering is August 5th-7th, 2011 in Celo, NC
Registration opens April 22nd, 2011.
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/SoutheasternPermaculture

COLORADO
http://coloradopermaculture.blogspot.com/2010/02/colorado-permaculture-convergence.html
The Colorado Permaculture Convergence is scheduled for Sunday, August 22nd, 2010 at the 63rd Street Farm near Boulder, Colorado. Contact the High Altitude Permaculture Institute if you are interested in helping organize this event.

NORTHWEST
http://www.washingtonstatepermaculture.org
2010's Washington State Permaculture Conference, tentatively scheduled to be held at The Evergreen State College in mid-September, 2010.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA BAY AREA
None planned I can find; last one Summer 2008
http://www.livingmandala.com/Living_Mandala/Bay_Area_Permaculture_Convergence.html

*************************************
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
None found for 2010
http://socalifornia.permacultureconvergence.org
1st Annual Southern California Permaculture Convergence
August 29-31, 2008

MIDWEST
The First Midwest Permaculture Convergence in Bloomington IN
September 23-25, 2010
Weblink to come....

UPSTATE NEW YORK PERMACULTURE GATHERING
First was March 2010
Next TBD
http://upstateNYpermaculture.Net

Everybody's flying and no one leaves the ground

2010-07-08T14:03:00.001-04:00

I just finished Strange Days Indeed: The Golden Days of Paranoia, by Francis Wheen, about the seventies.

It's not so noteworthy, but it was a good reminder of the malaise of the seventies. Perhaps more than any decade of this century, this was a decade of disempowerment & frustration. McGovern didn't win; and Nixon did instead and then lost; there were 150 hijackings from 1970-'72; numerous gas lines and in Britain, brownouts. Stocks lost their value, so did wages, so did savings. Elites were hemmed in by new rules of democracy, but unions started losing ground around 1974. The punks celebrated despair, and in Germany there was a Tunix movement (Tu Nichts-- "do nothing").

New York City almost went bankrupt, and did face severe increase in either crime of the perception of it; serial killers abounded, each with a nickname (Zodiac, Son of Sam, freeway Killer); city councillors killed city councillors. In the confusion of role models, cults abounded: Moonies, Scientologists, Rajneesh, Elizabeth Clare Prophet. So did shallow encounter groups.
Drugs grew in use, and moved from an earlier psychedelic focus on a higher truth, to an escape from reality and a contest to see who could get higher on heroin, cocaine, pot.

And as the book's title reminds us: crazy mysticism & conspiracy theories false AND true, abounded: Cointelpro, the assassination of JFK, flying saucers, Chariots of the Gods

I begin to better understand the appeal of Ronald Reagan in promising to end many of these things; and actually pulling it off, in the short term & middle term. Until 18 months ago.

The title of the book & my blog entriy is from a song by John Lennon-- Nobody Told Me.

Transition Movements springing up like wildflowers!

2010-04-09T07:48:00.010-04:00

I just learned about two of these-- Transition Decade & MAHB's outreach push-- in the last ten hours.

I'm going to post an incomplete draft 0.6 and then revise it later today. Disclosure at end.
-- Jim

Transition Decade
The Transition Decade creates a campaign platform and a shared timeline
for action for the next ten years. (Australia, 10 group coalition, launched 2/14/2010, acknowledges debt to Lester Brown's 1990 suggestion of a "Transition Decade" in 1990.)
http://www.t10.net.au/node/13 Official homepage
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Transition_Decade

Transition (Town) Movement
Started in Fall 2005 in Kinsale, Ireland by Louise Rooney and Rob Hopkins, this movement attempts to build community-based efforts to reduce our carbon footprint, reduce our oil dependence and build community. 284 official initiatives as of April 8th, 2010. Third annual conference coming up in June 2010 in Britain. Now based in Totnes, UK.
http://transitionculture.org/essential-info/why-transition-culture <-- early history
http://www.transitiontowns.org <-- movement home page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transition_Towns

Great Transition Initiative
Started in 1995, The Great Transition Initiative is a growing
international network of scholars and activists that
analyzes alternative scenarios and charts a path to a hopeful future. Based in Cambridge, MA out of Harvard University. Has many monographs and thinkpieces.
http://www.gtinitiative.org Official home page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Transition

Four Years. Go
Dedicated to the notion that the planet is at a tipping point, this campaign stresses that the next four years will determine the course of the next thousand years. This effort comes out of the Pachamama Alliance. It was born out of a speech by Lynne Twiss. Strongest on outreach, light on theory, the four years in question run from February 14, 2010 (Valentine's Day) to 2/14/14.
http://www.fouryearsgo.org
http://twitter.com/fouryearsgo
http://www.youtube.com/fouryearsgo
http://www.facebook.com/fouryearsgo

Millennium Assessment of Human Behavior (MAHB)
Pronounced “mob”, this initiative was catalyzed by Paul Ehrlich, a MacArthur award winning senior biologist most famous for writing the bestseller The Population Bomb in 1968. While it has been around for a fw months, it went public more loudly on April 6th, 2010 with the publication of an article in an online science magazine.

http://www.plosbiology.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pbio.1000330
http://mahbsustainability.wordpress.com/about

Defusing the Nuclear Threat (Stanford University)
 Professor Martin Hellman, who helped build the anti-nuclear group Beyond War, is trying to start a Stanford University effort that will go global. I don't know if he's talked to Paul Ehrlich (I imagine they must know each other, bring professor emeriti on the same campus). 
http://nuclearrisk.org

***********************************************
(Disclosure: I'm on-board with a number of these: I helped start Transition Town Asheville in December 2006 w/ two others; am recently part of the Great Transition Institute network; am recently part of the Four Years. Go connectors group, helped found the US Citizen's Network for the 1992 Earth Summit, and got started with all this by reading the Population Bomb in 1970 after the first Earth Day.)

Organic Grower's School 1994-2010

2010-03-27T18:52:00.013-04:00

Signs of hope escape our eyes easily; we like to see the doom.
Here's some good news: Attendance at the OGS doubles every four years.
Can we shrink our carbon footprint as quickly as this grows (17%)?
Easily, no. Impossible? Probably not.

*

*

Year

Attendance

% growth

1994

100

1995

213

213%

1996

141

66%

1997

160

113%

1998

230

144%

1999

430

187%

2000

392

91%

2001

500

128%

2002

533

107%

2003

609

114%

2004

683

112%

2005

800

117%

2006

900

113%

2007

1000

111%

2008

1200

120%

2009

1300

108%

2010

1500

115%

Average annual growth

17.3%

Average doubling time = 4.1 years

Figures courtesy of

Meredith Leigh McKissick

Director, Organic Growers School

Crooked Creek Farms & Sweet Earth Flower Farm

www.sweetearthflowers.com

2010 USA Permaculture Convergences

2010-03-25T15:38:00.005-04:00

2010 USA Permaculture Convergences
If you hear of another, please send word to SmithMillCreek
* at * gmail
Thanks!
*******************

NORTHEAST
http://northeasternpermaculture.wikispaces.com/Summer+Gathering
Fri- Sun, July 2-4, 2010
Unity, Maine USA $60- $120 ish
• Suggest a Convergence session here: http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?hl=en&formkey=dGFPSUlxdnV5MjRLT19GZEJIMEJMSGc6MA
twitter.com/NEConvergence

SOUTHEAST
http://www.southeasternpermaculture.org
The gathering is Fri- Sun, August 6-8, 2010 at the Arthur Morgan School in Celo, NC
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/SoutheasternPermaculture

COLORADO
http://coloradopermaculture.blogspot.com/2010/02/colorado-permaculture-convergence.html
The Colorado Permaculture Convergence is scheduled for Sunday, August 22nd, 2010 at the 63rd Street Farm near Boulder, Colorado. Contact the High Altitude Permaculture Institute if you are interested in helping organize this event.

NORTHWEST
http://www.washingtonstatepermaculture.org
2010's Washington State Permaculture Conference, tentatively scheduled to be held at The Evergreen State College in mid-September, 2010.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA BAY AREA
None planned I can find; last one Summer 2008
http://www.livingmandala.com/Living_Mandala/Bay_Area_Permaculture_Convergence.html

*************************************
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
None found for 2010
http://socalifornia.permacultureconvergence.org
1st Annual Southern California Permaculture Convergence
August 29-31, 2008

MIDWEST
The First Midwest Permaculture Convergence in Bloomington IN
September 23-25, 2010
Weblink to come....

UPSTATE NEW YORK PERMACULTURE GATHERING
First was March 2010
Next TBD
http://upstateNYpermaculture.Net

Some Haiti Resources

2010-03-18T08:56:00.001-04:00

I just got this via email. I myself would do well to compile some other responses I got from others.
-- Jim
*******************************
I am cut and pasting all the answers b/c quite frankly there were so many that I hesitate to choose.

I will narrow down some favorites later when I come back from work.
Alice Backer, Esq.
http://www.kiskeacity.com
http://twitter.com/kiskeacity
*********************************

Books:
1. Red and Black in Haiti (Matthew Smith)
2. The Uses of Haiti
3. Haiti and the United States
4. Haiti: State Against Nation

Novels:
1. Love, Anger, Madness
2. Brother I am Dying
3. Masters of the Dew

Films:
1. The Agronomist
3. Heading South
4. Man by the Shore
5. Ghosts of Cite Soleil
6. Moloch Tropical
7. Egalite for All
8. Royal Bonbon

After Copenhagen: Community Climate Discussion

2009-12-20T09:04:00.002-05:00

After Copenhagen: Community Climate Discussion
Talking Together about How We Feel, and what we might do, alone & together
(NOT at West Asheville Library Community Room & relocated next door to)
Waking Life Espresso
976 Haywood Road, West Asheville, NC 28806
Saturday, Jan. 2nd, 2010 10 AM to noon
Free and open to people who think that human-caused climate change is real
and worth stopping. don't drive-- if you can walk comfortably, come on over)

If you are on Facebook, you can "rsvp" (optional, but nice) at
http://j.mp/AvlAfterCop15

Questions? Email smithmillcreek at the domain of gmail dot com

More BAD action on climate later

2009-10-15T16:20:00.004-04:00

My blog action day post on climate change will probably be a few days late--
I'm preparing a talk on the phases of movements for the student climate conference, Powershift '09, this Saturday in Chapel Hill, NC.

the workshop will be a repeat of the one I did in November 2008.

-- End--

Tolstoy on Causation

2009-09-15T00:13:00.001-04:00

The human mind cannot grasp the causes of phenomena in the aggregate. But the need to find these causes is inherent in man’s soul. And the human intellect, without investigating the multiplicity and complexity of the conditions of phenomena, any one of which taken separately may seem to be the cause, snatches at the first, the most intelligible approximation to a cause, and says: “This is the cause!"

-Leo Tolstoy
War and Peace

Important August Essays on the Eco-Crisis

2009-08-26T04:35:00.001-04:00

All the essays agree on one thing: big changes are ahead of us, and soon.
All of the essays below are by some of the top eco-thinkers alive.

Paul Kingsnorth and Paul Monbiot debate the future in the (UK) Guardian

Northwest US-based Tom Atlee on the Great Turning

NY Times eco-columnist Andy Revkin on a new stage in humanity

Sharon Astyk (upstate NY) and Rob Hopkins (Devonshire, UK) debate Permaculture and Transition Towns.

Buses from Downtown Asheville to SEE Expo and back

2009-08-20T13:48:00.001-04:00

ROUTE 6 AIRPORT/HENDERSONVILLE TO Southern Energy & Environment Expo

( I am posting this on my private blog to enhance skimmability. You can also find it somewhere on their website. Maybe. If you're lucky.)

Asheville Transit Route 6-Airport/Hendersonville Road will stop at the 9th annual Southern Energy & Environment Expo at the Western North Carolina Agricultural Center on Friday, August 21 and Saturday August 22 (but not Sunday). From downtown Asheville, the route will make seven trips to the agricultural center as part of its regular schedule (which means rides cost $1, exact change- four quarters or a dollar bill).

Asheville Transit will provide service to the bus stop near gate 1 at the agricultural center. The first trip will arrive Friday and Saturday at 9:15 a.m. and the last trip will leave at 6:15 p.m.

Bus service is not available on Sunday.

Route 6 will stop at the expo about 10 minutes before arriving at the Asheville Regional Airport, as part of its current schedule Friday and Saturday. Route times include: 9:15 a.m.; 10:45a.m.; 12:15 p.m.; 1:45 p.m.; 3:15 p.m.; 4:45 p.m., and; 6:15 p.m.

The Asheville Transit Route 6 schedule can be found at www.ashevilletransit.com under “maps and schedules.”

For more information, contact Asheville Transit at 253-5691, iride@ashevillenc.gov or by going to www.ashevilletransit.com.

Help make video this Saturday noon

2009-07-30T14:34:00.003-04:00

Mountaine and I are doing a video this Saturday noon. We need extras.
Can you join us?
Facebook signup: http://bit.ly/p9xeR
-- Jim
*************************************

Hiya friends.
I'm involved in the October 24th global day of activism/education on sustainability, organized by the great folks at www.350.org. It's about the need to reduce carbon in the atmosphere from the current 390 parts per million (dangerous and rising) to 350 (much safer). Check out the website - this is HUGE.

One of the events I'm working on is a simple bit of street theatre that can be replicated easily around the world. It's called the "350 move". There is strong interest from the 350.org people in our getting a short video made quickly, so they can publicize it to the groups in over 80 countries gearing up for the big event on October 24th.

This Saturday August 1st, promptly at noon, at the downtown Asheville Vance Monument, some of us will meet to do 2 things - review the plan for the street theatre and make some final tweaks, and then get it videotaped. I hope it takes only an hour - if more, not much. Can you be a part of this? We need warm enthusiastic creative bodies! We're gonna meet at the Vance Monument, and choose a place to go depending on the weather. If you're pretty sure you'll come, please send me an email at mountaine at gmail . Or just show up.

If you can, bring a cardboard sign that says "350" on it. Dress the way you'll want to look for the world audience - a variety of styles (some in business clothes) would be great.

And if you can serve as our videographer, let me know right away. We have the offer of a video camera to borrow, but best if we have someone with a camera who knows how to use it, and perhaps do a wee bit of editing after the fact if necessary.

Grateful for who you are,
Mountaine

End of post

To Obama and Constitutzia!

2009-07-05T10:00:00.006-04:00

IN 1825, Russian officers staged a coup against the Tsar's absolute monarchy, and in favor of a constitution. Feeling their power after their army had defeated Napolean 13 years before, and back from occupying Europe where they got to read, talk and study with avant-garde thinkers, they saw their chance in 1825.

**********
The old czar died, and the more popular, more liberal older son, Constantine, chose love over office, choosing to marry a non-royal Polish girl. He renounced the chance at a throne in favor of his younger brother Nicholas.

The liberal officers staged a revolt, getting their men to cry "Constantine and Constitution!". Unfortunately, many of the common soldiers thought that "Consitutzia" was Constantine's wife. The premature revolt failed.

This month, June 2009, hasn't seen so many people in the streets since 1989 (Romania, East Germany, China). As of Sunday morning, July 5th 2009, it's an open question as to whether the forces of free election and popular participation will win in Iran and Honduras, both countries in which the American taxpayer funded CIA has done much to help kill, torture and imprison earlier advocates of change in the fifties, sixties, seventies in both countries, and in the eighties in Honduras.

Unlike earlier US administrations, Obama is sending signals to those who would use teargas and clubs that they don't have a friend in the White House. It's about time.

Here's to Obama and Constitutzia!
And to the fact that we now know the difference between Michelle and Constitution.

Courage

2009-06-16T12:45:00.004-04:00

Type your summary here
MOre later if I get time

Type rest of the post here

Massacres Don't Work for Long

2009-06-14T23:27:00.013-04:00

It seems rare enough that unarmed demonstrators are fired upon by police/national guard/soldiers. And it is frequent that there are agents provocateurs. It is also common for governments to bring in rural/poor/less educated militia members from distant provinces or different ethnic groups. The conscript Army in Egypt in Jan/Feb could not be reliably counted upon to fire upon demonstrators.

Clubbed, yes; fired upon, rare enough so that I could name a few prominent ones:

Peterloo Massacre, Manchester, England 1819 Short Documentary, 2010
Bloody Sunday, St. Petersburg, 1905 Hollywood, 1971
Amritsar (Jallianwala Bagh), India, April 13, 1919 from Gandhi, 1982
Bloody Sunday, Dublin, Ireland 1920 from Michael Collins, 1996
Ludlow Massacre, Ludlow, Colorado, 1914 from Howard Zinn: You can't be neutral on a moving train, 1996
Everett Massacre, Everett, Washington, USA 1916
Sharpeville, South Africa 1960 from 2010 newscast or this
Orangeburg Massacre, Orangeburg, SC, USA 1968
Tlatelolco massacre, Mexico City, Mexico; October 2, 1968 footage
Kent State Shootings, Kent, Ohio, USA May 4th, 1970 eyewitness account & these
Jackson State Shootings, Jackson, Missisippi, USA 1970 Democracy Now clip from Howard Zinn's last interview
Bloody Sunday, Derry, Northern Ireland, 1972 docudrama trailer, 2002
Black Friday, Tehran, Iran, Sept. 8, 1978
Greensboro Massacre, Greensboro, North Carolina 1979*
Tianamen Square Massacre, Peking, China 1989
Devil's Curve, Bagua, Peru, 2009
Teheran, Iran, ~ June 2009
Tahrir Square, Cairo, Egypt, Jan/Feb 2011
Lulu Square, Bahrain, Feb. 18, 2011

None of these are forgotten or swept under the rug. That I can name them years later proves that. As do the wikipedia articles & youtube films. You might have seen some of the fictional Hollywood portrayals above.
* The Greensboro demonstrators were shot by the Klan, but acquitted. The subsequent rift led to a Truth and Reconciliation process.

**Nothing more after this**

Mandela and ‘The Elders’ Aim to Save the World

2009-06-10T11:45:00.002-04:00

Mandela and ‘The Elders’ Aim to Save the World
http://abcnews.go.com/International/TenWays/Story?id=3389067
Written by Kate Snow
Saturday, 04 August 2007
JOHANNESBURG — The Elders, a new alliance made up of an elite group of senior statesmen dedicated to solving thorny global problems, unveiled itself today in Johannesburg. The rollout coincided with founding member Nelson Mandela’s 89th birthday.

After a grand entrance, Mandela, the former South African president, announced the rest of the Elders.

The members include Desmond Tutu, South African archbishop emeritus of Capetown; former U.S. President Jimmy Carter; former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan; Mary Robinson, former president of Ireland and Mohammed Yunus, the Nobel laureate and founder of the Green Bank in Bangladesh. The group plans to get involved in some of the world’s most pressing problems — climate change, pandemics like AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis, violent conflicts.

It was an extraordinary gathering;

a who’s who of famous international leaders, with enough emotion to move some of them to tears.

Under a large white futuristic dome, British billionaire Richard Branson and rock star Peter Gabriel, who conceived the idea for the Elders, gathered enough star power to change the world, or at least that’s the hope.

“The structures we have to deal with these problems are often tied down by political, economic and geographic constraints,” Mandela said. The Elders, he argued, will face no such constraints.

Seven years ago, Branson and Gabriel approached Mandela about the Elders idea, and he agreed to help them recruit others. “This group of elders will bring hope and wisdom back into the world,” Branson said. “They’ll play a role in bringing us together.

“Using their collective experience, their moral courage and their ability to rise above the parochial concerns of nations ? they can help make our planet a more peaceful, healthy and equitable place to live, ” Branson said. ” Let us call them ‘global elders,’ not because of their age but because of individual and collective wisdom.”

Calling it “the most extraordinary day” of his life, Gabriel said, “The dream was there might still be a body of people in whom the world could place their trust.”

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who moderated the event and will serve as its leader, was moved to tears after Gabriel sang an impromptu accapella version of his hit song “Biko,” written about a famous South African political prisoner.

Branson and Gabriel have raised enough money — some $18 million — to fund this group for three years.

Also onboard are names less well known in the United States, including Indian microfinance leader Ela Bhatt; former Norwegian Prime Minister Gro Harlem Brundtland; former Chinese ambassador to the United States Li Zhaoxing.

The group left an empty seat onstage — symbolically — for an elder who was invited, but could not attend because she is under house arrest in Burma, Nobel laureate and human rights advocate Aung San Suu Kyi.

Mandela and Carter emphasized the group’s ability to talk to anyone without risk.

“We will be able to risk failure in worthy causes, and we will not need to claim credit for any successes that might be achieved,” said Carter.

Carter said the group does not want to step on or interfere with other positive work that nations or organizations are doing but wants to supplement that work.

Several members acknowledged that the actual activities and actions of the group remain to be determined. There are no titles, no ranking of the members. And it is not clear if they will travel as a group, deploy individual members to global hot spots, or simply sit in a room together to develop strategies or assist those who are suffering find help.

But they certainly have high hopes.

“I didn’t like the title “elders,” because I didn’t feel like an elder,” said Yunus to laughter, “but I like the idea.”

Yunus said the world is without direction and he hopes the Elders can provide some direction.

Speaking of the Elders, almost in the way one would describe a cartoon about superheroes, Mandela said, “The Elders can become a fiercely independent and positive force for good.”

Annan added that the group does not “intend to go and take on Darfur or Somalia and resolve it singlehandedly. We don’t have a magic wand,” he said. But he argued that the group could intervene and perhaps force parties to honor agreements.

“There are certain crimes that shame us all,” said Annan. “We all have a responsibility, and I hope the Elders will take the lead in asking the question: What can we do to move the situation forward?

“Sometimes by saying ‘this is enough we can’t take this anymore it must stop,’ we are making a difference,” Annan continued

Mandela and Branson both celebrated birthdays today. At 89, Mandela looked frail. He walked with a cane and Carter helped him to the podium. But once Mandela got there, he stood tall and easily delivered some 10 minutes of remarks.

“He, as you know, walks sedately,” Tutu joked.

How to put the Copenhagen Countdown Clock on your website

2009-06-09T14:10:00.003-04:00

Concerned about climate change?
One of the most important things we can do on this planet is to create a strong climate treaty at the UN Climate conference in Copenhagen in December 2009.

And the most important element in drafting a strong treaty is creating an overwhelming public demand in all the countries of the world for this, in the face of reluctant governments and corporate lobbying and greenwashing.

And the key to creating that overwhelming public demand is getting people's mindshare focused on the climate negotiations.

And a good way to do that is to create a small public reminder of the negotiations.

If you have a website, here's something you can do in under two minutes (that's how long it too me):
How to put the Copenhagen Countdown Clock on your website

To put the clock on your website do the following:

A: From the homepage http://unfccc.int follow the link that say's "How to
use the countdown clock on your
website" [http://unfccc.int/home/items/4688.php]
Copy the html code from any of the boxes depending on which version of the
clock you want to use into their webpage.

B: Follow the instructions in A.

(Nothing more in the "more" section below.

Type rest of the post here

Why crack down on the Liberty Dollar now?

2009-06-06T10:20:00.000-04:00

I find this disturbing because, although I didn't like the Liberty Dollar (I think the income tax of 1912 was a good thing), there is a heavy quality of ex post facto here-- tolerating something for years and then coming down heavy just as the former chief economist of the IMF implicitly ponders whether US might go the way of Argentina and have a currency collapse.
**************************************

http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009906050331

June 5, 2009

Asheville man charged in alleged Liberty Dollar fraud scheme
By Clarke Morrison

Federal
authorities arrested an Asheville man in what they said was a scheme to
undermine the U.S. currency system and defraud consumers with so-called
Liberty Dollars.

William
Kevin Innes marketed the “barter” currency in Western North Carolina
and recruited merchants willing to accept it and give it as change for
products bought with real money, according to an indictment unsealed
this week.

Innes,
53, faces up to 45 years in prison if convicted. He was indicted along
with Bernard von NotHaus, president of the National Organization for
the Repeal of the Federal Reserve and Internal Revenue Codes, and two
other defendants from Indiana associated with the corporation.

Innes
made an initial appearance before a federal magistrate judge in
Asheville Wednesday and was ordered detained pending a detention
hearing set for Monday before a judge in Charlotte, according to the
U.S. Department of Justice.

Liberty Dollars are coins made of silver or gold and are touted as inflation-proof and a way to encourage buying local goods.

“When
groups seek to undermine the U.S. currency system, the government is
compelled to act,” said acting U.S. Attorney Edward Ryan of the Western
District of North Carolina.

“These
coins are not government-produced coinage, yet purchasers were led to
believe by those who made and sold them that they should be spent like
U.S. Federal Reserve Notes,” Ryan said. “Such claims are in violation
of federal law.”

Innes
and von NotHaus are charged with uttering and passing coins resembling
genuine U.S. coins and intended for use as money, mail fraud and
selling and possessing Liberty Dollar coins with intent to defraud.

Past statements

Despite warnings from the
federal government to the contrary, Innes told the Citizen-Times in
2006 that Liberty Dollars were legal.

“One
of the first things I did when I started this in Asheville was go to
the police and tell them what I was doing,” he said then.

Von
NotHaus created his organization in Evansville, Ind., in 1998, and
developed the Liberty Dollar. He touted the silver medallions as an
inflation-proof alternative to official currency.

The indictment alleges the corporation's purpose was to limit reliance on and compete with U.S. currency.

Innes
held the title of North Carolina regional currency officer and was one
of three members of the group's executive committee, the indictment
states.

A 2007 affidavit said more than 70 businesses in the Asheville area agreed to accept the Liberty Dollar.

“People
understand that there is only one legal currency in the United States,”
said Owen Harris, special agent in charge of the Charlotte office of
the FBI. “When groups try to replace the U.S. dollar with coins and
bills that don't hold the same value, it affects the economy.

“Consumers were using their hard-earned money to buy goods and services, then getting fake change in return.”

The
arrests are the latest development in an investigation under way since
at least 2004. Federal agents raided the company's headquarters in 2007
and seized documents and precious metals. A private mint in Coeur
d'Alene, Idaho, that produced the coins was raided the same day.

Von
NotHaus' organization said in 2006 that more than $20 million worth of
Liberty Dollar coins and notes were in circulation. Congress has
exclusive power to coin money in the U.S. and to regulate its value,
according to the Treasury Department.

--end --

Climate Talk- Monday 7 PM, free, Diana Wortham Theatre

2009-06-05T15:50:00.001-04:00

The lineup for the free event on Monday, June 8 at 7 p.m. in the Diana Wortham Theatre includes presentations by:

Greg Wilson, Director of Asheville Operations - Scientific Research Corporation
Ben Teague, Sr. VP for Economic Development - Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce/Economic Development Coalition
John Bates, Chief, Remote Sensing Applications Division - NOAA's NCDC
Ron Birk, Director, Civil Space Mission Integration - Northrop Grumman Space Technology

The presentations will be followed by a panel discussion and Q&A from the audience. A “meet the presenters” reception will be held immediately afterwards in the Colburn.

These talks are being presented by the Colburn Earth Science Museum and the Asheville Chapter of the American Meteorological Society.
********************
The Colburn Museum is having problems with their website today, so I'm posting this.

Bonnaroo, Newport Folk Festival or neither?

2009-06-04T09:49:00.002-04:00

In 2005, when my VW van was still running, I treated myself to Bonnaroo AND the Newport, RI Folk Festival. Here's my thoughts...
- What was great about Bonnaroo was- well, not much. The price seemed high ($270 minimum at this point), and while
• the lineup was stellar (Iron & Wine, Donna the Buffalo, Alison Krause, Herbie Hancock w/ a surprise appearance by John Mayer, John Prine & many bands who I'd kinda heard of but didn't quite know- Dave Matthews, Rilo Kiley. And many more), that turned out to be a weakness. Did you want to hear Prine OR Krause? With seven stages, one was forced to choose.
• They searched religiously to make sure folks didn't bring in outside liquids-- there was free bad-tasting water, or beverages in the hot sun for $4 or some such.
• The audience was rude and unappreciative. I didn't know there was such a thing as Drunken Southern Fratboys (and the women who mysteriously tolerate them) til I went there. Folks, having paid hundreds of dollars for the privilege of listening to Alison Kraus, sat around and talked with each other. They could have done this in their back yard for free!!
The admission DID cover parking, which WAS camping, toilets (but not showers), the ability to walkdown Shakedown Street (my first time, and an adventure) and the right to have cops tell you to walk in the mud and not on the grass.
I hated it.

In contrast, the Newport Folk Festival was well-behaved and there were only three stages-- two small, one big.
The price was cheaper, but didn't cover camping or parking ($12/day). There was a kids area, which I think there wasn't at Bonnaroo. The lineup was also stellar, but more focused on what I like (the kind of Americana that WNCW plays), and I had strong sense of the history that I was entering into-- many folks there were active singing AND speaking out in the early sixties, and there were at least THREE next generation acts-- Peter Seeger and his grandson Tao's band, Peter Yarrow and daughter Stephanie (I think), and Richard Thompson and son Teddie. I discovered a whole slew of artists, some of whom I only comprehended later as time went by.
(Oddly enough, on the way home from there, I discovered & stopped in at the Purple Fiddle in West Virginia, and heard this unknown group that the venue owner totally vouched for. Since then, the Avett Brothers are taking the world by storm.)
(I suppose I could hyperlink the heck out of this entry, but you can quickly get to respective web pages quickly enough).

So.... Bonnaroo, Newport Folk Festival, or neither? This year-- probably neither.

I'll probably just get my live music at the Grey Eagle.

Well Stated Piece on Urban Chickens

2009-04-23T22:04:00.001-04:00

Yes To Urban Chickens

By Gordon Smith

Eggs are my favorite food. Versatile, delicious, and elegant, the humble egg is sold on store shelves for anywhere from $1.30 to $4 a dozen depending on whether you like your hens cage free and hormone free. I do. If you’ve ever tasted a farm fresh egg, you know that it’s superior to store bought. There are a lot of Asheville’s citizens who love their eggs, too, so much that they want to keep chickens in their urban yards. My own living situtation doesn’t allow for much in the way of urban agriculture, but I love being able to support those who are making it happen.

Urban agriculture saves practitioners money. Whether it’s your bountiful garden, your beehive, or your chickens - choosing to raise one’s own food is a simple, effective way to live less expensively and more sustainably. It increases a municipality’s food security, and it teaches self-reliance to neighbors.

More at
http://scrutinyhooligans.us/2009/04/23/yes-to-urban-chickens/#more-7804

new test page

2009-04-19T20:20:00.001-04:00

this is the second try

Local Currency thoughts

2009-04-17T10:36:00.001-04:00

Someone asked what I had learned about local/alternative currency during the Asheville Currency Project in 2005.

Two answers:
A- As best my quickskim of Bill's link above seems to say that between 1863 and 1912, a bank could apply for a National Charter. If it got it, then it could print money. No idea what the qualifications, checks & balances were for this.
I wish had taken Econ 215 at UNCA [A study of commercial banking, the Federal Reserve System, the United States
Treasury, how money influences the economy, demand for money and monetary policy.
Prerequisite: ECON 101. Fall.] Maybe I should this fall.
B- When I was at the PLENTY annual meeting in Chapel Hill in Nov. 2005, it was held at the UNC-CH Currency Collection
http://www.lib.unc.edu/ncc/gallery/currency.html

I couldn't pull off getting the Curator, whose salary at that time included him the opportunity (and obligation?) to ....
lecture at various places in North Carolina about the collection, among other topics.
But we should bring him to Asheville.

And we should think about raising funds-- equal to, say, 0.5% of the CVB budget of 4.3 million-- this would be $20,000, to fund research into such an effort.

If everyone told you to give up, would you?

2009-04-15T10:22:00.007-04:00

If everyone told you to give up, would you?
*************************
The fourteen-acre community garden at 41st and Alameda in South Central Los Angeles is the largest of its kind in the United States. Started as a form of healing after the devastating L.A. riots in 1992, the South Central Farmers have since created a miracle in one of the country’s most blighted neighborhoods. Growing their own food. Feeding their families. Creating a community.

But now, bulldozers are poised to level their 14-acre oasis.

If everyone told you nothing more could be done, would you give up?

A new documentary, The Garden, follows the plight of the farmers, from the tilled soil of this urban farm to the polished marble of City Hall. Mostly immigrants from Latin America, from countries where they feared for their lives if they were to speak out, we watch them organize, fight back, and demand answers:

Why was the land sold to a wealthy developer for millions less than fair-market value? Why was the transaction done in a closed-door session of the LA City Council? Why has it never been made public?

And the powers-that-be have the same response: “The garden is wonderful, but there is nothing more we can do.”

If everyone told you nothing more could be done, would you give up?
http://www.blackvalleyfilms.com/trailer
* * *

The Garden has the pulse of verité with the narrative pull of fiction, telling the story of the country’s largest urban farm, backroom deals, land developers, green politics, money, poverty, power, and racial discord. The film explores and exposes the fault lines in American society and raises crucial and challenging questions about liberty, equality, and justice for the poorest and most vulnerable among us.

Transition Town Resources

2009-03-30T12:31:00.001-04:00

Transition Town Resources
(much more info after link below)

Jim Barton
Smith Mill Creek School
PO Box 6821
West Asheville, NC 28816
(828) 318-7418
http://smithmillcreek.blogspot.com

Useful Transition Town (or Movement) websites
WIKIPEDIA http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transition_Towns
THE BLOG http://transitionculture.org
THE WEBSITE http://www.transitiontowns.org
THE US SITE http://transitionus.ning.com
THE PRIMER http://transitiontowns.org/TransitionNetwork/TransitionPrimer
YOUTUBE http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=transition+towns
THE BOOK The Transition Handbook, by Rob Hopkins (~$25)
(at the West Asheville Library, Malaprops, or Firestorm Books)
& Transition Timeline, by Shaun Chamberlin & Rob Hopkins ($23, 5/9/09)
EDAP http://bit.ly/abnc
THE TOWNS http://bit.ly/3NpVcM
CRIERIA http://bit.ly/JyxpR
Twelve Steps of Transition

#1. Set up a steering group and design its demise from the outset
#2. Awareness raising
#3. Lay the foundations
#4. Organise a Great Unleashing
#5. Form sub groups
#6. Use Open Space
#7 Develop visible practical manifestations of the project
#8. Facilitate the Great Reskilling
#9 Build a bridge to Local Government
#10 Honour the elders
#11 Let it go where it wants to go…
#12 Create an Energy Descent Action Plan (EDAP)

US Towns (140 worldwide)
* Boulder, CO, USA
* Sandpoint, ID, USA
* Cotati, CA, USA
* Ketchum, ID, USA
* Lyons, CO USA
* Santa Cruz, CA, USA
* Montpelier, VT, USA
* Portland, ME, USA
* Sebastopol, CA, USA
* Laguna Beach, CA, USA
* Pine Mountain, CA, USA
* Ashland, OR, USA
* Berea, KY, USA
* Pima, AZ, USA
* Los Angeles, CA, USA
* Denver, CO, USA
* Whatcom, WA, USA
* Mount Shasta, CA, USA
* NE Seattle, WA, USA
* Louisville, CO, USA
* Newburyport, MA, USA

Review: The Greening of Southie

2009-03-23T13:08:00.000-04:00

I wanted to alert folks to what might be the only entertaining film on LEED.

The film The Greening of Southie
http://www.greeningofsouthie.com
is available for purchase for $3 from the itunes store (cheaper than most video rentals),
and for purchase at various prices at $25/$100. It covers the building of Boston's first LEED residential building from bare ground to opening day, and humanizes the story by focusing on a few characters & and building crises.

It also acts as training film on LEED as the filmmakers bring the LEED rating chart to life, point by point.

And it talks about class-- South Boston was notorious for being a outsider-unfriendly, conservative place (themes explored in Good Will Hunting and Mystic River) and the last place a green building would go. The film is honest about the fact that the well-paid union laborers can't afford the condos that start at $400,000 and wonders if the neighborhood Irish pub, The Quiet Man, would survive gentrification (it didn't).

The filmmakers also made the excellent King Corn (available at Orbit DVD), which is a better film, and more hilarious.

The filmmakers have a grant to show the film at union halls around the country next month, and details on that are available on their website.

Transition_Towns

2009-03-14T17:47:00.002-04:00

Interested in the Transition Town movement from a US perspective?

You can learn more from
WIKIPEDIA http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transition_Towns
THE BLOG http://transitionculture.org
THE WEBSITE http://www.transitiontowns.org
THE US SITE http://transitionus.ning.com
THE PRIMER http://transitiontowns.org/TransitionNetwork/TransitionPrimer
YOUTUBE http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=transition+towns
THE BOOK The Transition Handbook, by Rob Hopkins (~$25)

--Nothing more below--

************************

New Green Building Documentary: The Greening of Southie

2009-03-08T15:20:00.001-04:00

The Greening of Southie
http://www.greeningofsouthie.com
is a new film from the makers of the excellent King Corn,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Corn_(film)
which deals with the building of a green building
The MacAllen Building ( http://www.themacallenbuilding.com ),
"Boston's first green residential building", slotted to be rated LEED Gold,
in South Boston. (Which makes it a cultural contrast with Garbage Warrior
( http://www.garbagewarrior.com )

During the week of Earth Day (always April 22nd, every year), the filmmakers are encouraging the showing of this film at union halls.

The website has...
- a trailer &
- much background info
- flash construction, which makes it impossible to link to anything but the website itself (aargh!)

new books on Thoreau and by Goleman

2009-03-07T13:08:00.002-05:00

Two infoblurbs on new books on Thoreau and by Goleman.
I sent this info to Asheville indy bookseller Malaprops. I wonder if they'll have them the week they are published.
The Thoreau You Don't Know: What the Prophet of Environmentalism Really Meant, by Robert Sullivan
Ecological Intelligence: How Knowing the Hidden Impacts of What We Buy Can Change Everything, by Daniel Goleman

*******************************

The Thoreau You Don't Know: What the Prophet of Environmentalism Really Meant (Hardcover)
by Robert Sullivan (Author)
By Wendi Sitara (North Jersey & Indiana) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
I am someone who knows even less about Thoreau than this book is written for. I didn't read "Walden" or "Civil Disobedience" in high school. I did, however, see "Dead Poets Society" so I know he was a so-called Romantic. I've heard that he was a virgin, and that he lived in nature at a pond for awhile. That's all I know.

So, this book was a complete introduction to Thoreau for me. And I say this is a great book, especially during our time, in 2009. Thoreau's time was one of great change. His relatives participated in the events of the Revolutionary war, and from that vantage point, he was living in a "mature" America was was changing. When he was a boy, he lived in a town where people would take long horse drawn journey and stop in taverns and inns in Concord. After college, the the railroad came. People were changing from an artesian culture to a mass produced factory one, where people's jobs and skills were being outsourced. Thoreau spent most of his young adult hood trying to scrape by during a major Depression caused by bank failure and overspeculation...you get my point. Interesting how history repeats itself.

For people that maybe do know Thoreau, did you know that he ran a pencil factory? That he got by on being a land surveyor? And a teacher? And an aupair for his friend and neighbor Emerson? And what was he really saying? To be involved in your community, to see the details of nature as they are in relation to the people that shape them (New England is perhaps more "natural" ie wooded now than it was in his time, when most of the land was cleared for farming) and to live a nondistracted life.

Thoreau was a hard working guy. He built fences. He built his cabin out at Walden. He was a great gardner. He could shovel manure with the best of them and get something out of it. He wasn't just a Romantic who liked to run his mouth and write poetry and be an unsociable hermit.

Anyway, this is definetely a readable, interesting book that is both about Thoreau and about a slice of American history that I didn't know too much about. I am so glad I picked it up. By the way, my next book on my list, of course, is Walden.
*************************
Ecological Intelligence: How Knowing the Hidden Impacts of What We Buy Can Change Everything (Hardcover)
by Daniel Goleman (Author)

Editorial Reviews
Review
"Ecological Intelligence is a fascinating whodunit revealing the intricate processes that create our material world. Written by the acknowledged master on how to be a truly intelligent human being, Goleman reveals the complex web of impacts everyday products have upon people and habitat and how a new form of intelligence can radically alter consumption patterns from destructive to constructive."
-- Paul Hawken, Author of the Ecology of Commerce and Blessed Unrest

“The eight hundred pound gorilla behind virtually all of the ‘sustainability challenges’ is you, and me, the consumer. The problem is not that we are bad but that we have been blind to the impacts of our every-day choices - which is about to change. As Goleman shows, new information technologies and growing public concern are awakening our intrinsic desire to do what is right to shape a healthier world for our children and grandchildren.”

--Peter Senge, Director of the Center for Organizational Learning at the MIT Sloan School of Management and author of The Fifth Discipline, The Dance of Change, Presence, and The Necessary Revolution

“Drawing on his capacious intelligence Daniel Goleman dissects the issues involved in the attainment of long term sustainability and details promising and intriguing solutions. Once again, he has written an essential book.”

--Howard Gardner, author and Hobbs Professor of Cognition and Education at Harvard Graduate School of Education

“Our civilization faces a sobering, momentous challenge, one of the most profound in its history: the ominous possibility of ecological collapse, and Dan Goleman provides fresh insight and the most intelligent, thoughtful plan to confront it. Goleman skillfully weaves together his argument, through a masterful combination of logic and persuasion, about how we can apply our intelligence to this pressing question. Goleman makes a powerful and compelling case that how we answer this question will determine not just our fate, but the fate of our children and even life on this planet. This book should be required reading for every politician, policy maker, and citizen of this planet. It should sit on the desk of everyone who is concerned about making the best, most intelligent choices for our destiny.”

--Michio Kaku, Professor of Theoretical Physics, author of Physics of the Impossible and Parallel Worlds

“The market place is a democratic voting booth, if we chose to make it so -- we the consumer get to decide which companies will succeed and which ones fail. Dan Goleman's Ecological Intelligence provides tools for voting consciously and rationally. An eloquent "must read" bridge between business and consumer that crosses generational gaps and lights the path to an environmentally sustainable and socially just destination.”

--John Perkins, bestselling author of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man

Product Description

The bestselling author of Emotional Intelligence and Primal Leadership now brings us Ecological Intelligence—revealing the hidden environmental consequences of what we make and buy, and how with that knowledge we can drive the essential changes we all must make to save our planet and ourselves.

We buy “herbal” shampoos that contain industrial chemicals that can threaten our health or contaminate the environment. We dive down to see coral reefs, not realizing that an ingredient in our sunscreen feeds a virus that kills the reef. We wear organic cotton t-shirts, but don’t know that its dyes may put factory workers at risk for leukemia. In Ecological Intelligence, Daniel Goleman reveals why so many of the products that are labeled green are a “mirage,” and illuminates our wild inconsistencies in response to the ecological crisis.

Drawing on cutting-edge research, Goleman explains why we as shoppers are in the dark over the hidden impacts of the goods and services we make and consume, victims of a blackout of information about the detrimental effects of producing, shipping, packaging, distributing, and discarding the goods we buy.

But the balance of power is about to shift from seller to buyer, as a new generation of technologies informs us of the ecological facts about products at the point of purchase. This “radical transparency” will enable consumers to make smarter purchasing decisions, and will drive companies to rethink and reform their businesses, ushering in, Goleman claims, a new age of competitive advantage.

See all Editorial Reviews
Product Details

* Hardcover: 288 pages
* Publisher: Broadway Business (April 21, 2009)
* Language: English
* ISBN-10: 0385527829
* ISBN-13: 978-0385527828
* Shipping Information: View shipping rates and policies
* Amazon.com Sales Rank: #117,735 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Popular in this category: (What's this?)
#88 in Books > Science > Nature & Ecology > Natural Resources

How deep is the Great Recession? Check this out

2009-03-06T19:40:00.001-05:00

Nothing more to say, nothing after the link.

Asheville has it all

2009-02-26T10:35:00.001-05:00

I wonder if they rent in two hour increments?
(Nothing more after jump)

******

Hard Rains, Weak Umbrellas

2009-02-24T23:23:00.002-05:00

I have a queasy feeling after the NSOTU (not the state of the union speech, as folks on twitter call it).

Barack Obama is vastly more qualified than anyone I've seen on the political scene, and I know I'm not alone in saying that.

He's a strong liberal-- who opposed the Iraq War when it took courage to do so, who verifies conservative truths when appropriate. I shudder to think what we'd be going through if we had President Clinton or Pelosi, or god forbid, McCain or Huckabee.

But my sense is that we needed to have a recession in 2001 after the tech bubble-- the one that put me and so many other Silicon Valley workers out of a job.

I didn't think that then. After I drove home from work each night to news of yet another decrease in the interest rate by the Federal Reserve, I cheered-- I was that much less likely to be laid off by a company that was clearly headed out of business. Better to be laid off later than sooner: something would come up.

But now I see, or rather believe-- because who among us can know what is going on with certainty in the economy-- that by putting off a stronger recession than we experienced, we guaranteed that when it did come, it would just be stronger.

The low interest rates stimulated housing price rises, which gave people the opportunity to borrow off the increased value of their homes. Which kept the economy going. But I can't help believe that we all knew somehow in our guts that we were living on borrowed time.

Bullshit was all around us. An essay I read recently, I think by Paul Rogat Loeb, speaks of the tragedy of the lies that we expect
and thus no longer enrage us- the phony surveys by large corporations that are really sales pitches, the recording that plays while we are on hold that tells us we are valued, valued , valued, valued customers.

My sense is that any stimulus borrowing that does not build natural capital, or reduce it's reduction, will just lead to an economic collapse later that is all the more severe.

How bad can it get? When record drought is all around, when the ice caps melt, when forests die because of beetle infestations, when record heat waves lead to blackouts and nuclear plant shutdowns, when petroleum is more expensive, well.......

it could get worse than it is.

And right now, it's worse than it's been in a long time; and we're only a third or halfway through. And as the stress hit the economy, more stores, clubs, institutions may collapse, thus stress-testing nearby institutions and populations, which may then themselves collapse.

It could be a hard rain that falls.

Remembering the East End

2009-02-19T09:54:00.005-05:00

Click on image to enlarge.

Nanotopia

2009-02-12T08:08:00.001-05:00

One of the cheesy advertisements that continually appears on the freebie internet services reflects this. It is a (useless) outfit that wants to glean and refer people for online degrees from various sources. It has a dozen icons for you to choose among and click. Want to move up in the world?

How do I become a: medical billing specialist, social worker, criminal investigator, health care manager, graphic designer, project manager, public relations specialist, counselor, author, accountant…? Glance over this list once again and recall the last time you had need of the services of any of them.

If we based such solicitations on what we consumed rather than how we hoped to idle away our lives, the list would read: How can I become involved in: supplying cloth, growing food, supplying fuel, making tools, making shoes, supplying dish washing detergent, milling lumber, etc.

(Exceprt from the website link in title)

http://milesfrombabylon.blogspot.com/2009/01/nanotopia.html

Twestival

2009-02-06T20:50:00.001-05:00

We are thrilled to announce that Asheville will be joining over 175 cities worldwide hosting Twestivals to raise awareness and money for charity: water!

charity: water is a non profit organization bringing clean, safe drinking water to people in developing nations by funding sustainable clean water solutions in areas of greatest need. Right now, 1.1 billion people on the planet don’t have access to clean drinking water. That’s one in six of us.

Twestivals are organized 100% by volunteers and 100% of the money raised will go directly to support charity: water projects.

Check back soon for updates. For more information please email us at avltwestivalgmailcom or follow us on Twitter.

Root Shock in Asheville: A Weekend of Events

2009-02-01T11:16:00.001-05:00

Root Shock in Asheville: Urban Renewal Hits Home
A Weekend of Event, Exhibits and Conversations

The "Twilight of a Neighborhood" project documenting the history of Asheville's East End community, continutes with a weekend of events in February.

Friday, February 27 at 7:00 PM
The Humanities Lecture Hall, UNC Asheville
*Dr. Mindy Thompson Fullilove
ROOT SHOCK 2009*
Book sale/signing & Reception to follow.......

Saturday, February 28 from 2-4:00 PM
Holly Library, A-B Technical Community College
*EXHIBIT: Twilight of a Neighborhood: Asheville's East End, 1970
*Opening & Reception for Andrea Clark

Saturday, February 28 at 7:00 PM
Diana Wortham Theatre -- Pack Place
*Conversations with Community Elders/YMI Reception for Drs. Mindy T. & Robert E. Fullilove*
Diana Wortham Theatre -- Pack Place

Sunday, Mar. 1 from 2:30-4:00 PM
Ferguson Auditorium, A-B Technical College
*PUBLIC FORUM: ROOT SHOCK Today & What We Can Do About It
*Moderated discussion by a distinguished panel, including Dr. Mindy Fullilove

/Event sponsors: Buncombe County Public Libraries, UNC Asheville, The Center for Diversity Education, The Stephens-Lee Alumni Association, The YMI Cultural Center, The Urban News, Asheville-Buncombe Technical Community College, and the NC Humanities Council, a state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Arts/

Hard Times Come Again No More

2009-01-26T16:30:00.001-05:00

Many of us worried now

from a NY Times article at
http://morris.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/mirror-mirror-on-the-wall/

Swearing in or swearing at

2009-01-21T20:06:00.003-05:00

It was hard for me, listening to one of the most crucial interchanges of the last eight years of this century-- the swearing in of Barack Obama,
not to think that the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court was trying to mess up Barack Obama, by interrupting him, and then feeding him phrases that were difficult to repeat back under stress.

Actually, I heard on NPR today, that the US Constitution specifies the exact words that need to be said by the president. Barack had them memorized; the Chief Justice tried to recite them from memory and messed up.

Obama paused to give the justice an opportunity to correct his mistake.

Somehow it seemed a metaphor for the notion of a competent, fair Supreme Court-- one that was neither.

Steve Colbert interviews Niall Ferguson

2009-01-17T18:26:00.004-05:00

A few weeks ago, I bought Niall Ferguson's Ascent of Money (a global history of money)
after hearing a good interview with him on NPR.

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Niall Ferguson

Colbert at Christmas
Colbert Christmas DVD

Green Screen
Bill O'Reilly Interview

YOu can watch the program in full at
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/ascentofmoney/featured/watch-full-program-the-ascent-of-money/24/
-- end of post--

A Primer on Finance

2009-01-17T00:35:00.002-05:00

Part One

Part Two

Arne Næss, Deep Ecology philosopher, born 1912; died 2009

2009-01-16T14:28:00.002-05:00

Arne Næss, who has died aged 96, was Norway's best-known philosopher, whose concept of deep ecology enriched and divided the environmental movement. A keen mountaineer, for a quarter of his life he lived in an isolated hut high in the Hallingskarvet mountains in southern Norway.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/jan/15/obituary-arne-naess/print

Obituary
Arne Næss

Arne Næss, who has died aged 96, was Norway's best-known philosopher, whose concept of deep ecology enriched and divided the environmental movement. A keen mountaineer, for a quarter of his life he lived in an isolated hut high in the Hallingskarvet mountains in southern Norway.

Through his books and lectures in many countries, Næss taught that ecology should not be concerned with man's place in nature but with every part of nature on an equal basis, because the natural order has intrinsic value that transcends human values. Indeed, humans could only attain "realisation of the Self" as part of an entire ecosphere. He urged the green movement to "not only protect the planet for the sake of humans, but also, for the sake of the planet itself, to keep ecosystems healthy for their own sake".

Shallow ecology, he believed, meant thinking the big ecological problems could be resolved within an industrial, capitalist society. Deep meant asking deeper questions and understanding that society itself has caused the Earth-threatening ecological crisis. His concept, grounded in the teachings of Spinoza, Gandhi and Buddha, entered the mainstream green movement in the 1980s and was later elaborated by George Sessions in Deep Ecology for the Twenty-first Century (1995).

Deep ecology teaches that belief in an objective comprehension of nature is belief in a flat world seen from above, without depth, and that such cool, disembodied detachment is an illusion, and a primary cause of our destructive relation to the land.

Næss was also an activist, inspired by Rachel Carson's 1962 book Silent Spring. In 1970, together with a large number of demonstrators, he chained himself to rocks in front of Mardalsfossen, a waterfall in a Norwegian fjord, and refused to descend until plans to build a dam were dropped. The demonstrators were carried away by police but the action was a success. He was the first chairman of Greenpeace Norway when it was founded in 1988 and was also a Green party candidate.

As a mountaineer, Næss led the first expedition to conquer the 7,708m (25,289ft) Tirich Mir, in Pakistan, in 1950. He led a second Norwegian expedition up the mountain in 1964. Mountains were at the centre of his vision and he often asked audiences to practise the Taoist injuction to "listen with the third ear" and "think like a mountain".

In its first form his philosophy was known as ecosophy T - the T standing for the Tvergastein mountain hut where he lived and worked. It was as a teenager on a mountain that Næss met a Norwegian judge who advised him to read Spinoza, the 17th-century Jewish philosopher who taught that God is present throughout nature.

Born in Oslo, Næss earned his doctorate at the city's university and, at the age of 27, became its youngest professor. He continued to teach until 1970. Over the years he published more than 30 books as well as numerous essays and articles.

He faced controversy when deep ecology was attacked as "eco-la-la" by Murray Bookchin, who had founded the social ecology movement in Vermont, US. Bookchin claimed the philosophy came mainly from white, male academics and their students, and that its concerns were akin to New Age occultism, with undertones of paganism, and redolent of quasi-fascist Aryan movements.

Næss did not feel the need to confront the social ecologists, but his movement faced embarrassment at the other extreme when activists of Earth First used its concepts to justify violent action, green Luddism, and a campaign to enforce sterilisation and end food aid to developing nations.

Næss countered that his movement for widening compassion towards non-humans did not imply diminishing compassion towards humans. "We don't say that every living being has the same value as a human, but that it has an intrinsic value which is not quantifiable. It is not equal or unequal. It has a right to live and blossom. I may kill a mosquito if it is on the face of my baby but I will never say I have a higher right to life than a mosquito."

His closest friend in Britain, Stephan Harding, the head of holistic science at Schumacher college, in Dartington, Devon, where Næss conducted courses, said Næss was horrified by suggestions of enforced sterilisation and that droughts and famines were good. Harding argued that Næss accepted that "since we are humans, we have to put humans first. He was against violence."

Næss never managed to translate his awareness of overpopulation into a scheme of practical action. He maintained that a world population of 100 million - roughly a 60th of the present figure - would be compatible with quality of life, but 11 or 12 billion - the level predicted for the end of the next century - would not. He said: "I am, to the astonishment of certain journalists, an optimist. But then, I add, I am an optimist about the 22nd century. And they say, 'Oh, you mean the 21st ...' 'No, the 22nd century.' I think that in the 21st century, we have to go through very bad times and it will hurt even rich countries ... So, I am a short-range pessimist, long-range optimist."

Næss was appreciated, even in old age, for his exuberant, frolicsome manner, which reminded people of Gandhi or the Dalai Lama. He believed awareness of deep ecology was present in us all, especially in childhood, when a butterfly could be regarded as a brother or sister. Like Wordsworth, he lamented the attenuation of such awareness in later life through loss of contact with animals, plants and significant places.

He was knighted by King Harald in 2005 and made a commander with star of the Royal Norwegian order of St Olav First Class.

His nephew was the mountaineer and businessman Arne Næss Jr, the husband of Diana Ross, who was killed in a climbing accident in South Africa in 2004.

Næss was married twice, first to Else, with whom he had two children. She predeceased him. He later married Kit Fai, a Chinese student four decades his junior, whom he met when he was 61. She survives him, along with his children.

• Arne Dekke Eide Næss, philosopher, born 27 January 1912; died 12 January 2009

One Citizen's Look at the Proposed Downtown Plan

2009-01-14T11:11:00.002-05:00

The following is written by a former Mountain Xpress reporter.
-- Jim
*************************************************

PROBLEMS IN THE DOWNTOWN MASTER PLAN DRAFT:
A CITIZEN REPORT

By Steve Rasmussen
Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2009

It happened just as the cynics predicted. Asheville's Downtown Master Plan started out with great ideas for preserving a livable downtown as we grow, shaped over the summer by enthusiastic and thoughtful public input. Then it disappeared underground over the winter -- and into the non-public meetings of a dozen or so members of an advisory committee dominated by developers and their advocates.

Sure enough, the draft plan that has re-emerged -- just in time to be presented this Thursday evening to the public and City Council, who'll be urged by committee members to adopt it whole, "without any tinkering" -- is effectively gutted. Yes, it does contain some wonderful and visionary ideas for our future. But most of the teeth needed to enforce them have been pulled.

Participants in last summer's meetings were told over and over by the Goody Clancy consultants that strong design requirements were the key to maintaining our downtown's livable, human-scale quality of life; that if we had enforceable guidelines, we wouldn't need the "political" City Council hearings that generate so much heat and rancor; and above all, that we don't need to pander to developers, because our city is so desirable that we the citizenry can set a high bar for developers to meet.

It now appears that was mostly just high-gloss talk. Over and over again, the draft plan and the consultants' responses to developer objections show "requirements" being diluted into "recommendations"; enforceability being sacrificed together with Council review; and a hasty retreat being beat from almost every proposed requirement developers considered too "restrictive."

Here's a summary of problems I've discovered in the DMP draft, followed by a more detailed discussion of each. I'm disseminating this report to a wide variety of people -- preservationists, activists, officials, media, et al. (please forward at will!) -- and we're only being allowed one more shot at this, so I recommend you zero in on the particular problem or issue that matters most to you (whether one of the following, or one you've found on your own), attend the Thursday meeting (7 to 9 pm at the Civic Center), and vocally raise your pointed question or objection during the brief period the public will be given for comment. After the meeting, we'll have three weeks to submit written comments to Goody Clancy, the consultants whom we're paying $170,000 to create this plan. You may wish to CC your comments to City Council, who will be voting on the final plan March 10.

Please note: I'm intentionally focusing on the negatives here. There are a great many positive points in the draft plan, too -- but you'll hear all about those on Thursday. You probably won't hear about the following problems unless we bring them up. And the questionable changes the plan recommends in the development-review process are likely to be adopted very quickly if we don't speak out.

You can download a copy of the draft plan at www.ashevillenc.gov/downtownmasterplan. It's in two parts, the Draft and the Appendix.

What you can't download -- because it wasn't meant to be released to the public -- is another document I'll be citing: "Asheville Downtown Master Plan planning team response to Advisory Committee comments on Downtown Master Plan Preliminary Draft 2 dated 1 October 2008 In Draft Downtown Master Plan dated 2 January 2009." Let's call that "Planning Team Response" for short.

========================

SUMMARY OF PROBLEMS:

*1* HEIGHT RESTRICTIONS would be placed on new buildings in Asheville's downtown core -- except for certain favored developments, including Tony Fraga's.

*2* Our cumbersome, controversial DEVELOPMENT-REVIEW PROCESS would be streamlined -- but, at developers' insistence, the power to approve large buildings would be mostly taken out of the hands of our elected City Council members and transferred to the non-elected Planning and Zoning board. Council's role would be further reduced by eliminating the current Conditional Use Permit process.

*3* The "MANDATORY REVIEW, VOLUNTARY COMPLIANCE" design-review flaw -- which has allowed developers of buildings such as Staples to get approval for one plan and then build a different one, and which was the impetus in the first place for the Downtown Commission to seek a new Downtown Master Plan -- remains unchanged. Review would still be mandatory ... and compliance would still be voluntary.

*4* The one mechanism that state law provides cities such as Asheville to enforce mandatory compliance -- LOCAL HISTORIC DISTRICTS -- is cursorily dismissed without any examination or analysis, apparently because developers feel it's too restrictive. Instead, preservation of our historic downtown buildings would be, not enforced, but merely encouraged -- largely by selling off the buildings' "air rights" to new developments next door.

*5* Remember how eloquent the Goody Clancy planners waxed last summer about requiring tall buildings to be slender instead of massive so they wouldn't CAST SHADOWS on nearby neighbors and streets? Remember their inspiring proposals and maps about mandating preservation of the VIEW CORRIDORS to the mountains that help make downtown Asheville such a pleasant place to live? All that is now tossed out the window as "unnecessary restriction."

*6* In the long term, development decisions for city-owned land would be delegated to a non-elected entity, the ADD (ASHEVILLE DOWNTOWN DISTRICT), that would start innocuously small by handling matters like graffiti cleanup and marketing downtown. But it's intended to morph eventually into a mammoth centralized bureaucracy for buying and selling city land, development rights, etc.

========================

DISCUSSION OF PROBLEMS:

------------------------

*1* HEIGHT RESTRICTIONS:
The maximum height allowable would be "265 feet (27 stories)... (similar to the Ellington and Battery Park proposals)" (DMP Draft, p.56). Mostly this height would be allowed only in the lower-elevation areas that citizens generally agreed were appropriate for tall buildings, along with some "gateway" areas such as the Patton Ave. entrance to downtown. The downtown core would be limited to 145 feet (15 stories), "the intermediate height threshold defined by the community’s favorite 1920s structures: the Jackson, Battery Park Hotel, County building and City Hall." (ibid.)

So far, that looks very much like what the community told the planners it wanted last summer -- keep the big skyscrapers out of our downtown center, and put them on the South Slope and other less sensitive areas.

But wait -- what's this in the Appendix?

"Building height and density:
"[A] Substantial height and density are a traditional
hallmark of downtown streets and should
continue to be encouraged to support property
value, intensity of activity and urban design
character.
"[B] The intermediate 145’ height threshold applies
to much of the district to reinforce the
prevailing scale of tall traditional buildings like
the Jackson Building, and to reduce shadow
impacts on narrow streets.
"[C] The taller 265’ height threshold applies to
Battery Hill and previously redeveloped area
between Woodfin, and College, and Spruce,
to bring additional value and activity to these
areas and augment the skyline at high points
in downtown."
(DMP Appendix, pg. S3-4)

"Substantial height and density" may be hallmarks in Atlanta or Boston -- but the whole point of the big-building issue is that this is Asheville. This statement in the Appendix completely contradicts the Draft.

Why the exceptions for "Battery Hill" and the area between "Woodfin and College and Spruce"? A reference in the Draft, pg. 21, makes it clear that "Battery Hill" refers to Haywood Park -- Tony Fraga's giant skyscraper that City Council has rejected as way out of scale with the area. How did Fraga get special treatment from Goody-Clancy? Is this the "bad old way" of making special deals with powerful insiders?

This deference to a well-connected developer sets the tone for all the other problematic areas in the DMP.

As for Woodfin and College and Spruce, I'm not sure who's planning what enormous building there -- but it's uncomfortably close to the County Courthouse and City Hall. Despite the ad-agency language about "additional value" and "augment[ing] the skyline," allowing a Haywood Park-size building there would dwarf these signature downtown buildings and contradict the Draft's claimed intent of preserving Asheville's character.

------------------------

*2* DEVELOPMENT-REVIEW PROCESS:
The UDO divides development proposals according to their size into Levels I, II and III. Levels I and II are currently subject to final approval by the Technical Review Committee, which is composed of city staff representatives. Level III -- building projects of 100,000 square feet or larger -- are subject to final approval by City Council.

No one likes this arrangement. The public doesn't like the way TRC seems to rubber-stamp large, controversial buildings such as Parkside or Haywood Park, with TRC staffers claiming that their hands are tied by their narrow mandate to look only at their particular technical piece of the elephant -- fire safety, traffic, etc. When the developer of Parkside, for example, saw that he was not going to win approval from City Council, he dropped just enough square footage from his design to shift it from Level III to Level II, and the TRC approved it.

Developers, on the other hand, don't like having their proposals routinely OK'd all the way through the process till they get to City Council, where they can be scotched by a loud enough public outcry.

The subject reportedly raised a great deal of ire at the Advisory Committee meetings. One member, a co-founder of the local pro-business lobby CIBO, reportedly stomped around the room, proclaiming that he would only support City Council's having final approval "if you can promise me no hippies, no artists, no activists, no mamas with babies on their hips will get up at City Council and stop developments" that are already approved at lower levels.

So Goody-Clancy's plan considerably reduces the amount of say City Council will have. Although the DMP would have Council retain final approval for Level III proposals, the threshold for Level III would be raised considerably, from 100,000 to 175,000 square feet.

That means elected officials accountable to the public would have final say over far fewer proposals.

The much-expanded Level II would, under the plan, be subject to final approval by the Planning and Zoning board instead of TRC. Currently, P&Z is allowed to examine larger, non-technical issues such as building scale and appropriateness (indeed, it was the first body in the review process to fail to approve Parkside), but its rulings are only advisory to City Council. Under the DMP proposal, however, its authority would be enormously expanded.

But P&Z members are appointed, not elected -- and therefore insulated from public accountability. Appointments to the 7-member P&Z board have always been the subject of intense lobbying of City Council by the development community. How much more intense will the lobbying become when P&Z is given final say over most large developments?

The DMP says nothing about the makeup of this much-more-powerful P&Z -- the word is that won't be discussed till just before the plan goes to City Council. I'm sure it's safe to predict that the rationale for stocking the board with members of the development industry rather than representatives of the larger public will be the same it's always been -- developers have the "expertise" to judge projects by their fellow developers. Government watchdogs have another name for this classic rationale -- the "revolving door," or, "you scratch my back now, I'll scratch yours when I'm on the board."

In response to developer demands for eliminating City Council approval, the Goody Clancy consultants also noted in the PTR (ref. no. 9): "Limited use of the Conditional Use Permit process will also reduce city council role and permit more structured review process." The new plan would make Level III approval subject to conditional-use permits only when conditional land uses actually apply -- which at first seems sensible, but here is what this means: Currently, whenever a Level III proposal goes to City Council for final review, Council is required by the UDO to handle it as a "conditional use," even if there are no actual special conditions involved. This compels Council to hold the review hearing as a "quasi-judicial hearing" -- as if they were judges in a court case. Like judges, they are banned from receiving information about the proposal before the hearing. Council members complain that this process prevents them from learning any more about a proposal than they are told at the hearing.

But as bizarre as it may seem to hold conditional-use hearings when there are no conditional uses, this does have the political advantage of shielding City Council from lobbying by either side before the review hearing. Before we junk this peculiar way of doing things, shouldn't we find out if there was a good reason for instituting it?

It may be that this process was instituted because it is the only legal way to deny approval of a project based on design standards -- the Seven Conditional Use Standards outlined in the UDO, Sec. 7-16-2 part (c). Wouldn't it have been wise for the consultants to investigate whether this or soemthing similar is the case before recommending its dismantling?

------------------------

*3* MANDATORY REVIEW, VOLUNTARY COMPLIANCE:
At the Advisory Committee meeting I crashed last Monday morning, Downtown Commission chair Pat Whalen acknowledged that the draft plan still does not mandate compliance with design standards, which the Downtown Commission and the general public had insisted last summer should be a key element of any new plan. Instead, the plan would introduce what he called a "carrot and stick": All Level II and Level III projects would be subject to design review by the Downtown Commission, as well as Planning and Zoining. If the DTC or P&Z denies approval, the developer could appeal to City Council.

I guess the "stick" here is the fear of those mamas with babies on their hips mobbing a City Council hearing. But that's not exactly guaranteed to make someone like Staples, Inc. shake in their wingtips.

The plan would give developers the right to appeal a denial at any level in the process to the next level up (DMP Draft, pg. 71). It seems that it would be much more of a stick -- and much more fair -- if the appeals went both ways. A group of affected citizens should, conversely, be able to appeal an approval to the next level up.

The Draft makes a big deal about instituting public input at each step of the design-review process -- without mentioning that the public already has the opportunity to comment at each step. The one innovation it does introduce is that developers of large projects would be required to meet and discuss their plans with the public before beginning the review process -- which the UDO currently encourages but does not require.

The reason there is no mandatory compliance in the plan is because downtown developers object to *4*.

------------------------

*4* LOCAL HISTORIC DISTRICTS:
At the last public meeting Goody Clancy held last summer, one of its consultants told me the draft would include a table showing a number of possible restructurings of the design-review process and their consequences. Included among these options would be the only one that would, under North Carolina law, allow for mandatory compliance: designating downtown as a Local Historic District, which would put final approval for design review in the hands of the Historic Resources Commission.

There is no such grid of options in this draft -- only the flat recommendation of expanding P&Z's authority, etc. as discussed in *2* above. Maybe $170,000 wasn't enough to buy us an options grid.

And instead of an objective investigation of how an LHD might or might not be advantageous, it is treated like an afterthought and then summarily dismissed: "In addition, explore the pros and cons of designating a local historic district. (Note that local historic district designation could excessively restrict the ongoing investment that downtown needs to thrive by establishing stringent restoration standards without adequate financial support to help meet them.) (DMP Draft, page 30-31)

The last statement is the viewpoint that was presented to the Advisory Committee by a single historic-preservation consultant who is employed by a downtown-development company. It is not the view of most local or state preservationists, and it is certainly not supported by the well-known study conducted by Dr. Pamela Nickless of UNCA in 1997 on "Economic Development and Historic Preservation" (summarized at http://www.psabc.org/news/econ.htm). Nickless -- whose study Goody Clancy was informed about, but apparently ignored -- demonstrated the enormous jump in investment in the Montford district after it was designated a local historic district.

The DMP draft simply recycles many developers' prejudices against local historic districts -- which restrict them from demolishing historic buildings at will, and compel them to make historically appropriate alterations to their buildings instead of whatever suits their whims or costs the least -- and marginalizes preservation by continuing to overlook the central role our historic buildings play in the character and desirability of downtown.

Worse, it encourages the development of massive buildings right next to historic properties by advocating the sale of the historic property's "air rights" (DMP Draft, page 31). Developers could dodge the DMP's proposed 20-foot side step-backs from adjacent buildings by buying the rights to the step-backs from the adjacent building's owners -- which would seem to defeat the DMP's own stated purpose of requiring side step-backs, which is to minimize shadows and the depressing "slab" effect of overcrowded buildings.

Finally, it seems imbalanced, at least, for the plan to dismiss Local Historic Districts on the one hand, and on the other hand to advocate: "Diversify the Asheville-Buncombe Historic Resources
Commission to include Asheville Downtown Commission members, design professionals (including urban designers), sympathetic developers, construction professionals, and members with similar backgrounds." (DMP Draft, page 32) What would be the point of this if the HRC is given no power to enforce downtown historic-design requirements?

------------------------

*5* SHADOWS & VIEW CORRIDORS:
This may be the clearest example of how readily Goody Clancy backed off from its "livable" and "human-scale" design-requirement proposals when these met resistance from developers.

The problem of massive new buildings overshadowing smaller existing ones was in the forefront of public concern twice last year: The Coalition of Asheville Neighborhoods opposed the Horizons proposal's large condo tower at the old Deal property on Merrimon Ave. because it would have cast the residential neighborhoods next to it in continual shadow, interfering (among other concerns) with residents' solar-cell panels. And the Parkside condos would have cast a daily shadow over City Hall, as well as over City-County Plaza.

Preserving downtown residents' and visitors' views of the surrounding mountains from encroachment by massive buildings was also a frequently expressed concern. Again, Parkside highlighted this issue -- one of the Pack Square Conservancy's objections to the proposal was that it would block a traditionally admired view of the mountains from City-County Plaza.

The consultants told us we could prevent these problems by requiring tall buildings to be tapered, decreasing their mass as they rise (like the Jackson Building); by imposing restrictions on shadows; and by designating view corridors in which tall buildings would not be allowed.

Here's what happened to those ideas in the back room. (It may be mere coincidence that the owner of the Horizons/Deal property, Chris Peterson, is also the most outspoken developer on the Advisory Committee.)

In the Planning Team Response document, the consultants answer an objection -- perhaps from a non-developer on the committee -- that "More height regulation [is] needed" (ref. no. 26):

"We did not feel additional height controls were necessary compared to previous drafts, and have in fact removed some regulations that we feel imposed unnecessary restriction:

"[A] Removed requirement that building floor length gradually decrease (by 2' per floor) about 75'. This unnecessarily restricts upper floors; the 150' maximum will still ensure reasonable building size; we did not want to force tapered building forms that would be out of place with traditional sheer vertical buildings in downtown.
[Which 'sheer vertical buildings' are those -- the BB&T? The Wachovia?? -- S.R.]

"[B] Removed restrictions on new buildings casting shadows on private development parcels (restrictions on casting shadows on public parks remain). Further model study revealed that restricting shadows on private parcels dramatically crimps development envelope and forces tapered building forms out of character with downtown (precedent shadow ordinances we had invoked turned out to be geared to more suburban conditions). While removing these restrictions will impact private parcel access to direct sunlight, we feel this is a reasonable trade-off to maintain other important urban qualities and parcel value. Other sites out of downtown are better suited for solar power generation. The floorplate area and length restrictions and front step-backs that remain for taller buildings will help ensure that a reasonable amount of daylight and views remain among taller buildings.
[This strikes me as utterly arrogant, and contemptuous of the nearby residents whose access to sunlight would be "traded off" for "parcel value." -- S.R.]

"[C] New development is no longer restricted from designated public view corridors, but rather must provide photomontages illustrating how it would be compatible with important views. Curtailing development in view corridors would be overly restrictive, and lead to some very disproportionate impacts on certain parcels. Public review of clear before/after illustrations of the proposal will enable thoughtful accommodation of views and development through good architectural design and site planning."
[If you allow a tall building to jut up into a view corridor, it's hard to see how it will "thoughtfully accommodate" views for anyone except the residents of its penthouse. -- S.R.]

------------------------

*6* ADD (ASHEVILLE DOWNTOWN DISTRICT):
A good description of this is in David Forbes' Jan. 6 article in the Mountain Xpress, "Asheville Downtown Master Plan draft lays out potential future," at http://www.mountainx.com/news/2008/downtown_master_plan_draft.

Gordon Smith of Scrutiny Hooligans has aptly described this entity -- in the form the plan envisions it eventually taking as an all-powerful, independent controller of downtown -- as a "Petri dish for corruption." Huge amounts of money and power would be controlled by appointed -- not elected -- officials who would be subject to no effective oversight.

Asheville has experienced this sort of Soviet-style central planning before -- in the 1960s and 70s, when autocratic City Manager Weldon Weir and his successors demolished large parts of the city's downtown (including its African-American section at what's now South Charlotte Street) in the name of urban renewal. We don't need to delegate away what little power would remain with elected officials after the DMP strips City Council of its design-review function (see *2*, above).

========================

CONCLUSION:

In sum, the Downtown Master Plan, which began with such a breath-of-fresh-air flourish of public input and citizen control over Asheville's destiny, seems now to be degenerating into an undemocratic delegation of power into the hands of appointed, insulated boards that well-connected developers have plenty of experience in controlling. Although it is packed with excellent, far-sighted recommendations, these are made hollow by the plan's weak requirements.

The public needs to resist the inevitable rush to implement the plan's developer-friendly rule changes, and to avoid being swayed by arguments that "everyone has to compromise" and "we can't delay any longer." The fact is, Goody Clancy was right the first time -- we DON'T have to compromise our quality-of-life standards to suit the demands of a few developers who want to continue putting up ugly, oversized cubes.

Historic preservation and renovation -- not new development -- has been the driving force behind downtown Asheville's economic revival. This will prove even more true as the present recession deepens, since historic restoration is cheaper and greener and creates more local jobs than new development.

The organizers of the DMP process made one fundamental mistake in closing off the process to the public and moving it to a developer-dominated back room. They made another in repeatedly failing to provide a due proportion of seats at the table for the historic-preservation community.

It's not too late to reverse these mistakes. The DMP is still only a draft. The planners could:

* Make a concerted effort with preservationists to research and discuss Local Historic Districts, the one tool that can give us "mandatory review, mandatory compliance."

* Retain City Council review for all Level III projects over the old threshold, 100,000 feet.

* Investigate the consequences of dropping the Conditional Use Permit process.

* Consider how to diversify the membership of the Planning and Zoning board beyond the developer community, and how to insulate its appointments from special-interest lobbying.

* Restore the design requirements it has weakened.

* Fully include the public in all of its discussions and findings.

In its present form, however, this Downtown Master Plan should NOT be adopted by City Council.

------------------
-- Steve Rasmussen

Jason Webley in Asheville, 12/29, Flood Gallery

2008-12-20T20:56:00.003-05:00

If you like the Avett Brothers and what they do for bluegrass,
you will also like Jason Webley and what he does for the accordian.

I experienced them both the same summer and saw many similarities.

Wait a minute! Stop presses! He IS appearing with the Avett Brothers.
http://www.jasonwebley.com/events.html
And I was THE FIRST to note the similarity!

And do I get credit?
No. As usual.
I can't find the emails, but I noted to the Avetts that they were like Jason Webley,
and one of them replied something like "Thanks. Never heard of him-- I'll have to check that out."
Trust me. I thought I might have said the same thing to Jason.

Here's what one fan said of them together in Seattle:
QUOTE: (anne @ Nov 12 2008, 8:38 AM)
"I believe Jason Webley played before the Avetts at Pickathon in 2007. He was f-ing awesome!! He had the whole crowd pointing in the air and spinning in circles. My son and I had a blast during his set.
he did and it *was* awesome!"

he also opened for them the first night in Seattle this past April and i don't think that show would have been as good without his stellar, energetic performance. he brought something special to that evening.

New York times has an article on Ecotopia

2008-12-13T19:12:00.002-05:00

Back in 1977, there were a few sci fi utopias and dystopias that had been recently published:
- Woman on the Edge of Time, by Marge Piercy
- Wanderground, by Sally Gearhart

but my favorite, which I read as part of a study group with the MOvement for a New Society, was ecotopia, by Ernest Callenbach.

Today the NYT has an article on it. Perhaps there might be a market for a booklength study of MNS after all. I'm headed to the official archives of the group, the Swarthmore College Peace Collection next week. It's my second visit-- I went there in October 1979 to research the 1948 anti-draft movement, in which Bob Swann was quite influential.

No one else seems to writing on MNS yet, nor to have written on them. The three scholars I've contacted think it's high time for someone to do it.

The Novel That Predicted Portland
By SCOTT TIMBERG
Published: December 12, 2008
SOMETIMES a book, or an idea, can be obscure and widely influential at the same time. That’s the case with “Ecotopia,” a 1970s cult novel, originally self-published by its author, Ernest Callenbach, that has seeped into the American groundwater without becoming well known.

The novel, now being rediscovered, speaks to our ecological present: in the flush of a financial crisis, the Pacific Northwest secedes from the United States, and its citizens establish a sustainable economy, a cross between Scandinavian socialism and Northern California back-to-the-landism, with the custom — years before the environmental writer Michael Pollan began his campaign — to eat local.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/14/fashion/14ecotopia.html

Bumpersticker Visions

2008-12-13T18:51:00.002-05:00

I was driving (yes, a rented car) along Haywood Road, wondering how many of my fellow citizens got it about peak oil and the need for a new lifestyle.

I saw a new health club at Haywood and Patton, with a name like a corporate radio brand: "The Rush". Apparently the complex is 40,000 square feet. All well and good, but in a month where
• hunting licenses are on the rise because budgets are tight
• electricity use is down by 7% for the same reason
• gas purchases have been going down, and transit use up-- even though gas is half the price it was just a few months ago......

do these folks really think that folks will an unspecified amount of money
(never a good sign when the price is available only by talking to a push sales person)
to exercise when they could bike or walk up these plentiful hills?

I don't think they get it, and imagine they are going under.
In contrast....

a minute after that, I saw a woman with two bumperstickers--
one that has been around for quite a while on simple living, and the other apparently homemade, which said something like "This petroleum bonanza is a one time deal."

An Open Letter to Obama on the next Secretary of Agriculture

2008-12-05T14:35:00.000-05:00

The following letter is signed by
Wes Jackson, Wendell Berry, Alice Waters, Marion Nestle and Bill McKibben,
among others.

They suggest some people they think would be good for the next Secretary of Agriculture:

# Gus Schumacher, former Under Secretary of Agriculture for Farm and Foreign Agricultural Services and former Massachusetts Commissioner of Agriculture.
# Chuck Hassebrook, executive director, Center for Rural Affairs, Lyons, Neb.
# Sarah Vogel, former Commissioner of Agriculture for North Dakota, lawyer, Bismarck, N.D.
# Fred Kirschenmann, organic farmer, distinguished fellow at the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture in Ames, Iowa, and president of the Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture, Pocantico Hills, NY.
# Mark Ritchie, Minnesota Secretary of State, former policy analyst in Minnesota’s Department of Agriculture under Governor Rudy Perpich, co-founder of the Institute for
Agriculture and Trade Policy.
# Neil Hamilton, Dwight D. Opperman Chair of Law and director of the Agricultural Law Center, Drake University, Des Moines, Iowa.

Jim Barton
http://smithmillcreek.blogspot.com

******************************

Dear President-Elect Obama,

We congratulate you on your historic victory and welcome the change that your election
promises to usher in for our nation. As leaders in the sustainable agriculture and rural
advocacy community we supported you in record numbers during the caucus, primary
and general election because of the family farm-friendly p olicies that you advocated
during your campaign.

As our nation's future president, we hope that you will take our concerns under
advisement when nominating our next Secretary of Agriculture because of the crucial
role this Secretary will play in revitalizing our rural economies, protecting our nation's
food supply and our environment, improving human health and well-being, rescuing the
independent family farmer, and creating a sustainable renewable energy future.

We believe that our nation is at a critical juncture in regard to agriculture and its impact
on the environment and that our next Secretary of Agriculture must have a broad vision
for our collective future that is greater than what past appointments have called for.

Presently, farmers face serious challenges in terms of the high costs of energy, inputs and
land, as well as continually having to fight an economic system and legislative policies
that undermine their ability to compete in the open market. The current system
unnaturally favors economies of scale, consolidation and market concentration and the
allocation of massive subsidies for commodities, all of which benefit the interests of
corporate agribusiness over the livelihoods of farm families.

In addition, America must come to understand the environmental and human health
implications of industrialized agriculture. From rising childhood and adult obesity to
issues of fo od safety, global warming and air and water pollution, we believe our next
Secretary of Agriculture must have a vision that calls for:
• recreating regional food systems,
• supporting the growth of humane, natural and organic farms, and
• protecting the environment, biodiversity and the health of our children while implementing policies that place conservation, soil health, animal welfare and worker's rights as well as sustainable renewable energy near the top of their agenda.

Today we have a nutritional and environmental deficit that is as real and as great as that
of our national debt and must be addressed with forward thinking and bold, decisive
action. To deal with this crisis, our next Secretary of Agriculture must work to advance a
new era of sustainability in agriculture, humane husbandry, food and renewable energy
production that revitalizes our nation's soil, air and water while stimulating opportunities
for new farmers to return to the land.

We believe that a new administration should address our nation's growing health
problems by promoting a children's school lunch program that incorporates more healthy
food choices, including the creation of opportunities for schools to purchase food from
local sources that place a high emphasis on nutrition and sustainable farming practices.
We recognize that our children's health is our nation's future and that currently schools
are unable to meet these needs because they do not have the financial resources to inve st
in better food choices. We believe this reflects and is in line with your emphasis on
childhood education as a child's health and nutrition are fundamental to their academic
success.

We understand that this is a tall order, but one that is consistent with the values and
policies that you advocated for in your bid for the White House. We realize that more
conventional candidates are likely under consideration; however, we feel strongly that the
next head of the USDA should have a significant grassroots background in promoting
sustainable agriculture to create a prosperous future for rural America and a healthy
future for all of America's citizens.

With this in mind, we are offering a list of leaders who have demonstrated a commitment
to the goals that you articulated during your campaign and we encourage you to consider
them for the role of Secretary of Agriculture.

Signatories:

1. David Murphy, Clear Lake, IA
2. Paul Willis, Thornton, IA
3. Michael Pollan, Berkeley, CA
4. Bill Niman, Bolinas, CA
5. Nicolette Hahn Niman, Bolinas, CA
6. Diane Halverson, Northfield, MN
7. Marlene Halverson, Northfield, MN
8. Aaron Woolf, Elizabethtown, NY
9. Judy Wicks, Philadelphia, PA
10. Wendy Wasserman, Iowa City, IA
11. Anna Lappé, Brooklyn, NY
12. Cornelia Butler Flora, Ames, IA
13. Eleanor Bertino, San Francisco, CA
14. Wes Jackson, Salina, KS
15. Wendell Berry, Port Royal, KY
16. Alice Waters, Berkeley, CA
17. Marion Nestle, New York, NY
18. Bill McKibben, Middlebury, VT
19. Rick Dove, New Bern, NC
20. Ann Cooper, Berkeley, CA
21. Michel Nischan, Fairfield, CT
22. Jerry DeWitt, Ames, IA
23. Michael Dimock, San Francisco, CA
24. Jim Harkness, Minneapolis, MN
25. Frank Reese, Lindsborg, KS
26. Jeff Odefey, Irvington, NY
27. Cathy Liss, Alexandria, VA
28. Eric Schlosser, Monterey, CA
29. Leigh Adcock, Ames, IA
30. Dan Barber, Pocantico Hills, NY
31. Francis Thicke, Fairfield, IA
32. Josh Viertel, Brooklyn, NY
33. Peter Hoffman, New York, NY
34. Tom Philpott, Valle Crucis, NC
35. Hillary Wilson, Valle Crucis, NC
36. Dan Imhoff, Healdsburg, CA
37. Michael Stumo, Sheffield, MA
38. Simran Sethi, Lawrence, KS
39. Lisa Stokke, Clear Lake, IA
40. Sarah Willis, Thornton, IA
41. Peter Kaminsky, Brooklyn, NY
42. Kurt Michael Friese, Iowa City, IA
43. Carl Safina, Stony Brook, NY
44. Anthony Garrett, Washington, DC
45. Eliza Maclean, Snow Camp, NC
46. Odessa Piper, Silver Spring, MD
47. Edward Behr, Barnet, VT
48. Phyllis Willis, Thornton, IA
49. Larry Cleverley, Mingo, IA
50. Jesse Ziff Cool, Menlo Park, CA
51. Curt Ellis, Austin, TX
52. Wenonah Hauter, Washington, D C
53. Patty Lovera, Washington, DC
54. John Ikerd, Columbia, MO
55. Lucia Watson, Minneapolis, MN
56. Deborah Madison, Galisteo, NM
57. George DeVault, Decorah, IA
58. Melanie DeVault, Decorah, IA
59. Andrea King Collier, Lansing, MI
60. Rosiland Creasy, Los Altos, CA
61. John Jeavons, Willits, CA
62. Samuel Fromartz, Washington DC
63. Frances Moore Lappe, Cambridge, MA
64. Denise O'Brien, Atlantic, IA
65. Arnell Hinkle, Berkeley, CA
66. Marjie Bender, Pittsboro, NC
67. Winona LaDuke, Ponsford, MN
68. Diane Hatz, New York, NY
69. Cory Schreiber, Portland, OR
70. Rick Bayless, Chicago, IL
71. Angie Tagtow, Elkhart, IA
72. Ralph Paige, East Point, GA
73. Clara Bingham, New York, NY
74. Arie McFarlen, Dell Rapids, SD
75. Bret Kortie, Dell Rapids, SD
76. Dwight Ault, Austin, MN
77. Amy P. Goldman, Rhinebeck, NY
78. Judith LaBelle, New York, NY
79. Patrick Martins, New York, NY
80. Mary Berry Smith, New Castle, KY
81. John Fisk, East Lansing, MI
82. Tim LaSalle, Kutztown, PA
83. Susan Stokes, St. Paul, MN
84. Jude Becker, Dyersville, IA

Some Constructive Approaches to the Mumbai Massacres

2008-12-03T14:39:00.002-05:00

This Joint Statement is being released to the press simultaneously in Pakistan and India today, 30th November 2008.

We are deeply shocked and horrified at the bloody mayhem in Mumbai, which has claimed more than a hundred and ninty lives and caused grievous injuries to several hundred people, besides sending a wave of panic and terror across South Asia and beyond. We convey our profound feelings of sorrow and sympathies to the grieving families of the unfortunate victims of this heinous crime and express our solidarity with them.

As usual, all sorts of speculations are circulating about the identity of the perpetrators of this act of barbarism. The truth about who are directly involved in this brutal incident and who could be the culprits behind the scene is yet to come out and we do not wish to indulge in any guesswork or blame game at this point. However, one is intrigued at its timing. Can it be termed a coincidence that it has happened on the day the Home Secretaries of the two countries concluded their talks in Islamabad and announced several concrete steps to move forward in the peace process, such as the opening of several land routes for trade ? Kargil, Wagah-Attari, Khokhropar etc ?, relaxation in the visa regime,? a soft and liberal policy on the issue of release of prisoners and joint efforts to fight terrorism? Again, is it just a coincidence that on this fateful day the Foreign Minister of Pakistan was in the Indian capital holding very useful and productive talks with his Indian counterpart?? One thing looks crystal clear. The enemies of peace and friendship between the two countries, whatever be the label under which they operate, are un-nerved by these healthy developments and are hell bent on torpedoing them.

We are of the considered opinion that the continued absence of peace in South Asia - peace between and within states - particularly in relation to India and Pakistan , is one of the root causes of most of the miseries the people of the region are made to endure. It is the major reason why our abundantly resource-rich subcontinent is wallowing in poverty, unemployment, disease, and ignorance and why militarism, religious and sectarian violence and political, economic and social injustice are eating into the very vitals of our societies, even after more than six decades of independence from colonial rule.

At this moment of unmitigated tragedy, the first thing we call upon the Governments of India and Pakistan to do is to acknowledge the fact that the overwhelming majority of the people of India and Pakistan ardently desire peace and, therefore, the peace process must be pursued with redoubled speed and determination on both sides. The sooner the ruling establishments of India and Pakistan acknowledge this fact and push ahead with concrete steps towards lasting peace and harmony in the subcontinent, the better it will be not only for the people of our two countries but also for the whole of South Asia and the world. While the immediate responsibility for unmasking the culprits of Mumbai and taking them to task surely rests with the Government of India, all of us in South Asia have an obligation to join hands and go into the root causes of why and how such forces of evil are motivated and emboldened to resort to such acts of anti-people terror.?

It is extremely important to remind the leaderships of Pakistan and India that?? issuing statements and signing agreements and declarations will have meaning only when they are translated into action and implemented honestly, in letter and spirit and without any further loss of time. It assumes added urgency in the prevailing conditions in South Asia , with the possibility that so many different forces prone to religious, sectarian and other forms of intolerance and violence may be looking for ways to arm themselves with more and more sophisticated weapons of mass murder and destruction. The bloodbath in Mumbai must open the eyes of our governments, if it has not already happened.???

We urge upon the governments of India and Pakistan to immediately take the following steps:

1. Cessation of all hostile propaganda against each other;
2. Joint action to curb religious extremism of all shades in both countries;?
3. Continue and intensify normalization of relations and peaceful resolution of all conflicts between the two countries;
4. Facilitation of trade and cooperation between the two countries and in all of South Asia . We welcome the fact that the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad and Poonch-Rawlakot borders have been opened for trade and that the opening of the road between Kargil and Skardu is in the pipeline.
5. Immediate abolition of the current practice of issuing city-specific and police reporting visa and issue country-valid visa without restrictions at arrival point, simultaneously initiating necessary steps to introduce as early as possible a visa-free travel regime, to encourage friendship between the peoples of both countries;
6. Declaration by India and Pakistan of No First Use of atomic weapons;
7. Concrete measures towards making South Asia nuclear-free;
8. Radical reduction in military spending and end to militarisation.

Signatories:
Pakistan

1. Mr. Iqbal Haider, Co-Chairman, Human Rights Commission Pakistan and former federal Minister of Pakistan
2. Dr. Tipu Sultan, President, Pakistan Doctors for Peace & Development, Karachi
3. Dr. Tariq Sohail, Dean, Jinnah Medical & Dental University , Karachi
4. Dr. A. H.. Nayyar, President, Pakistan Peace Coalition, Islamabad
5. Justice (Retd) Rasheed A. Razvi, President, Sindh High Court Bar Association
6. Mr. B.M.Kutty, Secretary General , Pakistan Peace Coalition, Karachi
7. Mr. Karamat Ali, Director, PILER, Karachi , Founding member, PIPFPD
8. Mr. Fareed Awan, General Secretary , Pakistan Workers Confederation, Sindh
9. Mr. Muhammad Ali Shah, Chairman , Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum, Karachi
10. Mr. Zulfiqar Halepoto, Secretary, Sindh Democratic Front, Hyderabad
11. Professor Dr. Sarfraz Khan, Area Studies Centre ( Central Asia), Peshawar University
12. Syed Khadim Ali Shah, Former Member National Assembly, Mirpur Khas
13. Mr. Muhammad Tahseen, Director, South Asia Partnership (PAK), Lahore
14. Mrs. Saleha Athar, Network for Women's Rights, Karachi
15. Ms. Sheema Kermani, Tehreek-e-Niswan, Karachi
16. Ms. Saeeda Diep, President, Institute of Secular Studies, Lahore
17. Dr. Aly Ercelan, Pakistan Labour Trust, Karachi
18. Mr. Suleiman G. Abro, Director, Sindh Agricultural & Forestry Workers Organisation, Hyderabad
19. Mr. Sharafat Ali, PILER, Karachi
20. Mr. Zulfiqar Ali Shah, PILER, Karachi
21. Mr. Ayub Qureshi, Information Secretary , Pakistan Trade Union Federation
22. Ms. Sheen Farrukh, Director, Interpress Communication Pakistan , Karachi
23. Mr. Zafar Malik, PIPFPD, Lahore
24. Mr. Adam Malik, Action-Aid Pakistan , Karachi
25. Mr. Qamarul Hasan, International Union of Food Workers (IUF), Karachi
26. Prof. Muhammad Nauman, NED University , Karachi
27. Mr. Mirza Maqsood, General Secretary, Mazdoor Mahaz-e-Amal
28. Ms. Shaista Bukhari, Women Rights Association, Multan

India

1. Kuldip Nayar, journalist, former Indian High Commissioner, UK., Delhi
2. S P Shukla, retired Finance Secretary, former Member, Planning Commission, Delhi
3. PEACE MUMBAI network of 15 organisations, Mumbai
4. Seema Mustafa, Journalist, Delhi
5. Manisha Gupte, MASUM, Pune
6. ?Dr. Ramesh Awasthi, PUCL, Maharashtra
7. Jatin Desai, journalist, Mumbai
8. Prof. Ritu Dewan, University of Mumbai
9. Prabir Purkayashta, DSF, Delhi
10. Prof. Pushpa Bhave , Mumbai
11. Paromita Vohra, filmmaker, Mumbai
12. Achin Vanaik, CNDP, Delhi
13. Meena Menon, Focus on the Global South, Mumbai
14. Romar Correa Professor of Economics, University of Mumbai
15. Anjum Rajabally, film writer, Mumbai
16. Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker, Mumbai
17. Kamla Bhasin, SANGAT, Delhi
18. Dr. Padmini Swaminathan, MIDS, Chennai
19. Sumit Bali, CEO, Kotak Mahindra Prime Limited
20. Dr Walter Fernandes, Director, North Eastern Social Research Centre , Assam ,
21. Rabia, Lahore Chitrkar
22. Rakesh Sharma, filmmaker, Mumbai
23. Prof. Kamal Mitra Chenoy, JNU, Delhi
24. Prof. Anuradha Chenoy, JNU, Delhi
25. P K Das, architect, Mumbai
26. Neera Adarkar, architect, Mumbai
27. Datta Iswalkar, Secretary, Textile Workers Action Committee, Mumbai
28. Madhusree Dutta, filmmaker, Majlis, Mumbai
29. Amrita Chhachhi, Founding member, PIPFPD
30. Mazher Hussain, COVA, Hyderabad
31. Prof. Manoranjan Mohanty, Delhi
32. Prof. M C Arunan, Mumbai

Bená Burda on Sustainable & Ethical Entrepreneurship

2008-12-03T00:50:00.000-05:00

What: Bená Burda on Sustainable & Ethical Entrepreneurship
When: Friday, December 5, 2008, at 2:00 p.m.
Where: Mountain BizWorks, 153 South Lexington Avenue, Asheville NC 28801
Why: Learning opportunity for entrepreneurs and sustainability activists.

Bená Burda, founder of Maggie’s Functional Organics will share her
experience in building a nationally prominent brand upon a model of
sustainable and ethical business at Mountain BizWorks. Burda will
describe the growth of the company a line of corn chips into one of the
country’s best-known makers of organic cotton clothing. Entrepreneurs
and others will learn of the challenges and surprises that Burda
encountered while developing fair trade imports, organic cotton fabrics,
and competing in the global textile market.

Burda hopes to foster a revival of textile manufacturing in North
Carolina through her involvement with Opportunity Threads, a startup
cut-and-sew operation in Morganton. The Maggie’s Organics product team
worked with this new employee-owned business to create a line of sock
monkeys and other whimsical animals using irregular socks that would
otherwise have gone to waste processes. Says Burda, “So far we are
selling every piece that they are able to produce. Our plan is to keep
'scaling up' this and other projects like it, while we design high
quality, unique products and offer them to a widening consumer base."

Burda’s presentation was organized for local entrepreneurs by
MountainBizWorks, the regional microenterprise development organization,
and FastTrac WNC, which offers entrepreneurial training for high-impact
enterprise. Burda is visiting Western North Carolina to attend a
community open house at the Opportunity Threads facility in Morganton on
Saturday, December 6.

A great American passed away today.

2008-12-01T18:50:00.001-05:00

A great American passed away today.

Tanta, an anonymous blogger who wrote so insightfully
of the irresponsibility of the American economy, passed away today.
She was three years younger than I.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2008/12/on_the_loss_of_tanta_1.html#more

Armistice Day

2008-11-11T09:29:00.008-05:00

I remember sitting in a cafe on Nov. 11th, 1983 in the Town Hall Square (RatHausPlatz) in Bonn, Germany at 11:11 AM. I noticed that some oddly dressed fellows were performing a ceremony, and asked my friend what that was.

"It's the 11th minute of the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month. One of those fellows is the Mayor, performing a ritual for Karneval (Mardi Gras to those of us who know New Orleans). It's the official countdown to Karneval."

What I didn't know (and should have, as an history student),

was that it was also Armistice Day, and that there was a tradition after World War I to honor the dead.

According to Wikipedia,
An Act approved May 13, 1938, made the 11th of November in each year a legal holiday; "a day to be dedicated to the cause of world peace and to be thereafter celebrated and known as 'Armistice Day'."

Like Mother's Day, founded as a peace holiday by Julia Ward Howe, writer of the
Mother's Day Proclamation,
and International Women's Day, founded by woman union activists;
the holiday has been re-purposed by those with more power.

But perhaps today, with the anti-nuclear movement on the rise, echoing the events of 32 years ago, we can take some hope.

11:11 AM on 11/11 is a good time to pray for the dead,
and resolve to fight like hell for the living.

Update:
A similar piece (and more informed) at
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/11/opinion/11watson.html

As world demand falls, prices for recyclables go down too

2008-11-11T02:52:00.001-05:00

A sudden collapse in worldwide demand for re- cyclables, particularly from China, has scrap dealers from Sacramento to San Diego stockpiling curbside collections as never before and charging walk-in customers for their throwaways.

As world demand falls, prices for recyclables go in dumper
cbowman@sacbee.com
Published Monday, Nov. 10, 2008 Sacramento Bee

A sudden collapse in worldwide demand for re- cyclables, particularly from China, has scrap dealers from Sacramento to San Diego stockpiling curbside collections as never before and charging walk-in customers for their throwaways.

Stacks of baled paper, plastic and metal are mounting at the Sacramento Recycling & Transfer Station plant on Fruitridge Road because market prices are too low to turn a profit or, worse, no buyers can be found, its operators said.

Five miles to the west, Ming's Recycling Corp. recently posted a sign at its entrance on 47th Avenue: "Ask for prices before you unload."

"We got fed up reloading everybody's pickup," said Kevin Luong, the company's marketing director, now in his seventh consecutive week of meager sales. "People are so shocked by the low prices. They think they are being ripped off here, but that's not the case. It's not us. It's the market."

If the scrap market doesn't recover anytime soon, homeowners could see their garbage rates rise. Most recyclers pay for the materials cities and counties collect from residents' blue curbside bins and then sell it for a profit. The proceeds help offset the government's costs of collection.

"It helps keep our recycling rates low," said Jessica Hess, a Sacramento city spokeswoman.

Local officials also see the buildup of unsold rubbish as a potential public health hazard. State waste regulators anticipate that dealers will ask that limits on the volume of stockpiled bales be relaxed.

"We're wondering what can we do to provide some relief," said Jon Meyers, spokesman for the state Integrated Waste Management Board.

Devalued recyclables easily could end up in the dump, making it harder for municipalities to comply with a state mandate to divert at least half of their waste from landfills, Meyers said.

As far as Sacramento County officials know, recyclers "are not landfilling it as yet," said Paul Philleo, county director of waste management and recycling.

The scrap market took a nosedive in late September. At first, industry analysts thought they were seeing a short-term "Olympics effect" from the shutdown of Chinese paper mills and other big polluters during the Summer Games in Beijing. But as the weeks of rock-bottom prices wore on, the cause became clear.

China, a voracious consumer of West Coast scrap, has all but stopped buying used paper and plastic because international demand for Chinese products made from these recyclables has diminished. Much of the material goes to making cardboard and plastics for packaging everything from iPods to eyewear, computers and cars.

"A lot of the material was going to China to make boxes for all the things they were shipping back to the United States," said Bruce Savage, spokesman for the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries in Washington, D.C. "When they aren't producing products, they don't need the packaging materials."

When the cavalcade of collapses in housing, credit, stocks and commodities hit the recycling industry, it plummeted.

On Oct. 1, for example, baled newspapers in Northern California were going for $140 to $150 a ton. By Nov. 1, the market price had dropped more than 60 percent to $55 to $60 a ton.

The scrap market is inherently volatile. Two years ago, demand from China and India was high enough for thieves to steal newspapers from street stands, rip off water meters and manhole covers and strip cemeteries of bronze plaques.

The depth and speed of the recent price fall has taken many by surprise.

"We've seen recyclables crash down in value in 1995, but we never have had a situation where we couldn't sell our materials at any price," said Steven Moore, president of Pacific Rim Recycling, which sells curbside scrap from several East Bay cities.

The cavernous Sacramento Recycling plant has 120 workers and a maze of electronic conveyors, chutes, sorters and balers processing 450 to 500 tons a day of papers, cardboard, plastic containers and metal cans collected at the curbs of Sacramento area homes.

Beginning last month, some of its regular scrap brokers and paper mills stopped buying no matter how low the price dropped, said Shawn Guttersen, the company's vice president, who entered the business during the 1995 slump.

"I've never seen suspended orders in the recycling industry during my career," Guttersen said.

Recyclers, being the experts they are at finding silver linings, have recovered a good piece of news from the tanked market.

"We haven't been seeing as many of the stolen materials coming in lately," said Luong of Ming's Recycling.

Unemployment Rates Vs. Citizen Mobilization 1950 to now

2008-11-08T11:44:00.002-05:00

A corrleation?

Comments and reactions welcome.

Author Talk- Nov. 2oth- Breaking America's Addiction to Oil and Coal

2008-11-07T23:10:00.006-05:00

AUTHOR MICHAEL BRUNE
Speaking at Warren Wilson College
Date: November 20, 2008
Time: 7 PM
Location:
Warren Wilson College
Gladfelter Building
Canon Lounge

Type rest of the post here
Map: http://www.warren- wilson.edu/info/ campus_map.php Michael Brune is the executive director of Rainforest Action Network (RAN) and a founding board member of Oil Change International, an organization dedicated to dissolving the political barriers to a clean energy transition. At age 26, Brune joined RAN to direct its campaign to convince Home Depot to stop selling wood from endangered forests. After a year of creative protests, celebrity activism, and shareholder advocacy, Home Depot agreed. Time magazine called it the top environmental story of 1999, and the announcement led to the protection of 5 million acres in British Columbia’s Great Bear Rainforest. Under Brune’s leadership, RAN has successfully campaigned to change the environmental policies and practices of some of America’s largest corporations, including Citi, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Kinko’s, Boise, Lowe’s and others. RAN has been referred to as “some of the savviest environmental agitators in the business” by the Wall St. Journal, “a lean, green, fighting machine” by the San Francisco Chronicle, and “rainmakers” by the Financial Times.

Obama's new official website is up

2008-11-07T15:31:00.001-05:00

http://www.change.gov

is the website for the for the incoming Obama-Biden administration.

No word yet on whether he will be putting in a farm, as Michael Pollan suggested.
He HAS read the article, however, and mentioned it to Joe Klein in a Time magazine interview.

Type rest of the post here

Environment Page
http://www.change.gov/agenda/energyenvironment
(mostly reccyled from campaign lit so far. There's also a "rural" page, but not a food or ag page)

Blog (acceptance speech video so far)
http://www.change.gov/newsroom/blog

Email Signup
-- At top of page.

Here's the blurb from the "About" page:

About the Transition

Throughout the Presidential Transition Project, this website will be your source for the latest news, events, and announcements so that you can follow the setting up of the Obama Administration. And just as this historic campaign was, from the beginning, about you -- the transition process will offer you opportunities to participate in redefining our government.

Come back often as we define new programs and possibilities to engage and be part of this administration.

The New Organizers: What's really behind Obama's ground game

2008-11-05T10:30:00.003-05:00

From a fellow named Zack Exley at Huffington Post
The New Organizers, Part 1: What's really behind Obama's ground game
Inside the Obama campaign, almost without anyone noticing, an insurgent generation of organizers has built the Progressive movement a brand new and potentially durable people's organization, in a dozen states, rooted at the neighborhood level.

The "New Organizers" have succeeded in building what many netroots-oriented campaigners have been dreaming about for a decade. Other recent attempts have failed because they were either so "top-down" and/or poorly-managed that they choked volunteer leadership and enthusiasm; or because they were so dogmatically fixated on pure peer-to-peer or "bottom-up" organizing that they rejected basic management, accountability and planning. The architects and builders of the Obama field campaign, on the other hand, have undogmatically mixed timeless traditions and discipline of good organizing with new technologies of decentralization and self-organization.

This post looks better at
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/zack-exley/the-new-organizers-part-1_b_132782.html?view=print

Win or lose, "The New Organizers" have already transformed thousands of communities—and revolutionized the way organizing itself will be understood and practiced for at least the next generation. Obama must continue to feed and lead the organization they have built—either as president or in opposition. If he doesn't, then the broader progressive movement needs to figure out how to pick this up, keep it going and spread it to all 50 states. For any of that to happen, the incredible organizing that has taken place this year inside Obama's campaign—and also here and there in Clinton's—needs to be thoroughly understood and celebrated. Toward that end, here are glimpses from several days of observations and interviews in Central and Southwest Ohio. This article focuses on the field program's innovative "neighborhood team" structure and the philosophy of volunteer management underlying it that is best summarized by the field campaign's ubiquitous motto: "Respect. Empower. Include."

In her job at a Middletown, Ohio, steel factory, Glenna Fisher managed the preparation and shipping of millions of pounds of steel per year until her retirement six years ago. But when she has volunteered for democratic campaigns in the past, no one ever asked her to do anything more complicated than calling voters with a script.

This year, the field organizer (FO) assigned to her town, Ryan Clay, had much bigger plans for her.

Ryan Clay, Glenna Fisher"He'd gotten my name from info I'd entered on the Obama website listing ways in which I'd be willing to volunteer," Glenna explained in the Hamilton office before a regular report-in with Ryan. "He called and we set up a time to meet at a local coffee shop."

One of the ways Ryan asked Glenna to help was recruiting other volunteers.

"And that Sunday, my church had a joint service with our sister church, a local African-American congregation. There I talked with a friend who gave me several names of people who also might be interested in volunteering with the campaign. I called Ryan and passed on those names and phone numbers," Glenna said.

Ryan was impressed, and continued to ask Glenna to try increasingly difficult tasks. She didn't know it, but she was being "tested" to see if she had what it took to be a neighborhood team leader (NTL).

Middletown Ohio Office

After Glenna had proven her reliability and effectiveness, Ryan asked her for another special one-on-one meeting where he invited her to formally agree to become an NTL. He spelled out all of an NTL's responsibilities before allowing her to accept it and even gave her a binder spelling it all out in writing: She would work with him to recruit other team members such as coordinators for canvassing, phone banking and data management. Her team would be responsible for connecting with all of the Democratic and undecided voters within their "turf." Other volunteers who stepped forward in her area would not be managed by campaign staff, but by Glenna's team. As team leader, Glenna would report results to Ryan a couple times per week and would be held accountable for meeting specific goals by certain deadlines.

2008-10-08-rootscampad.pngIn 2004, it was unusual for volunteers to have persistent roles and responsibilities—both at the Kerry campaign and the independent field operation Americans Coming Together. That is the norm for electoral organizing campaigns, and perhaps organizing in general these days. In contrast, the Obama neighborhood team members are organizers themselves, sometimes working more or less as staff alongside the young FOs.

Patrick Frank, 21, joined the campaign as a volunteer, won an unpaid "Organizer Fellowship" and finally was hired as an FO in July. Having served as a volunteer on more than 10 political campaigns, Patrick contrasts his experience at Obama with the traditional organizing model he was used to:

"It's about empowering. When I was 16 I worked on a big governor's campaign. And we were reliable volunteers and we were putting in serious hours. I felt like we should have been leaders, but that never happened. They said, 'Do your call lists, knock on doors—let us do the thinking.' Now, on the Obama campaign, when I see people like me and my friends used to be, we turn them around and say, 'Well hey, here's how to be a community organizer. Let me help you be a community organizer.' And then they go out and they get people to be their coordinators. And then we tell those new coordinators, 'Build yourself a team and be organizers too.' There's no end to it."

Oxford OfficeAnd that's exactly what Patrick did with long-time Democratic activist Don Daiker, who told me at the Oxford campaign office, "I've succeeded in recruiting 4 organizers: one in charge of canvassing, one in charge of phone banking, one in charge of volunteer recruitment, and one in charge of data transcription and recording. So that's my team. And we're responsible for roughly a quarter of Oxford, excluding the campus. And on top of that, I've taken charge of organizing house parties in the area."

While it was Patrick's job to make sure that all of those coordinators had been sufficiently tested for reliability before they got their official position, Don was the one making the ask. Describing how he made the ask to his canvass coordinator, Anne Bailey: "I said, if you're really interested in doing more, meet me at the coffee house and we'll talk about it. So I met her there and I said, 'How would you like to be canvass coordinator?' And she said, 'What does that mean?' I described it and I said, 'I'll print it out for you—because the Obama people have a little manual and there's a section in it about how you do canvasing.' "

Team leaders like Don have some latitude to shape roles around individual personalities. While not everyone has a volunteer coordinator, Don created that role for retired high school English teacher Marilyn Elsley, one of his recruits who wanted to lead but wasn't comfortable with the canvassing coordinator position.

"Up here there's a sign up sheet for phone banking," Don said, pointing to a giant chart on the wall of the office, "And it's filling up. Marilyn calls the people, and then we fill them in here, and then the phone bank coordinator, Cynthia Durgan, sets up the phone bank and trains the callers. We'll be phone banking just about every day between now and November 4."

IMG_1900morepostAfter visiting my fourth or fifth team, it was painfully clear that an enormous amount of power is unlocked by this incredibly simple act of distributing different roles to people who actually feel comfortable taking them on. And I say "painfully" because I couldn't stop thinking about all the union and electoral campaigns I've worked on where we did not do this.

I thought about Patrick's story from high school when I met Jacob Manser, a 16 year-old who is serving as the canvass coordinator for his neighborhood team in the heart of Columbus. The team's FO, Steph Lake, took me by the beginning of an afternoon phone bank that the team was coordinating. All the team members were playing their different roles: The team's volunteer coordinator, a semi-retired software developer named Robert Hughes had prepared the call lists in conjunction with the team's phone bank coordinator, Leslie Krivo-Kaufman, another high school student. Team leader Janeen Sands oversaw the whole event. And another volunteer, who was not even a team coordinator (yet) had donated her house for the event. Jacob helped out that day by collecting the data from the event. The team was still looking for a data coordinator and other members were sharing that role. Later that night, Steph and I stopped by his house to get the tallies (though volunteers organized by the team would do the actual data entry). They made the exchange in the street in front of Jacob's house, talking softly so as not to disturb any neighbors. It was about 10:00 PM—on a school night!

FO Steph Lake collecting results from Jacob Manser "Should I be worried about your grades?" I asked.

"I have a 4.2," he said.

"OK—I didn't even know that was possible," I admitted.

While the team structure dramatically increases volunteer productivity, it does so even more for the staff FOs.

Ryan, for example, has six teams covering a wide swath of rural and exurban Southwest Ohio. He said, "It's great—it's like having six offices around town."

He elaborated: "So many people lose elections because of the places you can't get to. This program allows Glenna's team, with just two or three weeks of VAN training to know how to cut turf, to know how to pull lists and put canvass packets together. So all that type of work that eats up so much time for organizers can be handled at the local level—at her place. That allows me to bounce around and find other team leaders. Since she's become a team leader and started taking care of her neighborhood, I've been able to go out and find four other team leaders—because I can rest assured that she's made the volunteer recruitment calls for her canvasses, and that she's made the confirmation calls. I might make a few calls at night—and if I find a new good volunteer I'll shoot Glenna an email saying, 'Call this person when you can.' But for the most part, it allows me to jump out of that neighborhood and spend time with another neighborhood that needs the help."

"So being able to play in every single street is really important and the teams are what let us do that," Ryan continued.

The Ohio campaign is attempting to build teams in 1,231 campaign-defined "neighborhoods," each covering eight to ten precincts. They are targeting virtually every inhabited square mile of the state. The campaign claimed to have teams in 65% of neighborhoods when I visited in early September. That's risen to 85% coverage at press time—and they are shooting for 100%. In contrast, the Kerry campaign effectively wrote off rural counties, and completely abandoned them in the final few weeks of the campaign in a last minute all-in shift to the cities.

It was a huge risk for the national field program to have paid staff take the time to methodically build volunteer teams instead of rushing directly to spend all their time running voter contact activities themselves. From the point of view of the conventional wisdom of much of the pre-Obama field organizing world, the campaign is actually taking two big risks: first they are risking everything on the effectiveness of masses of volunteers, then they are risking everything again by relying on volunteer teams to lead those masses. What if teams was just a bunch of hippy nonsense? What if it turned out there just weren't that many unpaid activists capable of running high-quality canvasses?

Jeremy Bird & Christen Linke YoungJeremy Bird, the Ohio general election director and one of the driving forces behind making teams a national strategy, said, "We decided in terms of timeline that [our organizers] would not be measured by the amount of voter contacts they made in the summer—but instead by the number of volunteers that they were recruiting, training and testing. It was much more an infrastructure focus. So there would be no calls from Chicago saying, 'Why haven't you made more calls?!' Instead there would be calls saying, 'Where are your neighborhood team volunteers?' Or, if the numbers seemed high, 'Are they real?' It was a whole shift in mentality that was really, really good."

IMG_1947It is impossible to overstate how counter intuitive this slow-build approach was for Democrats. Even Regional Field Director for Southwest Ohio, Christen Linke Young—who I witnessed in 2004 pushing independently for just this strategy as an Ohio FO in Franklin County—said it was scary to take this patient approach:

"We had a whole month where, on our nightly calls with headquarters, we did not report our voter contact numbers. We only reported our leadership building. I definitely stayed on top of what our voter contact numbers looked like. But headquarters wasn't paying attention to how many voters we registered or how many doors we knocked that day—they were paying attention to how many one-on-one meetings we had, house meetings, neighborhood team leaders recruited, how many people we had convinced to come to this wonderful training in Columbus that we had. Yes, it was definitely scary to see how big our persuasion universe was and know that our first priority was not to just be tearing through that."

But Christen said the meticulous building has paid off: "And then last weekend we [teams in Christen's area] had 100 volunteers on Saturday canvassing—which is not something I ever would have thought was possible. And they knocked on 2,500 doors. And so you go: 'OK, it paid off, it worked.' We spent a month focusing on getting the pieces in place and now we can knock on 2,500 doors on the first Saturday in September. I'd love to count up how many canvasses we actually staged that day but I think most organizers had at least two canvasses—they were able to be in two places at once because they had recruited and trained leaders who could run their own canvasses and who could train other volunteers in persuasion."

When this story was finally ready to go to press, I called to get an update on Christen's numbers. Last weekend (October 4-5), the teams in her region knocked on 10,300 doors—and another 1,906 in the weekdays leading up to that. She mentioned a team that is canvassing now three times per week. They have dinner together every Tuesday night and breakfast every Saturday morning.

Christen said, "I feel like people are committing more time this election because there's a community thing going on, and they're part of something that's local and social. But we're also more effective at harnessing volunteers because the teams do a lot of the training and debriefing themselves—it scales well. Everyone who goes out canvassing comes back with at least one story of someone they impacted. The team leaders are trained to give people time to tell those stories, and so everyone gets a sense of progress and they learn from each other how to be more effective next time."

That's a totally different picture than what I saw in scores of Kerry offices in 2004: crowds of canvassers receiving minimal instruction before being sent to an unfamiliar neighborhood and rarely getting the chance to debrief with others as a group.

IMG_1896morepostThe long term planning and relationships that emerged in the process were the keys: "These are tested and trained leaders—we knew we could trust them, and they knew they could trust us. They knew that if we said we'd give them everything they needed to run their event, that we'd have it for them. So that when we said, 'recruit 15 people to be at your house on Sunday, but I'm not going to be there'—that they knew we'd adequately prepare them for that day."

Compared to 2004, the productivity of the field is on a whole different level, said Christen, "There wasn't even a special push last weekend to get those volunteers there. I remember in 2004 there was a huge push to knock on this many doors one weekend in Franklin county as part of a nationwide thing. We dropped everything for that. But here, it was just a normal Saturday. And it's just going to keep getting bigger each weekend."

Training for organizers—and for volunteers—was critical to the success of this unorthodox model. In Ohio, Jeremy insisted on getting the whole staff together for an intensive full-weekend training early in the program.

"When I got here, yeah, I was nervous," said Jeremy, "because most of these organizers had never done this [team building] before. We did two days—we got everyone together, we went to Oberlin."

That training was expensive, but Jeremy said, "We spent more money than they ever wanted us to. But training is the most important thing. So [in our field budget] I'll cut whatever you want—but having all of our organizers together and training them for a full weekend. A lot of campaigns say they do training but it's often like a two hour orientation. We wanted to make sure that ours was a real, interactive, in-depth training."

A similar training was held for the first wave of team leaders that had been recruited by late August—and two different volunteers who I spoke to about it literally choked up as they tried to describe how powerful an experience it was. Training for staff and teams continues every week. Just the day before I first met Don and Patrick, they had spent an afternoon with the whole team gathered, going over the big-picture campaign strategy right up through Election Day. Of course they took some time to beef up on voter contact basics too. While I was in Ohio, the whole paid staff came together regionally for a full-day session of sharing successes and trouble shooting problems. The campaign is fanatical about constant quality checking and continuous feedback.

Both staff and volunteers are unusually reflective and analytical regarding the team model and the organizing philosophy of "Respect. Empower. Include." Those words were plastered in hugh letters around almost every office I visited, and organizers will get carried away talking about those principles and how they are supported by various details of the organizing model they're practicing.

I think this is partly because the model is working, and so people are excited about it, and excited to think about it. But it's also because the leadership—models this methodological introspection in all the trainings they do in in their daily management of organizers.

Jeremy and other national leaders actually produced a 280 page manual spelling out the model after conducting hundreds of interviews with primary and caucus organizers as well as ploughing through thousands of survey responses from volunteers.

The field director Jackie Bray was driving around the state doing spot checks on the quality of local team structures when I was in Ohio. So I asked her to describe the field model in an email. I'm struck by two things about her response: first, how detailed and self-analytical it is; second, that it represents exactly the model I saw actually being practiced in the field—because I'm sorry to say it, but I'm just used to anyone with the title "director" being hopelessly out of touch with the reality of the ground. (Including myself in more than a couple past jobs!)

Jackie wrote: "When we identify a volunteer or a potential volunteer we always hold a one on one meeting. Movements aren't built on individual people—they are built on relationships. Then we ask our volunteers to make deeper commitments. We coach new volunteers and facilitate the process for folks who are old hat at this stuff through an organizing activity. Usually the organizing activity is hosting a house meeting but it can be hosting a community meeting or a faith forum or recruiting seven plus new volunteers to take the first step and come to our office. Once someone has succeeded at an organizing activity we ask them to try their hand at leading a voter contact activity. Mostly we are interested in how well they train fellow volunteers to make phone calls or knock on doors. Training is a huge part of quality control and we need our leaders to be good trainers. If a potential leader is a successful trainer then we meet with them again to ask them to take that next step and become a Team Coordinator or Team Leader. If at any moment in this process a volunteer isn't successful our organizers are trained to spend time coaching them through getting better. We are an inclusive team here and our goal is always to make people better."

All the organizers and team leaders I met were similarly reflective and highly aware that they were enacting a special model of electoral organizing. They actually sound like they're in a continuous state of shock at their own results and the power being unleashed by teams. A chill went down my spine one night—the good kind—when I was listening in on a nightly report-in conference call with 20 FOs at the Hamilton, Ohio, office. It was about 10:00 PM, and a new organizer was reporting in her daily voter contact numbers to Jackie.

FOs reporting inJackie asked her why that week they had been so much higher than the previous week. The young woman on the other end of the line—who I imagined calling from a car pulled over on the side of some far flung rural route—spoke with genuine amazement when she said, "It's the teams! It's these awesome team leaders! It's working! It's actually working!"

This high level of self-awareness regarding the organizing method seems to allow organizers to better adapt it to their own unique turf and personalities.

For example, field organizer Patrick Morrell has created a three-ring bound instruction manual all on his own that he gives to every member of his team. One of his team members, who is Ryan's housing provider (most field organizers are living in supporters' spare rooms), left her binder on Ryan's bed one night with a note saying, "Maybe you should take some notes."

Ryan's mainly working-class turf—or his own more flexible style—has led to a looser structure for his teams than Patrick's. Patrick's turf is a relatively well-off set of suburbs. Maybe because of that—or maybe because of his own detail-oriented personal style—his teams work in a highly-structured manner. Both organizers' teams are achieving their benchmarks on time.

Organizers like Patrick and Ryan who had very little campaign experience before Obama are already talking like experts, with insights worthy of a long career. Somehow in just a handful of short months, they have already distilled practice into theory that in turn feeds and improves their practice.

Patrick said, "I start by finding the team leader and then I work with them to find the coordinator folks—people who from my experience in working with people in volunteer activities and also people who they know in the neighborhood who are custom fit for different roles. Once that team is established then we have a sit-down meeting where we get everyone a binder, we go through it step by step, and make sure everyone is on the same page. And then it's very much me passing the torch—and I'm here for questions but the team is running the campaign at that point."

Ryan had his own wisdom on team building to contribute: "Don't pass the baton to someone until you get someone else running at your speed. It's important for organizers and team leaders to find that point where a new leader is running at the same speed—mentally, physically, time-wise, interest level, desire to win—all those things. You find that point, and then all of a sudden it hits you: they're running neck and neck with you and that's the time that you pass it off and move on to building the next new team."

Patrick Frank was a junior at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, when he started volunteering for the campaign. Now, as an FO, his turf now covers the university, and he has encouraged innovation. Sitting on the outskirts of a large campus rally that his teams had organized, he explained to me some of the modifications they were making to the teams model, "Rather than say we have X leadership roles to fill, we're creating leadership roles for as many leaders as we have. So we have people in charge of whatever they ARE. We are saying, 'What's your social network?' We say, 'OK, you're The Balcony Coordinator—your job is to go party at Balcony [a local bar] every weekend—like you do anyways—but now wear a Barack Obama button—and bring voter reg forms.' Or, 'Hey, you work at Brunos—when you go out on deliveries—as long as it's OK with your boss—ask people if they're registered. You're going to be our, um, pizza coordinator.' "

Dots!When Patrick was talking to me, a handful of team members were buzzing around the rally asking every student to sign in. The sign in sheet gave every person the option of indicating interest in becoming a leader. Free food would be served at the end of the rally, but you needed a little green sticker to get some. Of course, you got a sticker by signing in.

"There's no end to what you can do when you have the power to empower people as leaders on campus. It's beautiful. It's awe-inspiring," Patrick continued, pointing to the big event that was running itself without him having to worry about it or check on anything, "I mean look at this!"

We saw glimpses of the potential for this kind of organizing campaign in MoveOn's 2004 and 2006 volunteer operations, the Dean Campaign and even the Bush and Kerry campaigns. And there are great examples of this kind of organizing if you go back to the social movements of several decades ago. But the Obama campaign is the first in the Internet era to realize the dream of a disciplined, volunteer-driven, bottom-up-AND-top-down, distributed and massively scaleable organizing campaign. For anyone who knows how many times this has failed to happen, this is practically an apocryphal event. Marashal Ganz, who is an advisor to the national field campaign, and one of the main architects of the team model, said he's been waiting 40 years for it.

A well-run organizing campaign is the most beautiful thing in the world: people know what they're working for; they have little successes everyday; they prepare for problems ahead of time and have great fun attacking them when they happen. Everyone is in a state of constant euphoria. In the end, win or lose, you have built something that gives you hope for the future—hope that humanity can, as it turns out, work cooperatively towards a better future and succeed.

In the middle of a good organizing campaign, volunteers will stop and tell you that they are becoming better people. That's sounds cheesy, doesn't it? But I'll tell you, I wrote that line in a first draft of this article while waiting for my own neighborhood team meeting to start in Westport, Kansas City, Missouri. I looked at it and thought, "People won't buy that." I figured I'd delete it.

Then, at the end of our meeting, my neighborhood team leader, Jennifer Robinson, totally unprompted, told me: "I'm a different person than I was six weeks ago." I asked her to elaborate later. She said, "Now, I'm really asking: how can I be most effective in my community? I've realized that these things I've been doing as a volunteer organizer—well, I'm really good at them, I have a passion for this. I want to continue to find ways to actively make this place, my community, a better place. There's so much more than a regular job in this—and once you've had this, it's hard to go back to a regular job. I'm asking now: Can I look for permanent work as an organizer in service of my community? And that's a question I had not asked myself before the campaign. It never occurred to me that I could even ask that question."

Through the meeting, Jennifer had inspired and commanded the room of 50 new volunteers on top of her five team members who already had roles. Her seven year old daughter had been staring up at her with calm awe the whole time. Good organizing changes the world. In fact, it's what humanity is made out of. Every one of us is the product of centuries upon centuries of the struggle between good organizing and bad organizing. Barack Obama—through the most incredible, random, beautiful, twists of history—has brought good organizing back. God bless him and the army of volunteer and paid organizers who are making it real.

Nonviolence works

2008-11-05T03:21:00.002-05:00

Nonviolence works

A really fascinating post on the Buddhist Channel, via the Buddhist Blog on a new study showing that nonviolent campaigns are more successful than violent ones:

Nonviolent resistance is not only the morally superior choice. It is also twice as effective as the violent variety. That’s the startling and reassuring discovery by Maria Stephan and Erica Chenoweth, who analyzed an astonishing 323 resistance campaigns from 1900 to 2006.

“Our findings show that major nonviolent campaigns have achieved success 53 percent of the time, compared with 26 percent for violent resistance campaigns,” the authors note in the journal International Security.

(The study is available as a PDF file at http://www.nonviolent-conflict.org).

The result is not that surprising, once you listen to the researchers’ reasoning.

“First, a campaign’s commitment to nonviolent methods enhances its domestic and international legitimacy and encourages more broad-based participation in the resistance, which translates into increased pressure being brought to bear on the target,” they state. “Second, whereas governments easily justify violent counterattacks against armed insurgents, regime violence against nonviolent movements is more likely to backfire against the regime.”

Foreclosures and Obama Victory

2008-11-05T02:43:00.004-05:00

From Obama win tied to states with 79% of U.S. foreclosures
http://lansner.freedomblogging.com/2008/11/04/white-house-house-math/5607

PS- The acceptance speech brought tears to my eyes.

Doing Democracy- Bill Moyer's Movement Action Plan

2008-11-02T16:31:00.008-05:00

I did a workshop based on Bill Moyer's Movement Action Plan at the Youth Environmental Sustainability conference at the University of North Carolina, Asheville on Sunday, November 2nd.

You can find a wikipedia article on the late Bill Moyer (who is NOT the PBS guy, thought they share a lot in common) at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Moyer

His book is called Doing Democracy: The MAP Model for Organizing Social Movements
By Bill Moyer, JoAnn McAllister, Mary Lou Finley and Steve Soifer It is published by New Society Press
http://www.newsociety.com/bookid/3694

It costs $17 and you can buy used copies for $6, including shipping.
http://www.amazon.com/Doing-Democracy-Bill-Moyer/dp/0865714185/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1225734407&sr=8-1

The one minute overview is at
wikipedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Movement_action_plan
but you are much better off reading the free 14 page summary at

http://nonviolence.org.au/downloads/practical_strategist.pdf
Since giving ghe workshop, I have discovered a short compliation of excellent articles at
http://nonviolence.org.au/planning.html

If you'd like to see a video of Bill talking (his last talk, in fact) visit
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17iITob04t4

I think you'll get more out of the talk AFTER reading the book or overview--- it's more of an advanced talk than an intro.

In the course of the workshop, I mentioned two other works that talk about phases groups or individuals go through.

The first was Elizabeth Kubler-Ross's stages of grieving, detailed in her work
On Death and Dying

You can get a quick overview at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C3%BCbler-Ross_model

The second was the "innovation of diffusions" which was first developed by Everett M. Rodgers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffusion_of_innovations
but much better explained by Geoffrey Moore in
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossing_the_Chasm

A change is gonna come

2008-11-02T00:17:00.003-04:00

You won't understand the title until you watch both videos.

Obama's half hour commercial

2008-10-29T22:26:00.003-04:00

I watched Obama's half hour commercial. The comment below reflects my thoughts:

What I found most interesting about the half hour was that Obama never mentioned McCain or Palin, and only once alluded to the current administration. He devoted the entire half hour to spotlighting the nation's most pressing problems by showing how they have affected real families, and then describing, point by point, what he planned to do about them. How different is this campaign than McCain's! I doubt that this will change many voters' minds, but it was a remarkably principled, high-minded, and conscientious presentation of Obama's political philosophy. I will vote for this man and his vision for America.

You can read this comment, others, and watch the half-our at
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/2008/10/the_obama_informercial_good_ba.html?hpid=topnews

Sarah Palin Rallies the Troops in Asheville

2008-10-26T22:01:00.004-04:00

I was reading How the Irish Saved Civilization tonight.
The book opens with a summary how the Roman Empire was growing hollow and empty-headed at the end of empire.

What a fitting book to be reading in the arena of the Thomas Wolfe Civic Center, a few minutes before Sarah Palin came on.
******

It started out OK. People were polite in line, though not talking much to each other, and not having too much of a spirit. No non-stop nastiness, vicious patriotism, etc.

After waiting in line forever, it seems (others had worse), I got in and the auditorium was almost full (I think I was one of the last 800 in).

One thing that struck was the lack of organizing. No one asked me to sign for anything, gave me info about early voting, asked me to help or buy a yard sign.
Did everyone give up, or do they not know how to organize?

But, whatever. I read about the fall of the empire and waited for the rally to begin.
Nathan Ramsey gave an oily speech. Someone, I think Mumpower gave one-- probably the best of the evening.

When Palin came out, she got out a sentence before a part of the crowd started shouting over her "USA! USA!" I wondered if they were trying to drown out a heckler. Sure enough, Sara said "Why don't we let security take care of that, and in the meantime, let's hear another song!". Sort of like the film Bob Roberts.

Her speech depressed me. Not so much because I disagreed with what she said (of course I would, given where I came from), but because she said so little. Her main agenda, after heading into the most severe recession in 70 years, with an unprecedented credit meltdown, and a global panic is.......tax cuts.
(No wonder the British conservative paper Financial Times endorsed Obama today. Even they think she's clueless.)

What amazed me, was instead of applause lines, she had boo lines-- lines calculated to have the audience boo ("The media went after Joe the Plumber!" Crowd- angry boos and hisses). At first I was thinking there were a lot, then I thought it might be a 1:1 ration between boo and applause lines. In the end, it felt more like 1:2. 66% of what she had to say was anger about how she and her audience were victimized. This is after 20 out of the last 28 years being GOP presidents! You'd think they might look in the mirror.

I knew I'd disagree with her, but I expected better. There is no there there.
No wonder Alaska's largest newspaper endorsed Obama/Biden today.

For all of that, I think the crowd could be won by Obama after he takes office. They didn't seem all that truly enthusiastic for the GOP. They just need to have one last rally before they face up to reality. Not just of overwhelming electoral defeat, but economic collapse due to the policies they asked for and received.

A headline in the Asheville Citizen-Times:
Zombies pose no threat at Palin event
Um, you can read it for the explanation.

The Convergence of Commodities

2008-10-25T19:36:00.002-04:00

As a commodities trader, he said, he wasn't concerned with who was producing something, or why. He was interested in demand, and there are, in his world, only four demands:

the creation of transportation,
the generation of heating and power,
the manufacture of materials and
the provision of sustenance through food and water.

“Historically, these four demands never used to talk to one another – they were silent,” he said. That is, they lived in different worlds of pricing, depending on the amount of energy they could produce per dollar spent.

"[Now] ....We don't care what commodity you buy. We called it a bushels-to-barrels-to-BTUs convergence. Take corn:
• It can now create heating and transportation; it's actually very good for burning to generate electricity.
• It can create plastic or cardboard, so it's a source of materials.
• And finally, you can eat it if you want. It can meet any of these demands. And you can use petroleum to create plastics, or to create fertilizer to grow food – suddenly, we are indifferent to what commodity we are buying to meet our demands.”

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20081024.wreckoning1024/BNStory/International/home?cid=al_gam_mostemail

116 million people have heard of the MDG

2008-10-24T12:19:00.002-04:00

Though I'm not sure how many of them live in Asheville.
The MDG are the Millenium Development Goals, a UN-coordinated set of goals and
targets to improve the life of the poorest on this planet. More info on MDG at

And to hear about the 116 million people campaigning for the MDG, read more below

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=44421

DEVELOPMENT:
Now Sit Up and Listen
Analysis by Sanjay Suri
Inter Press Service News Agency

LONDON, Oct 23 (IPS) - For every one in 50 people around the world to make a point of standing up somewhere on the planet to say the same kind of thing adds up to a lot of people. More than any mass mobilisation on any issue ever before.
And now that they have, it should follow for leaders, if only for their own sake, to sit up and listen.

The official figure for the campaign to 'Stand Up and Take Action against Poverty and for the Millennium Development Goals' Oct. 17-19 has been declared at 116,993,629. The call came from the Global Call for Action Against Poverty (GCAP), an alliance of about 100 social movements, non-government organisations and community and faith groups.

This was considerably more than the 43 million recorded last year.

But the actual number is almost certainly higher than this official figure, says Salil Shetty, director of the U.N. Millennium Campaign. The official total was announced while results, after due verification, were still coming in, he said, adding that the number that actually stood up would be about twice the 67 million estimated before the weekend event. Organisers say two percent of the world population physically stood up to make a point against poverty.

Actions ranged from standing up to deliver petitions to presidents or at local events where city mayors and other officials were invited to listen, to protest marches and meetings where everyone stood up to make a point. The protest gave quite vivid truth to the old cliché about local actions, carried out globally -- this time about similar matters, simultaneously.

The added support for the campaign against poverty might just have been provoked by the global financial crisis, that has seen thousands of billions of dollars go into financial institutions brought down by dubious dabblers, after the leaders who sanctioned this money denied a fraction of that to feed the world's hungry.

"If the rich countries kept their promise of 0.7 percent of their GNP for aid, that would generate more than 200 billion dollars, more than enough to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and is still much, much less than we've seen available for the banking bailout," Mary Robinson, former president of Ireland and former U.N. high commissioner for human rights declared as the results came in Wednesday.

"The money is there. But it's the political will. Leaders must listen to more than 116 million people," she said. "We have shattered all previous records for mass mobilisation. People really want to stand up against poverty, and say we need change."

The highest number of people who stood up, 73 million, was recorded in Asia, with 13 million reported in Bangladesh alone. Africa recorded about 24.5 million, and less expectedly, what was declared the 'Arab region' recorded close to 18 million.

Europe recorded close to a million, but Latin America only about 211,000. North America seems not to have drawn a significant response at all -- though the movement was led and coordinated from New York.

The initiative is not just about numbers, but a way to make protest possible. "We've created an opportunity for ordinary people to have a voice and to participate and to feel that they are not just objects of change but really the drivers of change," said Kumi Naidoo, co-chair of GCAP and honorary president of CIVICUS, a leading global NGO campaigning for rights and development.

"We've created a global event which is fundamentally local in nature," he said at a press conference after the attendance count. "My sense of why there was such an overwhelming turnout is that there is deep concern that the global economic crisis must not detract from meeting the MDGs, and exceeding them."

The attention to the money market crisis rather than to the MDGs clearly spurred a good deal of the protest action.

For the food crisis the leaders struggled to pledge eight billion dollars, for the financial crisis they found 3,000 billion dollars, said Sylvia Borren, former head of Oxfam Novib and co-chair of Worldconnectors, an NGO building links among people. "There is an ethical question here. If we had used that money at the bottom of the pyramid we would have achieved the MDGs by now." In this protest, "the urgency is the message."

The participation in the protest, she said, is "a democratic challenge for local governments, for national governments, but particularly also for the global governance we have, that says we the people do not understand that this kind of money can be spent on the Wall Street problem when children are dying every three seconds and women are dying at childbirth unnecessarily every minute."

The message coming across, Borren said, was that money was being spent "on financial institutions, on wars, it's being spent on all sorts of things we don't want; we want it spent on education, on water, on health, on food."

But between the delivery of a message and its receipt there still lies a wide gap. World leaders are meeting soon, not to end poverty or to find ways of providing everyone affordable food, but to make sure that the rich continue to buy, and that their market continues to flourish. (END/2008)

The Imelda Marcos Shoe Pile

2008-10-23T10:48:00.007-04:00

From an article in the New York Times:
In “Schooled,” Anisha Lakhani’s acidic narrative about an Upper East Side private school, swarms of seventh graders at a party kick off their high heels before descending on the dance floor. The narrator, who is their English teacher, regards the pile of footwear with a mixture of censure and awe: “Hard to believe, but there they lay, Jimmy Choos, Manolo Blahniks, Giuseppe Zanottis and Christian Louboutins — the abandoned shoes of 12-year-old girls.”

This reminds me of a visit to Manhattan I had a few weeks ago.

***

I was at a diner at 96th and Columbus Ave. 2-4 thirteen year old girls were at the table next to me (5th grade? 7th? something like that) talking about maids, vacation homes, shopping. It was utterly surreal and obscene. I half expected them to share corrupt hedge fund tricks that they learned from their daddies.

Of course, I am rather out of touch.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/23/fashion/23privilege.html

A new book about "human waste"

2008-10-21T10:38:00.003-04:00

Excerpt from the new book
The Big Necessity: The Unmentionable World of Human Waste and Why It Matters,
by Rose George

I need the bathroom. I assume there is one, though I'm at a spartan restaurant in the Ivory Coast, in a small town filled with refugees from next-door Liberia, where water comes in buckets and you can buy towels second-hand. The waiter, a young Liberian man, only nods when I ask. He takes me off into the darkness to a one-room building, switches on the light, and leaves. There's a white tiled floor, white tiled walls, and that's it. No toilet, no hole, no clue. I go outside to find him again and ask whether he's sent me to the right place. He smiles with sarcasm. Refugees don't have much fun, but he's having some now. "Do it on the floor. What do you expect? This isn't America!" I feel foolish. I say I'm happy to use the bushes; it's not that I'm fussy. But he's already gone, laughing into the darkness.

I need the bathroom. I leave the reading room of the British Library in central London and find a "ladies" a few yards away. If I prefer, there's another one on the far side of the same floor, and more on the other six floors. By 6 p.m., after thousands of people have entered and exited the library and the toilets, the stalls are still clean. The doors still lock. There is warm water in the clean sinks. I do what I have to do, then flush the toilet and forget it immediately, because I can, and because all my life I have done no differently.

This is why the Liberian waiter laughed at me. He thought that I thought a toilet was my right, when he knew it was a privilege.

This is why the Liberian waiter laughed at me. He thought that I thought a toilet was my right, when he knew it was a privilege.

It must be, when 2.6 billion people don't have sanitation. I don't mean that they have no toilet in their house and must use a public one with queues and fees. Or that they have an outhouse or a rickety shack that empties into a filthy drain or pigsty. All that counts as sanitation, though not a safe variety. The people who have those are the fortunate ones. But four in ten people have no access to any latrine, toilet, bucket, or box. Nothing. Instead, they defecate by train tracks and in forests. They do it in plastic bags and fling them through the air in narrow slum alleyways. If they are women, they get up at 4 a.m. to be able to do their business under cover of darkness for reasons of modesty, risking rape and snakebites. Four in ten people live in situations in which they are surrounded by human excrement, because it is in the bushes outside the village or in their city yards, left by children outside the back door. It is tramped back in on their feet, carried on fingers onto clothes and into food and drinking water.

The disease toll of this is stunning. Eighty percent of the world's illness is caused by fecal matter. A gram of feces can contain 10 million viruses, 1 million bacteria, 1,000 parasite cysts, and 100 worm eggs. Bacteria can be beneficial: the human body needs bacteria to function, and only 10 percent of cells in our body are actually human. Plenty are not. Small fecal particles can then contaminate water, food, cutlery, and shoes—and be ingested, drunk, or unwittingly eaten. One sanitation specialist has estimated that people who live in areas with inadequate sanitation ingest 10 grams of fecal matter every day.

Diarrhea—usually caused by feces-contaminated food or water—kills a child every fifteen seconds. That means more people dead of diarrhea than all the people killed in conflict since the Second World War. Diarrhea, says the UN children's agency UNICEF, is the largest hurdle a small child in a developing country has to overcome. Larger than AIDS, or TB, or malaria. 2.2 million people—mostly children—die from an affliction that to most westerners is the result of bad takeout. Public health professionals talk about water-related diseases, but that is a euphemism for the truth. These are shit-related diseases.

I'm often asked why I wrote The Big Necessity.

http://www.slate.com/id/2201466/entry/2201467

(No more at "Read More")

In Search of the Fabled Permaculture Chicken/Greenhouse

2008-10-20T17:06:00.005-04:00

By Rob Hopkins
http://transitionculture.org/2008/10/20/in-search-of-the-fabled-permaculture-chickengreenhouse

For many years I have taught permaculture courses, and like many who do so, I start my courses with the Tale of Two Chickens. This is a very useful way of looking at inputs, outputs, and the science of maximising beneficial relationships, and it concludes with describing one of permaculture’s Holy Grails, The Chicken/Greenhouse. However, now, as I stand on the verge of actually trying to make a chicken greenhouse, I am finding it very difficult to find actual working examples of chicken/greenhouses. Might I have spent years unwittingly promoting a permaculture urban myth?

The idea is straightforward and works brilliantly on paper. Patrick Whitefield in ‘Permaculture in a Nutshell’ sets it out very clearly (you can read it here), and you can read the thinking behind the Chicken/Greenhouse here. The picture below is taken from ‘In a Nutshell’, and captures the essential idea, which is that by placing the 2 elements of chickenhouse and greenhouse together with the proper orientation, you enable, via. good design, interactions to take place that otherwise would not take place and would require energy inputs to make happen. For example, the warmth from the chickens keeps the greenhouse free of frost, the carbon dioxide from the hens benefits the plants, and so on.

Visit full article at
http://transitionculture.org/2008/10/20/in-search-of-the-fabled-permaculture-chickengreenhouse
Click link to learn more

Asheville Transit- 3 Steps to Enlightenment

2008-10-19T12:57:00.003-04:00

Event: 'ADC Forum - 3 Steps To Transportation Enlightenment.'

Public Events
Public Asheville Design Center Events

Date: Wednesday, October 22, 2008 At 06:00:00 PM
Duration: 1 Hour

The City of Asheville’s Transit Division will make an introduction to how multi-modal approaches can help you become automobile-free. Join us and learn about how to be involved in our evolving transportation programs, such as the upcoming Transit Master Plan, Bicycle and Pedestrian Plan and the TDM program.
http://www.ashevilledesigncenter.org/index.php?option=com_jcalpro&Itemid=38&extmode=view&extid=71

(Nothing more at Read More)

Building a Food Pantry- the first steps

2008-10-18T23:46:00.003-04:00

http://sharonastyk.com/2008/10/17/friday-food-storage-not-quite-so-quickie-5-week-beginner-food-storage/

I hope you will never have an emergency, but even if you don’t, you will
always feel a more secure with (at least) one month’s food on hand. This is
definitely worth the little bit of work and expense it requires.
I cannot think of any food storage plan (than the one below) that would be cheaper, and yet have
the following features:

1. The food must all be nutritious.
2. It must all keep a long time without refrigeration.
3. You must be able to eat it uncooked if necessary.
4. It must all fit into a normal diet.

If you do this, I absolutely guarantee that you’ll be glad, and that it
will give you a very good feeling of security.

****************
The ANYWAY, Very Cheap, System of Food Storage for
Emergencies and/or Inflation for People Who Think They Cannot Afford Food
Storage

http://sharonastyk.com/2008/10/17/friday-food-storage-not-quite-so-quickie-5-week-beginner-food-storage/

HomeGrown: a film about a 21st century family farm in the middle of the city

2008-10-17T13:56:00.007-04:00

A Documentary About Modern Day Urban Homesteaders
(www.homegrown-film.com)
For screening venue information visit
http://homegrownfilm.blogspot.com

HOMEGROWN (2008) follows the Dervaes family who run a small organic farm in
the heart of urban Pasadena, California. While 'living off the grid’, they
harvest over 6,000 pounds of produce on less than a quarter of an acre, make
their own bio diesel, power their computers with the help of solar panels,
and maintain a website that gets 4,000 hits a day. The film is an intimate
human portrait of what it’s like to live like ‘Little House on the Prairie’
in the 21st Century.

**********
Director's Statement

"Many people are becoming aware of the environment. We may have gone to see
‘An Inconvenient Truth’, changed our light bulbs, or started to recycle
more. But how many of us are really walking the walk’ I know I’m not.

When I heard about the Dervaes family, I sensed that there was a human story
behind the headlines about global warming or buying organic produce. I
wanted to find out what it takes to live the life of an environmental
pioneer. I don’t wish to simply glorify or romanticize their way of life,
however. I want to show that along with the positive benefits there are also
sacrifices. Truly living by your ideals can have costs. I believe that
recognizing the hardships the Dervaes have faced makes their work all the
more inspiring.

HOMEGROWN is ultimately a family story. It’s about what lead them to where
they are today, what changed them and what keeps them together. Perhaps by
learning of their journey to a sustainable life style, we might be inspired
to take our own first steps."

About Robert McFalls

Early in his career he was an associate editor on ‘American Dream’, the
Barbara Kopple documentary, which won the Academy Award in 1990. That
experience helped him to see what a broad reach a well-crafted documentary
could have. He recently edited a documentary feature on the Dalai Lama,
which is now screening at festivals around the world.

Music

The beautiful music for this documentary was performed by our great American
homegrown musicians Jay Unger & Molly Mason.

Jay Ungar and Molly Mason are best known for their haunting composition
Ashokan Farewell in Ken Burns’ hit PBS series ‘The Civil War’’. The
soundtrack won a Grammy and Ashokan Farewell was nominated for an Emmy.
They’ve garnered legions of fans through their appearances on ‘Great
Performances’, ‘A Prairie Home Companion’, their own public radio specials,
and work on film soundtracks such as ‘Brother’s Keeper’, ‘Legends of the
Fall’, and a host of Ken Burns documentaries.

About the Family

The Dervaes Family (Jules, Ana’s, Justin & Jordanne)

Since the mid 1980s, Jules Dervaes and his family have steadily worked at
transforming an ordinary residential lot in Pasadena, California into a
verdant oasis in the midst of the city. On their small fifth of an acre they
are striving to be a self-sustaining urban homestead complete with bio
diesel power, solar energy, and wastewater management. These eco-pioneers
grow much of their own food and raise a menagerie of chickens, ducks, goats,
and an occasional cat. They have been the subject of numerous articles in
newspapers around the country, including The New York Times, The Los Angeles
Times and were recently featured on ABC’s Nightline. You can learn more
about them at their website: www.pathtofreedom.com

More Neighbors = Less Theft

2008-10-17T12:19:00.008-04:00

October 17, 2008

Breaking down fences makes good neighbors
Towns encourage residents to get to know one another
By Lisa Black |Chicago Tribune reporter

Connie Peyer barely knew the family who lived across the street, so she was shocked when her neighbor came over, upset, saying her home had been burglarized in broad daylight and no one bothered to call police.

Neighbors had watched as men loaded a truck with a television and appliances.
"Everyone thought, 'Oh, they're moving out,' " Peyer said.

The burglary taught Peyer a lesson about community isolation. So she was quick to volunteer when she learned that Skokie, where she had since moved, was sponsoring a program to help residents do what used to come naturally: get to know the Joneses next door.

28 years ago, I lived in central Cambridge, MA, when I heard that there was an attempted rape down the street. The woman cried out for help, and neighbors streamed out on the street of two and three story rowhouses. Afterwards, the neighbors held a block party to celbrate the power of community.

But when I moved onto that portion of the street a few months later, that all seemed a distant memory. So my housemates and I held a Neighborhood CrimeWatch meeting, and a police officer came by to talk about safety, and tagging possessions with ID numbers that would make them harder to pawn.

A few months later, our house got a call from the house across the street (we exchanged phone numbers). Did someone just steal one of our bikes?

Indeed they had. Even though we had hardly ever talked socially, the neighbor had a vague sense of who lived and visited our 7 person house.and thought it strange for someone to be removing a bike in the snowy dead of winter. It wasn't my first bike theft, nor my last; and the warning didn't come in time; but it did show the power of neighborhood.

(So I'm glad my neighborhood formed an association last Sunday night.)

Bio-Intensive Workshop in Virginia

2008-10-16T16:13:00.001-04:00

As far as I can decipher, this workshop would cost $400, not including lodging and most meals .

John Jeavons is famous for dropping out of his corporate systems analyst work after Earth Day 1970 to apply the insights to farming, so as to get the most calories out of a patch of land. (Activist Bill Moyer followed a similar path with the American peace movement, and helped to transform it).

If anyone goes to this, I'd be interested in hearing what they learn.
-- Jim Barton
smithmillcreek.blogspot.com
**********************************************

Food and Our Future:
Hope and Solutions through Biointensive Farming
A Workshop with John Jeavons
October 23 through 25, 2008
8:00-5:00 in Dayton, Virginia:
Woodment of the World Hall
3045 John Wayland Hwy
http://www.johnjeavons.info/workshop-locations.html
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/04/13/HO126062.DTL

http://www.johnjeavons.info/register.html

All of life on Earth…depends on six-inches of topsoil and the fact that it rains!
The soil is a living organism that must be fed and nurtured to keep it feeding us. This
basic understanding is not a major focus of most current forms of conventional
agriculture. In this workshop John will share eight essential aspects of GROW
BIOINTENSIVE including: Deep Soil Preparation, Raised Beds, Composting, Intensive
Planting, Companion Planting, Carbon Farming, Calorie Farming, The Use of Open-
Pollinated Seeds, and A Whole-System Farming Method. John will also provide time for
questions and answers concerning northwest small-scale farming, long-term sustainable
soil fertility, and specific crops.

John Jeavons has directed Ecology Action’s Mini-Farming program since 1972.
He is the author of How to Grow More Vegetables, Fruits, Nuts, Berries, Grains
and Other Crops…, the textbook of the GROW BIOINTENSIVE (GB) Sustainable
Mini-Farming system, as well as being author, co-author and/or editor of over 30
other Ecology Action publications.

His major responsibilities include directing field
and library research and education in GB food raising. He advises biologically-
intensive projects in Mexico, Kenya, Ecuador, Russia, Uzbekistan and Afghanistan
as well as all corners of the U.S. Jeavons holds a B.A. in Political Science from
Yale University. Before coming to Ecology Action in 1971, he worked as a systems
analyst in business, government and university settings. He has received the Boise
Peace Quilt, Santa Fe Living Treasure, Giraffe, and Steward of Sustainable
Agriculture awards for public service.

Stream Monitoring Training

2008-10-16T12:54:00.001-04:00

SMIE* is looking for new Stream Monitoring volunteers!

Sunday, October 26th
9am-5pm
UNC-Asheville, Forks of Ivy
$15 suggested donation
($ collected at training, please don't send in advance)

The morning will be spent at UNC-Asheville, learning background information and bug ID skills, using scopes and other equipment. There will be a lunch break from 12:30-1:30pm, and the afternoon will be spent applying the new protocol in the field (doing several types of biological sampling, bug ID, and data collecting). Attendees can earn 7 hours towards Criteria III for NC Enviro. Education Certification Program.

Volunteer expectations:
· Attend the training (lunch provided, carpooling encouraged).
· Sample a minimum of 2 sites (it only takes 2-3 hours for a group to sample one site), 2 times per year.

All volunteer groups will have a group leader, who has additional training in bug identification, and a paid technician will provide oversight for quality assurance purposes. This valuable training opportunity is open to anyone interested (ages 17 and up), so please help spread the word, and take advantage of this excellent opportunity!

To RSVP, or for more information, please contact Gracia O’Neill at Clean Water for NC (828) 251-1291, or gracia@cwfnc.org

We hope to hear from you soon!

~Gracia O'Neill

*SMIE is a collaboration of several area non-profits and government agencies, coordinated by CWFNC, which has been working to develop a new volunteer stream monitoring protocol. This method is more advanced than common biological citizen monitoring methods (such as Izaak Walton League), but is still easy to follow for volunteers with no prior experience in stream monitoring. All of the data collected by volunteer groups will be shared with NC DENR (Department of Environment and Natural Resources) to be used as a "red flag" for identifying waterways in need of additional protection. Volunteer monitoring groups will be a focal point or community interaction, promote a sense of stewardship of local waterways and empower residents to protect the quality of our mountain rivers and streams! Donations larger than the requested $15 will be gratefully accepted.

---------------------
Gracia O'Neill
Assistant Director
Clean Water for North Carolina
29 1/2 Page Ave.
Asheville, NC 28801
(828) 251-1291
www.cwfnc.org
><((((º>`·.¸¸.·´¯`·.¸.·´¯`·...¸><((((º>

22 years later

2008-10-15T14:14:00.009-04:00

While unpacking, I found some outlet insulation. It turned out that all these years, the outlets on the outside walls hadn't been insulated.

Here's the during picture:

And a close-up of the insulation outlet thingie:

And after:

This all seems pretty simple, but it reminds me that I spent the summer of 1986 doing this in Santa Cruz. Funded by Pacific Gas and Electric, a team of 20 students and recent graduates earned $12/hour visiting EVERY house in the City of Santa Cruz that had an electric or gas meter. If the resident (homeowner or renter) wanted, we did a quick energy audit, installed some outlet covers, covered their hot water heater, gave tips, left materials, and let them know how they could get further work done.

(and according to
http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl
that's $24 in 2008

(We did this for about four months, which means the labor cost would have been
40 hours*12 $/hour*20 people * 13 weeks = $125,000 in 1986 dollars for paid labor,
and a quarter million dollars in today's money (figure one to two million dollars total for admin support, materials & labor).

I wish I could tell you what the cost per watt saved ($/negawatt) was, but I've called the city of Santa Cruz and PGE and the report seems to have been lost. More than one person has said that getting info out of PGE is like pulling teeth.

And what does this have to do with the coming wave of unemployment, high heating bills, and the need to retrofit US housing stock to work towards reduced carbon emissions so that we can get our atmosphere to 350 parts per million of carbon?

I'll let you make that connection.
But here's a link or two to look at in the meantime.
***************************

If you want to buy some of these, they cost 33 cents each.
http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?action=productDetail&productId=96193-1410-OS6H&lpage=none

They might also have them at
http://www.ashevillehardware.com/householdhardware.html

What Happens to a Common Life Destroyed?

2008-10-15T10:09:00.004-04:00

Does it fester, or just shrivel up like a raisin in the sun?
********************

In response to a blog entry on the credit/financial meltdown by David Houlihan at
http://www.evolutionshift.com/blog/2008/10/15/the-collapse-of-the-third-economic-wave
I wrote this response:

Great column! In all the many words I’ve read the last two weeks, I haven’t heard anyone talk about how this affects the three different generations you mentioned.

I’m noticing that young people seem to like Derrick Jensen’s eco-doomsterism. One thing I was thinking about yesterday was how our failure to confront global warming affects our collective mood.

During the 80’s I could sense people shrinking into their cocoons as talk of nuclear winter increased. Christopher Lasch pointed out that a downside of anti-nuclear organizing was a psychic numbing in the general populace as we collectively said no (in Australia, New Zealand, Europe and North America) to omnicide.

There was a brief opportunity to breathe easier in 1988 as the cold war rapidly and unexpectedly wound down. Then the announcement of global warming we started a twenty year game that was a combination of Chicken and “Who Wants to Bell the Cat?”.

I can’t help but think that this common evasion of a problem is affecting our global family. It isn’t the case that a family ignoring an alcholic parent doesn’t know about it– to the contrary, a tremendous amount of energy is spent in the labor of Active Denial.

What happens when all the tens of millions of people in the industrial world who DID mobilize to reduce the risk of nuclear war pretend that global warming isn’t a problem, even thought they were concerned and civic enough to create a successful anti-nuclear movement?

I think there might be some interplay between your excellent post and my comments. I’d love to hear thoughts on this

Global Green Jobs

2008-10-14T21:15:00.001-04:00

From the website:

Green Jobs: Toward Decent Work in a Sustainable, Low-Carbon World

In partnership with the Worldwatch Institute, the Cornell Global Labor Institute co-authored a groundbreaking study on green jobs. Commissioned by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) under the joint 'Green Jobs Initiative' with the International Labour Organization (ILO), the International Trade Union Confereration (ITUC) and the International Organisation of Employers (IOE), the report is the first comprehensive report to analyze the current level and projected growth of green jobs on a global scale.

The report highlights the positive connections between stabilizing the climate and job growth. While a transition to cleaner, most sustainable forms of energy will cause a reduction in employment for carbon intensive industries, overall this transition will likely result in a net gain of employment. Moreover, the cost of not acting or being slow to act will have even greater negative consequences on the economy and jobs.

Some key findings of the report are:

Renewable energy jobs- now at over 2.3 million- are rapidly expanding
By 2030, wind and solar could reach upwards of 8 million jobs by 2030
During the next two decades, public and private investment for retrofitting or weatherizing buildings could add 3.5 million jobs in the European Union and United States.
"Clean tech" investment reached $148 billion in 2007, up 60 percent from 2006

The report emphasizes that green jobs will need to be scaled up dramatically in order to address the two most pressing issues facing humanity- climate change and the employment crisis- and highlights policies across the globe that have stimulated investment in the green economy and created new jobs.For the full report, click Green Jobs: Towards Decent Work in a Sustainable, Low-Carbon World .

Two more economic indicators

2008-10-11T17:09:00.001-04:00

Cancelled classes and seasonal hiring

A friend tells me that a class she's teaching that always fills up only has one student signed up, and will likely be cancelled.

A clerk at Barnes and Noble tells me that they aren't interviewing or hiring for the Christmas season. "We have a stack of applications this thick", she gestures with her fingers an inch apart.

This is going to be a cold winter.

A short talk and film on nuclear power, 1977

2008-10-08T14:27:00.003-04:00

Hi-
I'll be talking at this event about how this event shaped my life and jumpstarted the antinuclear movements against power plants AND weapons.
******************************

NO NUKES, NO COAL, NO KIDDING!

CALLING ALL CLAMS -- and anyone interested in non-violent direct
action...and energy issues... this 90 minute film is original footage,
remastered for the 30th anniversary -- of 1414 people taking over a
nuclear power plant construction site -- in 1977, in New Hampshire. They
did not cooperate with arrest -- and did not give their names, doing
massive "jail solidarity" for more than a week, while held in armories
and other large warehouse type settings. This is an amazing story -- and
now that that the nuclear industry is BACK and asking our region to take
the new nukes (15 new reactors are already in some phase of licensing in
the Southeast)...

"CLAMS" -- or those who were part of the Clamshell Alliance that did
this mobilization -- are coming to share their stories -- if you are a
Clam, come too!
Likely NIRS will screen this film again later in the season, since
several Clams that live locally already have sent "regrets" !

WHAT: Seabrook 1977 film -- "remastered"
WHERE: Firestorm Cafe and Books -- on Commerce St --just around the
corner from the light at Patton and Coxe -- diagonally across the street
(towards Patton) from the Coxe Post Office
WHEN: Monday October 13 at 7:30 pm -- discussion after
WHY: In part to support FIRESTORM -- nice menu of vegan wraps,
sandwiches and salads... coffee bar, baked goodies -- this is a worker
(activist) owned business -- come eat dinner!
*...and to revive the previous generations of anti-nuclear activists
while welcoming and CELEBRATING the 4th generation as they rise!

*More info:

Mary Olson
NIRS Southeast Regional Coordinator
Nuclear Information & Resource Service
PO Box 7586 Asheville, NC 28802
nirs@main.nc.us www.nirs.org
828-675-1792
new cell -- 828-242-5621 (no signal at my office)

Nuclear Information & Resource Service
6930 Carroll Avenue, Suite 340,
Takoma Park, MD 20912
tel: 301-270-NIRS (301-270-6477);
fax: 301-270-4291
e-mail nirsnet@nirs.org

Building a Sustainable Local Food Economy in North Carolina

2008-10-08T14:10:00.002-04:00

This came across my email:
************************************
Building a Sustainable Local Food Economy in North Carolina:
From Farm-to-Fork
March 2 and 3, 2009 Statewide Summit

We are pleased to announce that over the next year, the Center for Environmental Farming Systems (www.cefs.ncsu.edu) has been funded to reach out across the state and together with our partners ask: What will it take to build a sustainable local food economy in North Carolina?

From the mountains to the coast, various organizations are promoting and implementing exciting initiatives to support our state and communities through sustainable local agriculture. Examples include new farmer’s markets, local food policy councils, comprehensive county- or region-based food initiatives, farm incubator programs, farm and/or garden youth education programs, health and nutrition projects focused on local sustainable foods, procurement initiatives by large retail and institutional buyers and schools, and much more.

If each North Carolinian spent 25 cents/day on local food (just 2.5 percent of the $3600.00 that we spend on average on food consumption per year), it would mean $792 million for the state’s economy. That money circulates here in the state so has a multiplier effect, rather than going to a corporate headquarters in another state.

Other benefits of a sustainable local food economy in North Carolina include economic development, job creation within farming and food sectors, preservation of open space, decreased use of fossil fuel and associated carbon emissions, preservation and protection of the natural environment, increased consumer access to fresh and nutritious foods, and greater food security for all North Carolinians.

Over the next year, CEFS and its partners will be gathering information from across food system sectors: conducting regional meetings, targeted issues discussions, interviews, and hosting a statewide summit on March 2 and 3, 2009. Our desired result is a Statewide Action Plan for Building the Local Food Economy with specific steps (short- and long-term) that policy makers, Universities, government agencies, environmental organizations, businesses, funding agencies, social activists, NGOs and citizens can take to make this happen.

The first three regional meetings have been set and are to be held in:

Raleigh, North Carolina: October 14, 8:30-11:30 at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship at 3313 Wade Avenue.

Burgaw, North Carolina: October 21, 1:30-4:30, Pender County Cooperative Extension office, 801 South Walker Street

Ashville, North Carolina: November 12, 1:30-4:30 at the NC Arboretum, 100 Frederick Law Olmsted Way.

The purpose of the regional meetings is to bring together those engaged in all aspects of the food system, to collect information and ideas that will be the building blocks of discussion at the summit and eventually the core components of the State Action Plan. We want to identify specific regional and local sustainable food systems models that are working and also regional challenges that can be addressed through policies, programs, and funding. We seek to engage the broad group of those involved with the food system including farmers, suppliers, processors, economic development organizations, distributors, farm and food industry workers, extension and other educators, marketers, financial institutions, Universities and community colleges, elected officials, government agencies, county and city planners, farm organizations, anti-poverty organizers, social justice workers, consumers and consumer groups, granting agencies, health and wellness organizations, environmental groups, food banks, and more. These regional meetings will be facilitated listening sessions and provide important input into this process, so we are encouraging broad participation.

The end product–the State Action Plan–will articulate a shared vision and set of common goals for building a local, sustainable food system and economy in North Carolina. It will:

1) describe key elements of our current food system and define key terms;
2) identify the diversity of people, businesses, and organizations involved in and impacted by North Carolina’s food system;
3) highlight specific efforts and partnerships underway across our state and within different sectors of the food system to achieve greater “localness” in our food system; and
4) identify opportunities for action, and propose priorities, both in the short and long term, that will enable us to make progress toward shared goals.

Finally, another key goal of this process is the formation of an ongoing working committee or task force, with broad representation across food system sectors that will focus on facilitating and carrying out action items, provide ongoing networking opportunities, and revise the action plan as needs and priorities change.

A “Road to the State Action Plan” listserv has been established, please respond to: nancy_creamer@ncsu.edu to be added to the listserv and receive more information about the project, regional meeting dates, policy forums, summit, etc. If you or your organization is engaged in a food systems project, please take a minute to fill out the attached contact information sheet describing the nature of the work you or your organization does and email to nancy_creamer@ncsu.edu. This information will be included in a data base for all participants, and may also result in further interviews by the project team.

Please feel free to share this information with others who may be interested in becoming involved with this project. Please RSVP to nancy_creamer@ncsu.edu if possible if you are attending a regional meeting as it will help us in our planning, and check the CEFS website (www.cefs.ncsu.edu) for updates.

Inheriting the Future

2008-10-06T11:40:00.004-04:00

Over at her column in Mountain Xpress,
Edgy Mama has a good column on parenting in nervous times,
which echoes what I feel as an uncle:
http://www.mountainx.com/ae/2008/edgy_mama_inheriting_the_future

These are crazy times—renowned financial firms are going belly-up,
real-estate values are plunging, a conservative woman from nowhere is
poised to become vice president, and here in Asheville, we’re in the
middle of the great gas panic of 2008.

I realize that panic creates panic, and I’m not buying into the
gasoline panic. Yet. But I have found myself feeling generally unnerved
and upset by all this crazy stuff going on in the world. And I’m
worried, mostly for my kids.

Keep reading

Paulson letter- real or fake?

2008-09-23T10:07:00.002-04:00

Dear American:

I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a transfer of funds of great magnitude.

I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country
has had crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of
800 billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it
would be most profitable to you.

I am working with Mr. Phil Gram, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my
replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you
may know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation
movement in the 1990s. This transaction is 100% safe.

This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need
the funds as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these
funds in the names of our close friends because we are constantly under
surveillance. My family lawyer advised me that I should look for a
reliable and trustworthy person who will act as a next of kin so the
funds can be transferred.

Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund
account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to wallstreetbailout@treasury.gov
so that we may transfer your commission for this transaction. After I
receive that information, I will respond with detailed information
about safeguards that will be used to protect the funds. "

Yours Faithfully

Minister of Treasury

Paulson

State Senator agrees to meet with father of two after almost running him down

2008-09-22T14:49:00.001-04:00

http://www.walletpop.com/blog/2008/09/18/new-york-state-senator-jeff-klein-impacts-no-impact-man-with-cus/

No-Impact Man, Colin Beavan, is famous for trying to live his life without any impact on our carbon footprint. As part of this commitment, he rides his bike to work in New York City. Yesterday, while riding his bike and wearing a purple helmet, he got in an altercation with New York state senator Jeff Klein -- who almost hit him with his large black Mercedes, and then called him a "f-cking a--hole" for knocking on his window to alert him of his presence.
************
As a result of an open letter
http://noimpactman.typepad.com/blog/2008/09/ny-state-senato.html
the state senator got so many calls that Jeff Klein agreed to a meeting with Colin.

Three women, three bikes, 1600 miles and a whole lot of gardens and farms; and one movie trailer

2008-07-26T12:50:00.002-04:00

In early 2007, three friends planned a three-month-long bicycle journey to tour and document food-producing garden projects from Washington D.C. to Montreal - and back again.

The trailer of their film is now out at
http://womensgardencycles.wordpress.com/watch-the-trailer

*********************

Thanks to those who have answered my question about urban landsharing--
I welcome more stories and anecdotes.
-- Jim

smithmillcreek@gmail.com

Have you ever rented land from someone to food garden?

2008-07-25T08:57:00.002-04:00

The usual model is:
You own land, and you grow things on it.

Has anyone ever been too busy to farm/garden their land,
and rented it out; or bartered use of it to someone else in exchange
for some portion of what is grown? Or have you been the landless grower?

I'm especially interested in people that might have done this inside city limits,
or with land less than 3/4 of an acre.

Please write me at smithmillcreek@gmail.com if you have any leads or tips.

IMPactivism: Asset-based Community Development

2008-07-18T20:16:00.001-04:00

Please pass this opportunity on to any potentially interested parties. Space is limited to 25 participants per session, but if there is adequate interest, additional dates can be arranged.

IMPactivism: Asset-based Community Development

Neighborhoods often are reactive rather than proactive, and try to deal with issues or conflicts rather than isolate the capacities, skills and resources they already possess.

This seminar series introduces a new way of thinking about community building that encourages directing effort at positive, concrete results. Case studies and examples of focusing energies internally into the neighborhood illustrate the benefits of utilizing this approach to strengthen sense of community and address quality of life issues.
Guidance and approaches to building cross-sector partnerships, along with "next steps" provide an in-depth introduction to a different way to think about and enhance community development from a neighborhood perspective.

The series is being presented over a 4 week period, and will meet once a week, from 11:30a.m. to 1:00p.m. You may select either:
• Wednesday session 7/23, 7/30, 8/6 and 8/13,
or
• Thursday session, 7/24, 7/31, 8/7, and 8/14.

Registration R.S.V.P. is required by Monday, July 21st at noon, and should be directed to kendrapenland@yahoo.com .

Payment should be made by check to Sustainable Development, LLC, and mailed to:
Sustainable Development
PO Box 8041
Asheville, NC 28814

Cost of series: pre-paid by Monday, July 21st: $150.00

payment first day of seminar : $175.00

Lunch, educational resources and materials are included.

AGENDAS:

DAY 1: IDENTIFYING AND UTILIZING INDIVIDUAL CAPACITIES
11:30 - Introduction to traditional vs. asset-based model of community development
12:00 - Q&A, clarification
12:30 - Exercise

DAY 2: THE POWER OF YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD
11:30 - Case studies of how internal focus strengthens neighborhoods
12:00 - How a stronger community can be a safer, healthier community
12:30 - Q&A, brief exercise

DAY 3: UTILIZING LOCAL INSTITUTIONS FOR COMMUNITY BUILDING
11:30 - Building cross-sector partnerships: Why it's important and how to begin
12:00 - Neighborhood Planning, community service providers & churches
12:30 - Q&A, brief exercise

DAY 4: MOBILIZATION
11:30 - Next steps...getting started
12:00 - Organized for success
12:30 - Q&A, final exercise, evaluation

Feel free to contact me with any questions!
Kendra P. Turner
Sustainable Development, LLC
828-301-3162
"Depend not on fortune, but on conduct." Publilius Syrus

Searching for a place to live

2008-07-18T07:24:00.002-04:00

Can you post something like this on a blog?

I'm looking a place to live in West Asheville starting August 1st. Id prefer to rent a 2-3 bedroom house & populate it, but can also share a place with someone else.

If you have leads, email smithmillcreek at gmail dot com.

Faulty Media Coverage of Rainbow Gathering Police Riot?

2008-07-18T07:21:00.001-04:00

http://artvoice.com/issues/v7n29/getting_a_grip

Weirdos Riot: What's Wrong With the Buffalo News?

by Michael I. Niman

It doesn’t really seem like the kind of story that would make the national news—10
US Forest Service police officers arrest a man in Wyoming for crime of
being “uncooperative.” Add the freak show specter of “eccentrics” and
“hippie types” throwing rocks and sticks, however, and in the era of
Jerry Springer, you’ve got the makings of a national news story. Hence,
nearly 2,000 miles away, the Buffalo News ran the story under the headline, “5 arrested in Rainbow Family clash with feds.”

In actuality, there was a national story, only it wasn’t the one that appeared in the Buffalo News.
I was at the scene, conducting research and working with a film crew
producing a documentary about the group, which was the subject of my
doctoral research and subsequent book, People of the Rainbow (Univ. of Tennessee Press). The alleged hippie riot reported by the News and dozens of other media outlets around the United States never happened. This Buffalo News
story, gleaned from the Associated Press wire service, like much of
what we read in mainstream newspapers, was based entirely on an
official government source, with no “on the ground” reporting or source
verification, no independent eyewitness reports, and no quotes from the
group in question.

The main problem here, as legendary investigative reporter
I.F. Stone put it, is that “all governments lie.” It’s a chronic
problem that reporters face—and a point journalism professors have been
trying to drive home for at least three generations. You can’t base
stories entirely on the narrative provided by one party to a conflict.
You can’t base stories entirely on government or corporate press
releases or official documents. News stories need to be based on
reporting, not stenography.

Keep Reading

Net Zero Bungalow Presentation

2008-07-02T11:33:00.001-04:00

from Asheville architect/planner Joe Minicozzi

Hello all:
The Asheville Design Center (ADC) is sponsoring a presentation next week that should be pretty cool. The architect is from Portland, though she is an Asheville native. She will show some of her work that is "net zero", which means that the houses that she works on produce as much energy to the grid as they consume. Also, much of this is 'renewably' produced energy.

One of her projects is a conversion of a 1923 Bungalow to a "net zero" house. Please pass this on to all that may be interested, see attached poster. See you at the ADC next week (8 College Street in downtown Asheville - on Pritchard Park - Wednesday July 9th, at 6PM sharp).
Cheers,
Joe

-------- Original Message --------

Attached is a poster for the July 9 Forum. The presenter, Kathy Bash, is architect Joe Wakefield's daughter. There is more information on this web page: http://www.solaroregon.org/resources_education/goal-net-zero-home-tour/goal-net-zero-home-tour

Four ways to make it easier to raise chickens in Asheville

2008-06-30T11:40:00.002-04:00

Hi Folks-
Would you like to make it easier to raise chickens in Asheville?
Here are four things you could do:

1- Attend the hearing on this topic at 4:30 PM, Tuesday, July 8th.
It will be in the city conference room in the Fire Station next to Asheville City Hall (different from Public Works or the City Hall itself)

2- Call or email a city councilperson to express your support for easing the ordinances, which lag behind those of Raleigh. We are not talking about making it easier to have roosters in the city, just chickens:
local, low-cost healthy food in a time of rising food prices. For contact info, visit
http://www.ashevillenc.gov/government/mayor_city_council/city_council/default.aspx?id=1354

3- Join the listserv devoted to discussing this topic. More info at
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/ashevillecitychickens

4- Last, and something to do TODAY-- take part in the Asheville Citizen-Times poll at
http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/frontpage
(middle of the page, to the left). It asks
"Are you in favor of easing restrictions on raising chickens inside city limits?"

Thank you,
-- Jim
*****************************
From an email I got recently:

I am writing you because you have indicated an interest in changing
the existing Asheville city chicken ordinance. There is now something
very important, and easy, that you can do.

Just to catch you up on the city chicken work, there is a group who
has been meeting for some time, gathering friendly NC ordinances,
writing a draft ordinance for the council to consider, and meeting
with council members.
We are putting together information to support our assertion that a
few chickens are positive and not a nuisance, a solution to the high
cost of food, environmentally friendly as they are very local, an
excellent experience for the family, the eggs are very nutritious, and
Asheville has historically allowed small flocks for families.

Many other NC municipalities allow them, even Raleigh, within a
reasonable distance from a neighbor¹s home, typically 25 ft, and our
ordinance requires 100ft, and our permit requires 150 ft. Impossible.

We have been told that the city is holding a public hearing to discuss
animal ordinances July 8, Tuesday, 5:30 at the 4th floor training room
of the police department, not city hall.

If you could be there, please do! If not, please e-mail city council
and ask for a more favorable ordinance. You don¹t have to ask for
specific provisions.
Better yet, come to the hearing, and e-mail city council.
Could you please forward your e-mail to me and let me know if you plan
to attend the hearing?

Please forward this to anyone who would be supportive.

Thanks,
Jenny Mercer

Infectious Pessimism

2008-06-28T15:37:00.001-04:00

Robert Shiller on Infectious Exuberance (and infectious pessimism):
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200807/housing

"Benjamin M. Friedman, in his 2005 book, The Moral Consequences of
Economic Growth, cites abundant historical evidence that when economic
prospects look bleak—especially for long periods of time—intolerance,
racism, and other reactionary impulses flourish. As more people
experience hardship, trust between them tends to diminish, and the
social fabric itself seems to fray....

We recently lived through two epidemics of excessive financial
optimism. I believe that we are close to a third epidemic, only this
one would spread irrational pessimism and mistrust—not exuberance. If
that happens, our economic problems will become much worse than they
need to be, and our social problems will multiply. Only if we heed the
lessons of the boom can we keep the bust from causing lasting damage."

New Highways from Old

2008-06-27T15:17:00.002-04:00

http://www.sightline.org/maps/animated_maps/your-way-on-the-highway/

26 Things You Can Do RIGHT NOW To Manage Your Anxiety

2008-06-26T11:10:00.001-04:00

http://www.peakoilblues.com/blog/?p=181

If you aren’t feeling some degree of apprehension right now, you aren’t
reading the news. Here are some of my thoughts for turning that
emotional energy into constructive action:

More at link above. Easier to read than to do.......

Buckminster Fuller Challenge Movie

2008-06-22T11:36:00.001-04:00

http://bfi.org

Where should I Go? (in an age of peak oil)

2008-06-21T11:02:00.002-04:00

_http://www.mountainsentinel.com/#wherego_
(http://www.mountainsentinel.com/#wherego)

Where should I Go?
by Dale Allen Pfeiffer
June 18th, 2008 Foreword
June 18, 2008 (www.mountainsentinel.com) The following article originally
appeared in The Mountain Sentinel two years ago. Currently there are a number
of people making panicky statements that everyone needs to relocate. To
present a fair assessment of the idea and to help calm people down, I have decided
to reprint this article for free.
Since this article was written, my family has moved from Appalachian
Kentucky to Evansville Indiana. Evansville is not a haven of preparedness. It will
face many problems as we enter an age of energy depletion and impoverishment.
Our reason for moving here is that we have a lot of family in this area, and
family can be a far more important resource than any other.
My daughter is in public schools now. While she does battle with the
authoritarian rigidity, patriotic propaganda and religious zealotry that plague the
public schools, she is at least making friends.
For my part, when I can spare a little time from working on novels and short
stories, or playing the fiddle and the banjo, I do a little work with the
local sustainability group, and the food co-op.
As this article asserts, there is no place in North America that is ideally
prepared for the joint crises of resource depletion, environmental
destruction and economic impoverishment that now loom before us. Relocation is an
option, but for many people it is not the best option -- perhaps for most people.

The Delusion of Survivalism
Many people have asked me where they should go to survive the end of the oil
age. People asking this question generally fall into one of two groups,
those who believe that civilization will disintegrate into lawless chaos where
former neighbors will be preying upon each other and hordes of murderous
starving bandits will swarm out of the cities to feed on the suburbs. The other
group are those who see things breaking down, but not to the point where they
must seek to defend themselves against every stranger. These people want to
find a community and/or a farm where they can become self-reliant.
I will address the total breakdown group first. If there is a total
breakdown of civilization and we are left with neighbors preying upon neighbors, then
there is no place you can go. Whatever remote mountain hideaway you sneak
off to, in this scenario you will have to deal with pillagers out to take what
little you have. Anywhere you go, there are already people there.
In this day and age, the only places you can go to hide away are lacking in
human population because they are so inhospitable. There are so few people
there because it is so difficult to live there. And the few people who already
live there probably meet that ecosystem's limited carrying capacity for human
beings.
As someone who has lived alone in the wilderness, I have to ask you: do you
really want to be a hermit. Do you want to spend your entire day struggling
for the basic necessities? Can you make your own clothing, build and maintain
your own weapons, grow, forage and hunt enough food to feed yourself, lay in
a sufficient store of fuel to keep you from freezing in the winter? The list
goes on and on. Sure, you can survive off what you forage and hunt, make
clothes and blankets out of hides, and live in a debris hut; but do you really
want to?
Stop romanticizing about the myth of the rugged individualist. It is just
that: a myth. Almost all of the rugged individualists I have met were
maladjusted misanthropes who would likely have been institutionalized if they had
lived among others. This is not to say that I have not known many sane and
balanced mountainmen and mountainwomen. But the sane ones do not live in total
isolation, however limited their interaction might be, they are part of a
community.
Consider indigenous peoples throughout the world. They are not rugged
individualists. They all belong to tribes. Their sense of identity is closely
linked to the community of which they are a part. It is their family and their
safety net. They could not imagine trying to make it on their own and would
wonder why anyone would ever want to do such a thing. When they are taken out of
their tribal setting and placed in modern civilization, they are lost without
their community.
The pioneers were not rugged individualists. They knew that community was
the key to their survival. They worked together to build their community, plant
and harvest their crops and provide everyone within their community with the
necessities of life. It was only with difficulty that their sense of
community was squashed by the modern industrialized community and the centralized
state.
Let's get this straight. The myth of the rugged individualist is extolled by
the dominant socioeconomic system because it helps cover up the atomization
of society, and it leaves the disillusioned and disenfranchised uninclined to
work together towards an alternative.
And where did you ever get the idea that you will have to fight your
neighbors for survival, or that the cities will unleash hordes of desperate
degenerates to pillage the countryside? This is an unlikely scenario. Sure there
might be a rise in crime if the established order breaks down, or there might
not. In large part, this depends on us.
When we look at examples of collapse, we do not see much real change in the
crime rate. In a socioeconomic collapse, here does seem to be a relationship
between the crime rate and the strength of community. The more tightly knit
the community is, the lower the rise in crime, and vice versa.
During the Great Depression, people helped each other. Though they may have
little to share, they did share it. During the collapse of the Soviet Union,
people helped each other. Even in North Korea, people helped each other --
though they were terribly repressed by their government.
The counter-argument is that this is a different situation. There will be no
recovery, and in the US people are atomized, selfish and overly competitive.
We are no longer predisposed to help each other, and there is very little
sense of community left. Where people were once loyal to their community, they
are now loyal to their company. And if that company closes its doors to them,
they will do whatever it takes to survive.
My answer to that is Argentina. The people there were highly atomized and
terrorized. More so, even, than people in the US. Decades of experience taught
them not to concern themselves about their neighbors; to look out only for
themselves. But when the Argentine economy collapsed, the people banded
together to create one of our best examples of how people can respond positively on
a grassroots level to a collapse. For details on this, I refer you to my
article Coping with Collapse; Examples from Argentina in the The Mountain
Sentinel, Vol. 1 No. 1.
The scenario that the collapse of the dominant socioeconomic system will
result in a dog eat dog situation is another myth. This myth most likely evolved
from the misconceptions of social Darwinists. It is reinforced by the fear
mongering of the US news media which portrays our communities as dangerous
places full of murderers, rapists and thieves. And it is fleshed out by our
entertainment media (that is our manufactured perception of reality) that thrives
on cop shows and violence.
We are taught that it is a dog eat dog world, where you must always watch
out for the other guy, and where the successful businessman is he who reads The
Art of War. Then we internalize the perception of crime and violence that we
are fed daily by our media. It is no wonder that we wind up projecting our
own fears and insecurities onto the world around us, believing that the
collapse of the dominant system will leave us fighting each other for our very
survival.
Hog wash.
Where to Go
Okay, we have done away with the myths of survivalism. Now to address the
second group: those who worry that their community is not prepared for the
collapse of the dominant system and who are honestly wondering what to do and
where to go. Let's start off by stating that there is no place that is fully
prepared for the collapse. There are a few places where a portion of the
citizens in aware of the approaching problem and are beginning to prepare for it,
but these places are at present very few and would be quickly overrun if we
all headed there. As of this writing, most communities are unprepared and very
few people are even aware of the pending problem. So, for the most part, you
can forget about moving into a community where people are already aware of the
problem and are actively addressing it.
Now, where should you live? There are four choices: wilderness, rural, urban
and suburban. Each has its own benefits and drawbacks; except for suburban,
which has most of the drawbacks of both rural and urban with few benefits.
If you are living in a wilderness area, you will want to become completely
self-sufficient and you might want to hide your location as well. We have
already discussed wilderness living somewhat in the section above. It still
presents a viable option, which would probably be best pursued if a group of
likeminded people move to the wilderness to establish their own community. The
difficulties in doing so would be very similar to the difficulties encountered
by the first settlers who came the North America, but would be further
complicated by the fact that the remaining wilderness areas are largely inhospitable
areas that cannot sustain too many people.
If you are living in a rural area, then you will want to become a family
farmer living as part of a farming community. A farmer's life can be a hard
life, but it is not without its rewards. One major benefit of being a farmer is
that, so long as you can hold onto your land, you will have food. Bear in
mind, farming is not something you just decide to do. Even if you have the right
skills and a knowledge of farming, it will take some years of preparation,
trial and error before you have gained enough experience to even begin becoming
a self-sufficient farmer. Perhaps your greatest resource will be the advice
of the experienced farmers who are your neighbors.
If you are in an urban area, you will want to organize your community so
that you can survive with the cooperation of your community. You will want to
establish community gardens, and self-sufficient utilities such as water and
sewage. And you will need to form an agricultural cooperative with outlying
farmers, to help supply your community with the food you cannot grow.
It is those living in the suburbs who would be wisest to pull up stakes and
move to one of the other three areas. Suburbanites are too widely scattered
to build any sort of functioning community, yet too concentrated to feed
themselves by farming. If most of the residents of a suburb move away, the few
remaining might be able to plow up all of the lawns and become farmers, but they
will be lacking the support communities that are already established in
rural areas. The worst off of the suburbanites will be those who live in trailer
parks, closely followed by those who live in condos. There are simply too
many people in these locations and the living quarters simply won't be viable
without heating, electricity, water or sewage treatment.
Do You really Want to Move?
If you move, you will be the new kid on the block. Even in wilderness areas,
there are residents who will look on you as the new-comer. You may always be
the outsider. And if things become difficult, you may be persecuted simply
because are new.
If things have become difficult before you even begin to consider your move,
then you probably won't be welcome anyplace else. Communities struggling to
survive are not going to welcome the displaced.
If you move too far away, you will have to contend with cultural and
language differences. These differences will mark you and serve to keep you apart.
If you move to a small town in the south and do not join a church, then you
are likely to remain isolated. If you are moving as little as 300 miles south
or north of your current latitude, you will likely find yourself in a
different climate. Though you may have been an experienced gardener in your former
home, you will have to learn what to grow in your new location and when to
plant it.
Stop and think for a moment. If you have been living in your present
location for several years, then you know what is around you. If you need something,
you know where to go to find it. And you know what neighborhoods to avoid.
You have a network of friends and acquaintances. You know where the local
farmer's market is, where the food co-ops are, and where you can find community
activists with whom you can work. And, though you might not realize it, you
probably know where to go to fish, to hunt, to forage.
In your new location, you will know none of that. If times are already
getting hard when you make your move, then you will be at a distinct disadvantage.
Although the idea of moving might have some appeal -- certainly, the grass is
always greener -- do you really want to move? You need to decide whether it
would be preferable to move to a new and unknown community, or to help
organize the community where you are already at home. Instead of asking "Where
should I go?", you should be asking "Where do I want to live?" And, if you
honestly consider all of the possibilities and important factors, your answer might
be to stay right where you are and get more involved in your local community.
Speaking from Experience
Early in the year 2001, we had a family catastrophe that forced me to leave
my position, pull up stakes and move. All of our savings was used up paying
for medical and legal expenses. With what little we had left, we had to find a
new home in an area where I could find no employment in the field for which
I was trained. We wound up buying a trailer in a mobile home park, and went
to work as a substitute teacher until I could make enough money as a
journalist and author to leave that job.
We lived in that trailer park until summer of 2005. Although we were
grateful to have a roof over our heads, the neighborhood was bad and the trailer was
too small. Our yard was a small lot composed of shaded sand and acidic soil.
We couldn't grow anything on the little land we did have. From the
beginning, we knew that we would have to get out of this trailer park, preferably
before the economy went sour.
In summer of 2005, we did make a move, all the way from Michigan down to
Kentucky. The major factor in choosing the location was the proximity to
relatives in southern Indiana and Tennessee. The price of real estate and the
affordability of a mortgage were also major factors. There were other factors that
I won't get into here. In hindsight, although we now have more room, a better
yard and a much safer neighborhood, the move has not placed us in a much
better position.
The town we live in, as it turns out, is a dead town that has been overtaken
not by suburbs but by suburbanites. While it looks like a small town, and it
has a local government (indeed, it is the county seat), it is not a
functional town in the sense that the residents meet all of their needs locally. We
drive 20 miles to do our grocery shopping, and 60 miles to do any major
shopping, or to reach the only decent food co-op in the area. Most of the people
who live in this town make a 20 to 60 mile drive to work every day. When the
price of gasoline climbs over $4.00 per gallon, people around here are going to
have a very difficult time carrying on with their lifestyles.
We are very isolated in this community. We are not church-going people, and
so there is no social interaction with our neighbors. We have been invited to
attend a couple of the local churches, and though we have been tempted to go
simply for the socialization, we can't bring ourselves to actually do so. We
have started attending services at the Unitarian Universalist church 20
miles away, but none of the other members reside in our area.
Our daughter, who is now 14, has no friends. When we first moved here, we
sent her to public schools. Though we quickly found that the local schools were
3 years behind the schools she attended up in Michigan, we kept her in the
school so that she could make friends. She did meet a couple of girls who were
friendly, she did not socialize with them outside of school because we did
not attend their church. Other kids teased her because she was different. In
the end, we started home schooling her. We have found her one friend, who
subsequently moved 40 miles away. And it is mainly to provide her with social
activity that we began attending the Unitarian church.
Last summer we planted a large garden, but most of it failed because of the
heat. We did get a good crop of green beans, a fair crop of carrots and a few
tomatoes, but everything else failed, including corn, squash (zucchini,
summer and acorn squash), cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, and peas. We have since
learned that down here peas should be planted early in the spring, while
cabbage, broccoli and cauliflower should be planted at the beginning of
September. But nobody down here did well with their gardens this summer. It was too
wet in the spring and again in at the end of summer, while midsummer was much
too hot and dry. And fall has struck hard and cold this year, so fall/winter
crops are suffering as well.
Michigan had a lot of state land where I could hunt, forage and simply enjoy
nature. And there were any number of lakes up there for fishing, not to
mention the Great Lakes. Because it was largely settled before becoming a state,
Kentucky has very little open state land. It is mostly private land and some
national forest. There are some rivers down here, but I don't know that I
would eat anything out of them, even if I knew where to fish them. And there are
a few small manmade trout ponds where you can pay to fish in a puddle so
small I would have a tendency to caste right over the water and hit the guy on
the far shore. I wouldn't know where to hunt around here or where to forage.
And half of the plant I normally forage for -- such as cattail or boneset --
are comparatively hard to find around here.
No doubt, if I had grown up in Kentucky, none of this would be a problem. I
would know where to hunt and forage, or I would know who to ask permission to
hunt and forage on their land. And we would be recognized members of the
community. But, as it is, it was a mistake to move here, and now my hope is to
get out of here before things fall apart. I wish that somebody had given me
the advice I have tried to pass along in this essay, and I wish that I would
have listened to it.

Thanks to George Vye for passing this article along to us

People make a city

2008-06-21T10:29:00.001-04:00

Ken Gray
The Ottawa Citizen
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/columnists/story.html?id=eae0b0f7-c294-4b95-a51c-66ca170d6570&p=2
Friday, June 20, 2008

If you apply the conclusions of Richard Florida's book Who's Your City? to Ottawa, this municipality looks extremely successful. However, columnist Ken Gray says the community is not getting that message out to the creative people the city needs to prosper.

If you apply the conclusions of Richard Florida's book Who's Your City? to Ottawa, this municipality looks extremely successful. However, columnist Ken Gray says the community is not getting that message out to the creative people the city needs to prosper.

Cities do not consist of freeways, buildings, transit systems, houses, malls, sidewalks, hydro wires, sewers, water mains, snowplows, corporations or government.

Good cities consist of good people. Like a vibrant company, they tap their best people -- those with intelligence, energy, integrity, goodwill and a large well of experience -- to do the best things. With a critical mass of good people, all the other elements of urban living -- transit, wealth, a healthy environment ... the list goes on and on -- fall into place.

The key to successful cities in this age of increasingly specialized labour demand and a slowly eroding petroleum economy is to attract topnotch people who can adapt to the fundamental changes occurring in our community now.

Thus the key is to get creative people to come to your company, government department, hospital, university and community. This idea didn't originate with Richard Florida, it's as old as the hills. But Mr. Florida has certainly advanced, popularized it and shown its importance.

<snip>
go to
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/columnists/story.html?id=eae0b0f7-c294-4b95-a51c-66ca170d6570&p=2
for the full article

In the competition to get the best people, the city fails itself. Get those talented individuals -- the artists, the businesspeople, the innovators, the academics, the intellectuals, the superb public servants -- and they not only take care of themselves, they take care of the life of the city. Those creative souls generate business, entertainment and innovation so that Ottawa will grow imaginatively by itself. That's what a great metropolis does.

Ottawa has most of the characteristics that make up Mr. Florida's criteria for the best places to live. Ottawans just don't sell this place very well. Promote this city properly and creative people will flock here. It's that fine and smart a place to dwell.

Then creativity would come from the hundreds of thousands of people who live here rather than a few elites. That's when this city's leadership will have got it. And Ottawa will have arrived on the international stage.

Ken Gray is the city editorial page editor and a Citizen editorial board member. His column runs on Fridays.

go to
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/columnists/story.html?id=eae0b0f7-c294-4b95-a51c-66ca170d6570&p=2
for the full article

E-mail: kgray@thecitizen.canwest.com

Carrotmob: Green Shopping Goes Social

2008-06-20T19:45:00.001-04:00

Hundreds of hipsters, creatives and neighborhood folk lined up one
recent spring Saturday afternoon outside K&D Market in San
Francisco's Mission district where 16th meets Guerrero. They were there
to test an idea: Could a swarm of targeted spending prod one local
business into making concrete steps towards going green? Could
activists work cooperatively with business to encourage intelligent
upgrades, such as the switch to an Energy Star cooler, or the use of a
skylight to reduce electricity dependence?

It's an idea called Carrotmob, and it's the brainchild of Brent Schulkin. Schulkin, whose day job involves running high-tech "corporate play" events,
wanted to find a way to leverage the might of business to address the
climate crisis. His idea was simple: Let a business know which
proactive green steps to take, then reward their progressive actions
with business--and lots of it.

More at
http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/008118.html

Circuit Earth- new film on energy

2008-06-19T12:10:00.001-04:00

Produced for the Science Channel
http://www.circuitearth.org

Site includes a trailer.

America's Metro Areas: Carbon Leaders and Laggards

2008-06-19T10:59:00.003-04:00

I have admired Neil Peirce's work for about 15 years now. He likes to look at cities as organic entities. I think he was the one that popularizing the notion of looking at city's GDPs-- if NYC was a separate country, it would be the Xth largest economy in the world-- that sort of thing.
********************************

America's Metro Areas: Carbon Leaders and Laggards
June 1, 2008
http://www.postwritersgroup.com/archives/peir080601.htm

Neal Peirce

As greenhouse gases increasingly warm the globe, which of America's metro areas are the "cleanest" and which are the "dirtiest" in carbon emissions? And what are the most obvious steps that could be taken to protect the planet's future?

A first-ever study of the climate footprint of America's top 100 metro regions starts to tell the story. Based on 2005 figures calculated by the Brookings Institution, each region's carbon emissions caused by cars and trucks, plus power supplied to residences, is reported -- not a complete score (industries and office buildings are omitted), but close enough for a clear picture.

The "winners" -- the most modest users, per capita -- turn out to be such regions as New York-Northern New Jersey, Portland, Ore., Seattle-Tacoma, San Francisco, Honolulu, San Diego, and a surprise performer -- Los Angeles.

The biggest carbon emitters, by contrast, include such metro areas as Lexington, Ky., Indianapolis, Knoxville, Oklahoma City, Nashville and St. Louis.

So what explains the differences?

The best performers provide a clue: high-density, compact development with new and expanded rail transit. Many of the regions with the smallest per capita carbon footprints -- among them New York, San Francisco, San Diego and Los Angeles -- fit that profile.

By contrast, some of the metros with high per capita carbon emission scores have experienced dramatic sprawling and pedestrian-hostile development, and are weaker on mass transit.

There are some exceptions: The Washington, D.C., and Atlanta regions, for example, have significant rail transit ridership, but they've also sprawled so much that they have larger-than-average carbon footprints.

And the source of power makes a real difference. The nation's capital region has a carbon footprint 10 times the Seattle region's chiefly because it is heavily dependent on coal for power, while the Pacific Northwest has major hydropower sources that don't emit carbon.

Plus there's a surprise geographic factor too: The heavy carbon footprint metros are overwhelmingly east of the Mississippi, the light carbon ones in the West. And there's a north-south divide too: the map shows a concentration of high emitters in America's heavily coal-consuming, fast-suburbanizing Southeast.

The implications are compelling: State officials, mayors and county leaders should push for protection of open lands, new transit lines that attract more compact development, and rules and incentives to get utilities to switch away from coal (the most polluting, carbon-heavy energy source of all).

But the federal government needs to play a far more constructive role -- "Metros can't 'go it alone' in solving as vast a problem as global climate change," says Mark Muro, policy director of Brookings' Metropolitan Policy Program.

And arguably, how the metros go on climate emissions, so goes America: The top 100 account for two-thirds of the country's population and almost three-quarters of its economic activity. And their carbon output, despite all their mayors' noble talk of reducing our greenhouse gas emissions, rose 7.5 percent from 2000 to 2005.

The federal government is a poor ally now, Brookings charges. It fails to tax carbon fuels enough to discourage their polluting impacts and reduce the country's massive dependence on foreign oil. While countries around the world expand their clean energy research budgets, Washington is spending just a third as much on energy research as it did in 1978. Federal transportation funding is tilted heavily toward highways, away from transit; indeed, its formulas reward states for the worst behavior -- high vehicle miles traveled, fuel use, and lane miles of travel.

Solutions offered include a targeted carbon tax or full "cap and trade" system, so that polluting energy consumption pays its full costs; dramatic increase in federal research on potentials such as wind and solar power; a minimum power share of renewable sources that states must achieve (so that some, for example, can't leave carbon-heavy coal riding high even while competitor states invest forward in more expensive renewables); and "modal neutrality" -- an even playing field between highways and rail in federal transportation funding to states and localities.

The tax code could be adjusted to give smaller houses and compact development a better break -- and some ingenious shifts in regulations. Homebuyers, for example, now benefit from the federal Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act that requires sellers to reveal hazards, impediments, detailed lending terms and the like. But why not, says Brookings, also require clear, nationally standardized energy information -- factors such as the efficiency of water heaters or furnaces or lighting that can make a big difference in a buyer's real costs?
America's energy rules were written for a different world, a different century. So Brookings has it right: We need a massive re-evaluation -- federal, state, and metrowide -- to reinvent our energy future and rein in America's cumulative, massive carbon footprint.

Neal Peirce's e-mail address is nrp@citistates.com.

Sustainability Convergence in San Francisco

2008-06-16T14:01:00.001-04:00

I was struck last week when a
group of people were discussing local sustainability, and Janell Kapoor
said, "You know, there are groups of local people having this same
discussion." I nodded my head in agreement.

Every place has it's own flavor, but here's another eco-convergence below.

(and not a minute too soon!)

By the way, I am thinking more and more about the UN as a positive
force, and the local UN Association as a sustainability partner as well.

-- Jim

******************************

Community Convergence for Change

The Big ONE 2008
A Grand Collaboration

A village of engagement for healthy body, home, family and community

June 21& 22, 9am-7pm, 2008
Sharon Meadow, Golden Gate Park

next to the Children's Playground and Carousel
http://www.wiserearth.org/group/TheBigOne

The
Big ONE "village of engagement" is a gathering of people from Bay Area
neighborhoods, schools, coops, nonprofits, foundations, businesses, and
municipal agencies. Participants will design, envision, collaborate,
and dialog with new friends about the future of their neighborhoods and
communities.

Prepare for the challenging times ahead; come, be
heard, and engage. You can set up a table or an interactive exhibit to
collaborate and share information and/or do a workshop, presentation,
forum, art project, or hands-on demonstration of sustainable skills. We
provide the space – a large grassy area with open-air tents, a media
tent, and a stage for music encircling a larger gathering tent for food
and socializing.
Fill the space with your dreams.

This
is a 100% noncommercial event; nothing will be for sale. Bring picnic
food and drink, plates, cups, and utensils for an enormous zero-waste
potluck. We will have storytellers and games, and an eclectic mix of
live music will be performed throughout each day.

The Big ONE
movement represents a tectonic shift in thinking toward sustainability
awareness and action, civic engagement, and localization of culture,
economy, and decision-making. Based on respect for all life and the
planet that sustains us, the gathering provides opportunities to build
community through dialogue, committed engagement, and trust.

We are using the Wiser Earth platform to organize, plan, and co-create the event. http://www.beautifulcommunities.org

Who we are:
We
are Bay Area residents from diverse social and ethnic backgrounds. The
seeds of inspiration for this movement were planted in 2005 during the
week-long celebration of World Environment Day in San Francisco, which
coincided with the 60th anniversary of the founding of the United
Nations. A small group of people who felt the need to move beyond a
celebration, continued the dialogue about how to develop awareness
around sustainability issues.

In 2006 we started gathering every
three weeks to discuss community and sustainability. We decided to host
an annual “convergence” that would bring together people from all walks
of life. In order to reach the full spectrum of the diverse community
that inhabits the Bay Area, we focused our vision on the elements
needed by all life. We all need clean air to breathe, clean water to
drink, and healthy soil to grow food. We all want inspiring education,
decent housing, meaningful relationships, and a culture in which all
life is respected and all voices are heard.

Over the past three
years 110 people have flowed in and out of our gatherings. No one
person “owns” this vision. The Big ONE is a collaborative, democratic
embodiment of what we, as engaged members of our communities can
create. It belongs to all of us.

Come experience and participate. "The New Me is We."

Partners: 350.org,
Ahuma Institute,
Alemany Farm, Architects Designers and Planners for Social
Responsibility,
Arizmendi Bakery, Bay Localize, Bayview Farmers Market, Bayview/Hunters
Point
Foundation for Community Improvement, Buddhist Peace Fellowship, Buy
Local Buy
Fresh, Cafe Gratitude, Center for Safe Energy, Communities of
Opportunity,
Community Alliance for Family Farms, Conscious Change Collective, Core
Values,
CUESA, Culture Change, Dig Cooperative, Earth Charter Community
Alliance, East Bay Pesticide Alert, Ecology Center of San Francisco,
Farm Fresh Choice, Gabriel Cousens & Tree
of Life, Global Exchange, Global Oneness Project, Green Gulch Farm,
Green Music
Network, Greywater Guerrillas, Hillary Rubin Yoga, JK Sound, Literacy
for Environmental Justice,
National Holistic Institute, Network for Good, Oakland Based Urban
Gardens,
Occidental Arts and Ecology Center, Off the Mat into the World, Open
World,
Other Avenues Cooperative, Pacific Edge Institute, Peace Every Day,
People’s
Grocery, Permaculture Guild, Planet Drum, Quesada Gardens, Rainbow
Grocery Cooperative, Regenerative
Design Institute, Roots of Change, SF Bike Coalition, SF Dept, of
Public Health,
SF Dept, of the Environment, SF Food Systems, SF Green Schoolyard
Alliance, SF
Parks Trust, SF Peak Oil Task Force, Slow Food Nation, Sunrise Center,
Sunset
Green, Ultimate Prosperity, Urban Alliance for Sustainability,
Veritable
Vegetable, Wiser Earth, World Savvy, and many more

Trailer for Garbage Warrior

2008-06-15T09:50:00.002-04:00

DVD: Garbage Warrior

2008-06-15T09:37:00.006-04:00

http://garbagewarrior.com/about.html

What do beer cans, car tires and water bottles have in common? Not much unless you're renegade architect Michael Reynolds, in which case they are tools of choice for producing thermal mass and energy-independent housing.

For 30 years New Mexico-based Reynolds and his green disciples have devoted their time to advancing the art of "Earthship Biotecture" by building self-sufficient, off-the-grid communities where design and function converge in eco-harmony. However, these experimental structures that defy state standards create conflict between Reynolds and the authorities, who are backed by big business.

Frustrated by antiquated legislation, Reynolds lobbies for the right to create a sustainable living test site. While politicians hum and ha, Mother Nature strikes, leaving communities devastated by tsunamis and hurricanes. Reynolds and his crew seize the opportunity to lend their pioneering skills to those who need it most. Shot over three years and in four countries, Garbage Warrior is a timely portrait of a determined visionary, a hero of the 21st century.