SCROLL DOWN FOR TRANSCANADA XL PIPELINE UPDATE. Three pipeline related bills will be heard by the legislature’s Natural Resources Committee this Wednesday, February 9, 2011, 1:30pm, in room 1525, at the state capitol. News items and contact information for needed communication with specific elected officials are below in Congressional District 3 Green Notes.
Lincoln area: Congressional District 1
VIGIL AGAINST THE DEATH PENALTY . . . Every Monday, from noon to 1:00pm, Nebraskans for abolition of the death penalty meet in front of the governor’s mansion when weather is good, 1425 H Street, Lincoln. In winter, the vigil is inside the capitol, near the Information Desk. The lunch-hour presence reminds the governor of a constituency that does not want state killings. Weekly vigils have taken place year-round since July, 1991. All abolitionists are welcome to participate for a few minutes, or the hour. For information about Nebraskans Against the Death Penalty, click here.
CIVIL RIGHTS SERIES . . . The Nebraska Historical Society series of programs, “Civil Rights and Civil Liberties in Nebraska: Understanding the Past, Looking to the Future,” will present well known local attorney Alan Petersen discussing the rights of a free press versus the right of a fair trial, on Tuesday, February 8, 2011, 5:30pm, at the Nebraska History Museum, 15th & P Streets, in Lincoln. The presentation is free and open to the public.
WATER AND NATURAL RESOURCES SEMINARS . . . A 14-lecture series of seminars at UN-L focused on urban stormwater runoff, gobal climate change, and related environmental issues continues Wednesday, February 9, 2011, 3:30 TO 4:30pm, in the first-floor auditorium of Hardin Hall, on the northeast corner of North 33rd and Holdrege Streets, Lincoln. For more information, contact the UN-L Water Center, 402.472.3305. Click here for a schedule of the lectures. View most lectures online after the have been presented here.
LINCOLN PEACE VIGILS . . . Lincoln peace vigils continue at the Federal Building, 15th and O streets, every Wednesday from 5:00 to 6:00pm. Contact Mark at 402.499.6672 or e-mail mark [at] weddleton [dot] com for more information.
IMMIGRATION FORUM . . . Thursday, February 10, 2011, 7:00 to 8:30pm, there will be a forum on the implications of immigration legislation for Nebraska at Lincoln’s Unitarian Church, 6300 A Street. Panelists include retired Navy rear admiral Jim Partington, former state Senator DiAnna Schimek, and Nebraska Appleseed attorney Norman Pflanz, who will also take questions from the audience. The Forum is free and open to the public.
COMMUNITY CROPS GARDEN BRUNCH . . . Saturday, February 12, 2011, Community CROPS will host a Garden Brunch at Windsor Stables, 1024 L Street, Lincoln. For more information about the fundraiser, including a list of silent auction items donated for the event, and to by tickets online, click here. “Community CROPS helps people work together to grow healthy food and live sustainably.”
GREAT PLAINS TRAILS ANNUAL . . . The Great Plains Trails Network will present Andy Clarke, president of the League of American Bicyclists, speaking at their annual meeting, Sunday, February 13, 2011, 1:00pm, at BryanLGH College of Health Sciences, room 204, 5035 Everett Street, Lincoln. Clarke’s topic will be “Creating a More Bicycle-Friendly Lincoln.” The meeting is open to the public. Refreshments will be served. For more information, call 402.325.8668 or click here.
SUNDAY LECTURE SERIES . . . The Unitarian Church of Lincoln, 6300 A Street, is hosting its annual free winter lecture series about Russia and Post-Soviet states. Each two-hour Sunday lecture begins at 7:00pm. The first hour features a guest lecturer, followed by refreshments with a half hour of questions and dialogue. Sunday, February 13, 2011, Bill Gleason, Coordinator, Eurasian Studies at the US Department of State, will speak on Russian-Ukranian relations.
LOCAL ARTISTS WANTED . . . The Third Annual Artistic Rain Barrel Program invites local artists to paint rain barrels with original designs for display citywide next spring. Twenty-five artists will be chosen for a public auction of barrels in May, 2011. Click here [pdf] for an application, which includes a short summary and preliminary sketch of your intended design. Applications are due by February 11, 2011. For more information, contact Ellen Wright, 402.441.7075.
Omaha area: Congressional District 2
OMAHA PEACE VIGILS . . . Omaha peacemakers vigil every Wednesday, 4:30-5:30pm, at StratCom/UN-O, 6801 Pine Street, east of the Scott Technology Center on the UN-O campus. Free parking is available at the NE Corner of 67th Street and Pine in a student lot. For more information, phone Jerry Ebner, 402.502.5887. Every Saturday, 1:00-2:00pm, there is a Peace Vigil at 72nd and Dodge Streets. Park next to 72nd Street, in the pet store parking lot. Contact Steve Horn at 402.426.9068 for more information.
OMAHA PEOPLE’S FILM FESTIVAL . . . There is a People’s Film Festival every Wednesday evening, 7:00pm, at McFoster’s Natural Kind Cafe, 38th and Harney in Omaha. The event is always free and open to the public. This week’s film is “South Of The Border.” Oliver Stone films a road trip across five South American countries, interviewing seven of its elected presidents. View the trailer here. For more information, click here. The People’s Film Festival – Expanding Political Consciousness Since 2004.
PROGRESSIVE OMAHA MEETING . . . UN-L Economics professor Hank Van den Berg will speak on “How Economists Provided Intellectual Cover for the Corporate and Financial Takeover” at the Progressive Omaha meeting Saturday, February 12, 2011, 6:00 to 9:00pm, at 4924 Chicago, in Dundee. EveryOne is welcome at a potluck, beginning at 6:00, followed by the speaker from 7:00 to 8:00, and business meeting with social time until 9:00pm. Progressive Omaha provides information, education and support to progressive people and groups through various approaches including a website, speakers bureau, film festival, calendar of events, and monthly meetings.
PROTEST KEYSTONE XL PIPELINE . . . Saturday protest actions by Guardians of the Good Life are on hold until weather warms up. STOP THE PIPELINE yard signs are available in Omaha by calling Nebraskans for Peace Coordinator Mark Welsch, 453.0776, or e-mail NFPOmaha [at] nebraskansforpeace [dot] org For more information, e-mail japlapoo [at] netzero [dot] net
HIKE WAUBONSIE STATE PARK . . . There will be a Second Sunday Hike with the Nebraska Adventure Group at Iowa’s Waubonsie State Park on Sunday, February 13, 2011. Meet at Panera Bread, 344 North Saddle Creek Road, Omaha, 8:45am. Send a mandatory rsvp to debhoffnung [at] yahoo [dot] com.
Greater Nebraska: Congressional District 3
KEYSTONE XL PIPELINE UPDATE . . . The three pipeline related bills being introduced in the Nebraska legislature will be heard by the Natural Resources Committee this Wednesday, February 9, 2011, 1:30pm, in room 1525, at the state capitol. Links to Committee members’ e-mail are here. If you can’t be at the hearing, you may e-mail your testimony to info [at] boldnebraska [dot] org, and it will be submitted on your behalf Wednesday. Your presence at the hearing, however, is very important. Dr. Mary Pipher’s (sample) testimony is linked here. Even if you don’t wish to testify, being there, and signing-in to support the bills, will make a difference. Bold Nebraska will have t-shirts available to wear at the hearing starting at 1:00pm outside room 1525.
The following pipeline bills have been introduced in the Nebraska legislature this session:
LB 340 [pdf] establishes state-based guidelines and oversight for oil pipelines. Introduced by Senator Dubas.
LB 629 [pdf]establishes a state-based certification process for oil pipelines. Introduced by Senator Sullivan.
LB 578 requires pipeline companies to be financially responsible for clean-up, decommissioning, and maintenance to roads. Introduced by Senator Haar.
Nebraska Green Party is one of the 86 organizations that signed a letter to President Obama this week, asking him *not* to approved the proposed Keystone XL pipeline through our land and water. This weekend, Obama is meeting with the Canadian Prime Minster, who is pushing *for* pipeline approval. The February 5, 2011 Lincoln Journal Star front page hard copy report is titled “Canada’s PM pushes for pipeline approval; coalition of 86 groups opposed to pipeline urge Obama to reject it.” Online, the article is called “Report: Keystone XL could reduce dependence on Mideast oil.” From the article, “Environmental groups call the pipeline an ecological disaster waiting to happen and say the so-called tar sands produce “dirty” oil that requires huge amounts of energy to extract. A coalition of 86 environmental and progressive groups sent a letter Friday urging Obama to reject the pipeline and “stop giving a free pass to oil companies to increase profits at the expense of Americans. Activists also gathered across from the White House on Friday to protest the project.”
A LJS letter to the editor, “Stop the ‘black beast,” by Cindy Myers, Stuart, NE, was published February 2, 2011. “The ‘black beast’ must not be allowed to devour our waters, lands and people.” In a related event this week, despite public promises to compensate residents for losses associated with the summer oil spill in Kalamazoo, Enbridge is arguing it is not legally liable for damages from the spill. Read about that here.
Last week’s LA Times article by Kim Murphy, “Some Texans, too, resist Keystone XL Pipeline,” was published in the Sunday Lincoln Journal Star hard copy, January 30, 2011, under the title “One Pipeline Too Many.” From Port Arthur, the report begins “Texas has rarely met an oil business it didn’t like. Ever since Spindletop sent a gush of crude 150 feet into the air near here in 1901, Texans have been mostly willing to put up with the spills, smokestack belches and massive refinery vistas that go along with big, fat pots of “Texas tea.” But that was before a Canadian company, TransCanada Corp., came forward with a plan to build a 1,700-mile pipeline to carry heavy, high-pollutant oil from the tar sands under the boreal forests of northern Alberta, across the American heartland, through scenic ranchlands in the piney woods of east Texas and on to refineries near Houston and Port Arthur.”
“Big Oil’s Pipeline Scheme to Increase Midwest Gas Prices,” by Jeremy Symons, was published by Wildlife Promise January 24, 2011. “It’s an old story: oil companies increase gas prices and their profits soar. But rarely do we get an inside view of how they manipulate markets to drive up prices, and even rarer still an opportunity to stop it from happening. This time, Big Oil has been caught with their hand in the cookie jar as they scheme to hike America’s oil bill by $4 billion every year. This time, we have the industry documents that prove it.” From the article, “Here’s how the pipeline scheme would really work: …So here’s the bottom line if the Keystone XL pipeline is built: Canadian oil producers get a huge profit windfall, and America gets higher gas prices as well as the pollution from refineries and any pipeline spills.”
Learn more from the National Wildlife Federation’s report on XL, “Staying Hooked on a Dirty Fuel: Why Canadian Tar Sands are a Bad Bet for the United States.”
Click here to send a personalized message to the President, or sign the online e-mail strongly urging him to stop the proposed pipeline.
“TransCanada sues to access pipeline land,” by Cody Winchester, January 26, 2011, reports “Court records show that TransCanada has filed more than a dozen lawsuits to condemn land along the route of its Keystone XL oil pipeline in western South Dakota, though it hasn’t received the federal permit it needs to go ahead with the project. …So here’s the bottom line if the Keystone XL pipeline is built: Canadian oil producers get a huge profit windfall, and America gets higher gas prices as well as the pollution from refineries and any pipeline spills.”
A Washington Post article about the proposed XL pipeline was published on the front page of the January 24, 2011 LJS. “Great Plains oil pipeline plan sparks grass-roots activism, high-stakes lobbying,” was written by staff writer Juliet Eilperin. “A massive feat of engineering by any measure, the Keystone pipeline expansion project would transport crude oil close to 1,700 miles from “oil sands” in the icy reaches of Hardisty, Alberta, down through the Great Plains to the refineries of Port Arthur, Tex. In doing so, the giant pipe also promises to allay some fears about U.S. energy security: The oil will come from a trusted ally, and its cross-continental path avoids visions of another deep-sea drilling disaster. But the decision on whether to issue a permit to the project, opposed by environmental groups, rests with the State Department, which has little expertise in engineering or environmental matters. And reflecting the chaos of U.S. energy and environmental policy, the proposed pipeline is pitting Montana landowners against pipe fitters in Nebraska and creating unlikely allies of Nebraska ranchers and chieftains from Alberta’s indigenous communities.” The article continues here.
Save the Date: Sunday, March 6, 2011, join members of the groups actively working to protect Nebraska land and water from further pipeline exploitation at Lincoln’s Zoo Bar, 136 North 14th Street, 2:30 to 5:00pm. Live music to be announced.
The Natural Resources Defense Council calls tar sands “the dirtiest, most destructive oil on the face of the Earth.” The Keystone XL pipeline would threaten Nebraska’s underground source of fresh water, the 175,000-square-mile High Plains Aquifer, that provides water to 1.9 million people and irrigation for thousands of square miles of farmland throughout eight states. Nebraska’s geologically unique Sand Hills, where many bird species rest during migration, would also be threatened. Read Ken Winston’s November 4, 2010 Tar Sands Pipeline Update for Nebraska Sierra here.
Nebraska has no legislation on the books for regulating the current Keystone I pipeline, nor the proposed XL tar sands pipeline. Our Congressional delegation and the governor need to receive letters, e-mails and phone calls from constituents demanding regulation on the existing pipeline, expressing concern about more TransCanada
construction in our state. Contact information for Nebraska Congressional Representatives is as follows: Rep. Jeff Fortenberry, CD-1, 1517 Longworth House Office Bldg., Washington, D.C. 20515, 202.225.4806, 402.438.1598 (Lincoln); Rep. Lee Terry, CD-2, 1524 Longworth HOB, Washington, DC 20515, 202.225.4155, 402.397.9944 (Omaha); Rep. Adrian Smith, CD-3, 503 Cannon House Office Bldg., Washington, DC 20515, 202.225.6435, 888.ADRIAN7 (Toll Free); and Governor Dave Heineman, PO Box 94848, State Capitol Bldg., Lincoln, NE 68509, 402.471.2244.
Stop the Keystone XL pipeline — call your senators. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has the power to approve or reject the Keystone XL pipeline, and your senators can pressure her to stand up to Big Oil and stop it. Help put some needed pressure on Clinton by calling your senators today. Tell them that oil pipeline regulations need to be in place, not only to govern the existing pipeline, but also any future pipeline proposed by TransCanada or other environmental exploiters.
Click here to tell Secretary Clinton NOT to grant a permit to TransCanda, tell Gov. Heineman to put forth laws that protect our resources and economic activity and tell President Obama to live up to his promise of clean energy and energy independence. Click here for a Bold Nebraska XL Pipeline Action page with resources and background information. E-mail actions [at] boldnebraska [dot] org to get yard signs, bumper stickers and t-shirts.
Remember, every man-made by-product of the petroleum industry could be replaced by hemp. “Help Save the Earth, Time to Subsitute Hemp for Oil.”
AGENCY SCIENTISTS OPPOSE GENETICALLY ENGINEERED SALMON . . . The following quotes are from Fish and Wildlife Service scientists themselves: “The environmental impact of escaped GE salmon is of great concern.” – Gregory Moyer, Regional Geneticist, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service; “…approval of the proposal is premature, given the unknowns and uncertainties regarding the possible ecological and environmental effects of these fish.” – Jeff Adams, Branch Chief, Fairbanks Fish and Wildlife Field Office, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service; and “…I do think the chance of escapement is huge” – Deborah Burger, Manager, Chattahoochee Forest National Fish Hatchery, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Ask the President to stop the GE salmon approval process.
BUY FRESH. BUY LOCAL . . . . Farmers, gardeners, and craftspeople meet through The Nebraska Food Cooperative, an on-line, year-round farmers’ market and local food distribution service offering the best in local freshness. For ordering and pickup schedules, refer to the calendar here. Click here for products and prices from North Star Neighbors, a Cooperative member that doesn’t therapeutically medicate or unduly confine animals. Click here for Tomato Tomäto, Omaha’s year-round indoor Farmer’s Market at 156th & West Center. Shop for fresh foods grown in or very near your own community at Open Harvest, Lincoln’s member-owned natural foods retail cooperative at 1618 South Street. Buying local grows family farming, grows the local economy, and is thousands of miles fresher.
HELP NEBRASKA GREENS WITH GOODSEARCH . . . Each time you search the Internet (or shop online at a participating store), a donation can be made to Nebraska Green Party at no cost to you! To help NGP in this way, enter Nebraska Green Party where it says WHO DO YOU GOODSEARCH FOR? here. Bookmark the GoodSearch Homepage, or make it your own Home Page. Enter the url you want in the GoodSearch search box. Each time you do, one penny will be donated to Nebraska Greens. THANK YOU for your support!
We are no longer the alternative; we are the imperative. –Rosa Clemente