The public has until Wednesday to comment on a plan to open up 85 percent of the state of New York to the controversial practice of hydraulic fracturing or "fracking." In 2010, a moratorium on this form of "natural" gas and oil extraction in the state was put in place, but a plan to lift it, advanced by Governor Andrew Cuomo, could change this.
The corporations pushing for expanded "hydraulic fracturing" ("fracking") for "natural gas" are putting big money into PR campaigns due to growing citizen concerns about this damaging drilling process. At a "Media and Stakeholder Relations: Hydraulic Fracturing Initiative 2011" meeting this winter, an industry representative went so far as to suggest that industry public relations agents download the U.S. Army/Marine Corps' "Counterinsurgency Field Manual." He noted that it would be helpful because the industry is "dealing with an insurgency."
Recently, a group of farmers and neighbors in Salmon Valley, near Prince George, British Columbia, successfully blockaded Wright Creek Road and turned back a truck full of sewage sludge headed for a 117 acre parcel of farm land contracted as a dump site by the City of Prince George. One neighbor brought a snowmobile towing a portable fire pit on a sled so that they were able to keep warm while they blocked the road. As of this writing, the trucks have not returned.
The Water Environment Federation (WEF), the sewage sludge industry trade group that invented the Orwellian PR euphemism "biosolids" for toxic sludge in 1991, is now "rebranding" sewage treatment plants as "water resource recovery facilities." The PR spin conveniently glosses over the toxic sewage sludge removed from the water and then heated and dumped on land for crops and grazing as "fertilizer" or misleadingly called "compost." The toxins in sludge can then bioaccumulate in the meat and dairy we eat and be taken up by the food plants that feed us.
This is the second in a two-part series by the Center for Media and Democracy's Food Rights Network (FRN) about challenges to local food sovereignty across the United States. It was originally published on Alternet. For more, see the first article, on the lawsuit against Blue Hill, Maine farmer Dan Brown brought by the State of Maine and Maine's Agriculture Commissioner, here.
Maine farmer Dan Brown, who milks one cow and sells milk to his neighbors, is being sued by the State of Maine for "unlicensed distribution and sale of milk and food products." The lawsuit has sparked protest in Maine and concern in communities around the country.
In an interview with the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD), Brown said, "One of these times, they're going to come after one of us, and it's going to be that Rosa Parks moment ... [for] the food system."
The "Local Food and Community Self-Governance Ordinance" that passed in Brown's town of Blue Hill, Maine, on April 2, 2011, asserting its "citizens' right to foods of their choice" without impediment by federal and state regulations, served as a model for several counties in California. CMD spoke with three farmers and advocates about the food sovereignty movement there, and how the suit against Farmer Brown may affect their struggle.
On Thursday, the Raw Milk "Freedom Riders" rode again. In November, they crossed the Pennsylvania border into Maryland in protest against federal law 21 CFR § 1240.61, which prohibits interstate commerce of raw milk for human consumption.
Amid difficult United Nation climate talks this week in Durban, lead climate change denier -- U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Oklahoma) -- sent a patronizing video message to delegates in South Africa celebrating what he called the "complete collapse" of the movement to fight climate change.
His message comes as delegates work night and day in a last-ditch effort to produce a legally-binding deal to restrict the damage already underway due to the rise of carbon content in the atmosphere. United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon said earlier in the week that a new international climate pact might be "beyond our reach" given the "great economic troubles" many countries are experiencing.
This is the first in a two-part series by the Center for Media and Democracy's Food Rights Network (FRN) about challenges to local food sovereignty across the United States. This was originally published on AlterNet. Stay tuned for the next installment, coming soon.
More than 150 supporters gathered on the steps of Town Hall in Blue Hill, Maine on Friday, November 18. They protested the State of Maine's and Agriculture Comissioner Walt Whitcomb's lawsuit against local farmer Dan Brown of Gravelwood Farm in Blue Hill. In response to a shout of, "Who is Farmer Brown," the crowd shouted, "We are all Farmer Brown!"
An American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) member is defying Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rules limiting the sale of rat poisons that pose dangers to children and the ecosystem. ALEC representatives say that kids eating rat poison is an "acceptable risk" that does not justify government intervention in the market.
The U.S. House of Representatives votes soon on a series of deregulatory bills that, according to the Coalition for Sensible Safeguards (CSS), "threaten vital health, environmental, safety and financial regulations."
Voting is expected on the Regulatory Accountability Act (H.R. 3010) and the Regulatory Flexibility Improvements Act (H.R. 527) on December 1, and on The Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny (REINS) Act (H.R. 10) next week.
Representative Gerry Connolly (D-VA) calls these bills "an early Christmas present to the Koch Brothers, who made this Congress possible."
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