President-Elect Barack Obama outlined a bold new policy direction for the US to slash greenhouse emissions 80% by 2050. He stated his intention to implement a "cap and trade" system whereby countries agree to cut carbon emissions but allow industries to buy and sell credits to reduce the financial burdens of meeting those goals. His address comes a month before a new Kyoto Protocol for curbing emissions worldwide is to be negotiated in Poland. The US under the Bush administration has resisted global agreements to aggressively reduce global warming.
Here is Obama's address; This video highlights Obama's energy and environment transition team:
Green City Journal hosted a forum on November 8th for the closing night of Philadelphia Independent Film and Video Association's (PIFVA) expo "Politics As Usual?", which highlighted political documentaries made by local filmmakers. I moderated a forum with local activists: Jerry Silberman, sustainability advocate and negotiator for PASNAP , Philly for Change's David Sternberg, Casino Free Philadelphia's Jethro Heiko, who is also Director of Organizing for Iraq Veterans Against the War , Filmmaker and Evolve Strategies founder Rob Stuart, and Winter Soldier editor Gail Lloyd. The evening's focus was on grassroots local movements with attention to tactics and strategies used in various campaigns.
The program started with screenings of Casino Free Philadelphia video reports produced by Ed Goppelt of Hallwatch.org , which chronicled the struggle of Philadelphians to place a referendum on the ballot to vote about the placement of two state-mandated casinos within the city. The referendum was a result of the work of hundreds of volunteers collecting signatures and petitioning City Council members to support the initiative. City Council voted unanimously to support the referendum, which would create a minimal buffer zone between neighborhoods and casinos of 1500', only to see the referendum stripped from the ballot by the State Supreme Court in a challenge brought by the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board (PGCB), a state agency, and the Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce. The videos also highlighted some of the creative direct action strategies Casino Free Philadelphia used to bring attention to the issues, including a “Citizen Search and Seizure” at PGCB (located within a mall in Harrisburg), where several participants were arrested. Casino Free Philadelphia's campaign is ongoing.
Also screened was Rob Stuart's Free Schuylkill River Park which documented the grassroots campaign to provide citizens public access to the Schuylkill River. It was an early use of internet networking to grow a constituency. Cameras kept track of railroad operator CSX actions to prevent access, which were made available online, and organizers asked neighbors to sign online petitions while visiting the park. It was a great example of a successful campaign that involved both an “inside” and “outside” strategy. The “outside” strategy focused on getting the word out about the issue and building a constituency, while the “inside” strategy was to work with local politicians to hold public hearings about the contracts between CSX and the city.
“Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan” (warning: graphic violence) , directed by Jason Washburn and Steve Morillo for IVAW, produced by Amadee Braxton, edited by Gail Lloyd and shot by Serena Reed for IVAW, rounded out the screenings. Iraq Veterans Against the War talked to soldiers who went to Iraq believing in the mission they were told but found a different truth once there. Gail Lloyd joined our post-screening discussion.
Here's an excerpt from the discussion that followed the screenings where panelists discuss what they expect in the first 100 days of an Obama presidency. Participants include Jerry Silberman, from PASNAP and local sustainability movements, David Sternberg, Chairperson for Philly for Change, Jethro Heiko, Director for Organizing Iraq Veterans Against the War and co-founder of Casino-Free Philadelphia, Rob Stuart, filmmaker and founder of Evolve Strategies and Evolve Foundation, Gail Lloyd, editor of Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan and group moderator Caryn Hunt of www.GreenCityJournal.com. Video shot by Debbie Rudman.
Monday Nov. 17, 2008 7-9 PM First Unitarian Church 2125 Chestnut St. Philadelphia
Neighborhood Networks agrees with President-Elect Obama that we have to be the change we seek. To get universal health care, or to achieve independence from big oil, we have to be organized in the communities where we live.
Since 2005 Neighborhood Networks has organizing where we live in communities throughout Philadelphia.
On November 17 we will have a Citywide Town Hall meeting to engage everyone who participated in the Obama campaign to continue with us in building progressive infrastructure everywhere in our City.
Here's what we'll do on November 17. First we'll hear from two inspiring young Philadelphia leaders:
Maria Qunones-Sanchez, Elected to City Council in 2007 Seth Williams, former Philadelphia Inspector General
Then we'll hear Marc Stier, PA State Director, Health Care For America Now, and Carol Rogers of AFSCME District Council 47, talk about ways to work for health care for all.
Then we'll break into small groups and meet our neighbors who share our commitment to stay together and move ahead. And then, everywhere in the City we'll work to insure that the change is real.
Yes, We Can!
A Philadelphia Neighborhood Networks event. http://www.phillynn.com 215-568-4990
As the drama of the bursting bubble of Wall St. gives way to a slower, but steady and painful, economic decline, the first and most important question we should ask is "Should we try to blow another bubble, or should we reject bubble culture values for something entirely different?"
If we agree that we need a new culture, this leads to the question "Can we take advantage of the opportunity afforded by this collapse, by the exposure of a failed system, to establish new "rules for the house" (the root meaning of "economy" from the Greek)?"
If the house, metaphorically, is Planet Earth the way we have enjoyed it for millennia, then making the choice now to change to a sustainable economy is the best way to turn the apparent lemon of this economic contraction into the best lemonade in history.
The current economic contraction has been developing for almost 20 years, and for the last four or five has appeared inevitable to anyone not under the spell of the "free market" fantasy. It is the result of an economic system which was able, briefly, to ignore and disregard its natural limits and restraints. Finite resources were seen as infinite entitlements. Politicians, businessmen, and intellectuals of all stripes and ideologies shared a complete failure to understand the material basis for their apparent prosperity, arrogantly claiming to be its controlling agents, rather than understanding a unique and lucky convergence of cheap energy, political alignments, and misunderstood technology as the basis for their dizzying growth. The few economists and others trying to call attention to its faults were drowned out by those focused on the immediate financial gains.
Some of the controversy surrounding the downtown Market East Gallery site Foxwoods is considering for relocation of its project was addressed at a Society Hill Civic Association-sponsored forum Tuesday night. First District Councilman Frank DiCicco told the crowd that the City was committed to an honest, thorough look at the site through a Plan of Development process. Deputy Mayor for Planning Andrew Altman supported this commitment on behalf of Mayor Nutter's administration. He described the motion by Foxwoods to consider this location as "uncharted territory" and an action that set in motion an orderly Plan of Development process, beginning with the zoning designation introduced by DiCicco. The process, he said, will involve meaningful public input and dissemination of information.
DiCicco introduced the Commercial Entertainment District (CED) zoning legislation on behalf of Foxwoods because, he said, he'd learned from the past two years that thwarting their progress, even as part of a process of due diligence, only resulted in the State and the State Supreme Court wresting more control over permitting. "Decisions were being made that effect my constituents and I was not helping because I wasn't in that room," he said, "When I'm not in the room, you're not in the room."
In 14 cases brought before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to challenge gaming and in particular the two Philadelphia projects licensed by the State Gaming Control Board, the Court has ruled in favor of the casinos. All local Philadelphia elected officials support a resiting process, of which this is the first exercise although it puts the proposed site in another densely packed residential area of the city. Governor Ed Rendell has steadfastly supported the casino operators despite sustained opposition by thousands of Philadelphia residents to slots parlors in their neighborhoods. Act 71, passed in 2004, mandated two casinos be built in Philadelphia. The Gaming Control Board issued provisional licenses to SugarHouse and Foxwoods in December 2006, with locations on the waterfront, but intense local opposition has delayed their construction.
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