Vermont Gas Continues to Exploit Ratepayers to Finance Fossil Fuel Infrastructure Expansion

Are you a Vermont Gas customer and don't want to spend $122 million to expand fossil fuel infrastructure? This pipeline is being financed by the public - current Vermont Gas ratepayers - but does not benefit the people of Vermont. Vermont Gas continues to exploit ratepayers to finance fossil fuel infrastructure expansion in the face of ever-growing economic and ecological crisis. A $35.6 million cost increase is simply unacceptable. This project is not in the public good. Tell the Public Service Board that a 40% cost increase justifies a new evaluation of the permit: sign the petition here.

The Criminalisaton of Poverty

‎"How is it that a 15-year-old in Newark who the country labels worthless to the economy, who has no hope of getting a job or affording college, can suddenly generate $20,000 to $30,000 a year once trapped in the criminal justice system? The expansion of prisons, parole, probation, the court and police systems has resulted in an enormous bureaucracy which has been a boon to everyone from architects to food vendors—all with one thing in common, a paycheck earned by keeping human beings in cages. The criminalization of poverty is a lucrative business, and we have replaced the social safety net with a dragnet." -- Chris Hedges in Truthdig.

Join a statewide movement of Vermonters organising to pass a historic law banning private prisons: https://www.facebook.com/BanPrivatePrisonsVermont

Drones in Vermont

This is Fucked Up. The State of Vermont is launching drones while debating cutting fuel assistance to seniors.

What can ordinary Vermonters do about this?

Hold the Vermont Legislature accountable.

The Legislature makes the laws, laws that, according to the US Constitution, supersede federal laws.  But not many folks understand this.  So when  Vermont has been pressured to yield up major assets; e.g. our Vermont Guard to the Afghanistan Occupation, our hydroelectric dams to TransCanada and our surface water to Entergy and our groundwater to bottling companies, it is fashionable to blame the governor, especially if the governor is a Republican.

But it is the Legislature who willingly maintain the tax-free status of the entities named above and others.

Hold them accountable.  Demand to know why, demand that they act according to the wishes of their constituents. Vote them out of office!

In reality it is the Legislature that allows, forbids, funds, tolerates, or looks the other way.  An agency carries out policy.  An agency may not make policy.

Vermonters can’t do anything about Monsanto’s control over the USDA and their $149 billion budget, run by a Monsanto insider and lobbyist.  We can’t affect UN’s Agenda 21.  That part of US sovereignty has recently been ceded.  Congress, unless the incumbents are replaced, will continue to pursue an agenda which has nothing to do with the interests of their constituents, no matter who is elected president.

This, domestic surveillance in Vermont, we can do something about.

STRAIGHTENING OUT THE YELLOW SHIRTS

Burlington Farmers Market Attempts (and fails) to Ban Political Speech in City Hall Park

Demand accountability this Tuesday at 6:00pm at 1 North Ave (Burlington Police Department).

This Tuesday evening come show your support for an INDEPENDENT investigation into the police brutality in Burlington.

Mayor Weinberger has let the Burlington Police investigate themselves as to whether shooting protesters performing civil disobedience on July 29th was justified. The police preliminary incident report itself is marked by many factual errors and misrepresentation and a sheer lack of accountability that many feared would be the result of having an organization with such a vested interest investigate themselves. T

Tuesday August 28th, Burlington Police Commission will receive the BPD incident report about July 29th. The meeting is open to the public.

Last week, four City Councilors (Vince Brennan, Sharon Bushor, Rachel Siegel, and Max Tracy) wrote Mayor Weinberger, demanding an independent investigation. Their request echoed many, many Burlington citizens wishes at a City Council meeting on August 13.

Here is part of their letter:

"While we are grateful to the BPD for conducting their own investigation, we hope that an independent investigation will help build public trust in our police force and provide a forum through which to answer pressing questions...

"It is our sincere hope that with a complete and independent review, we can determine the sequence of events and why actions were taken and, more importantly, how we can respond differently in the future."

Some of the questions that this preliminary action/incident report (conducted by the police themselves) did not answer and still need answering include:

■ An understanding of the kind of training officers receive to deal with “de-escalating protests.”
■ The mayor’s involvement in preparation for the protest and whether he authorized the use of “pepper spray and rubber bullets.”
■ Whether the police had exhausted methods short of force to disperse the protesters.
■ Why, as no arrests were made, the police used pellets and pepper spray.
■ Why those pellets were beyond their expiration date.
■ Whether officers removed their badges, and if so, why?
■ Whether all of the officers involved in the use of force were Burlington police officers.
■ Whether the officer who gave the order to use force was present.

Neither of our Ward 5 City Councilors, Joan Shannon nor Chip Mason, have signed on to their colleagues' letter to the mayor. Why haven't they? Don't they have questions, too? Why are they not demanding an independent review? As City Council President, why has Joan Shannon not demanded that the police incident report be presented to the full city council on the day that the police commission receives their copy?

I've seen first hand how police wrongdoing and abuse has lead to a breach of trust in other cities where I've lived. And I won't stand by and let that happen in Burlington.
With people's rights being trampled by police all over the country, it is crucial that we set a precedent that this is unacceptable in Vermont, and that Vermonters
don't just let something like this happen and then do nothing and forget about it.

Show up, pay attention, speak out on August 28.

On going in Burlington: JOIN THE CITIZENS BANK PICKET

On April 29th, the Occupy Burlington General Assembly issued its first demand: that Citizens Bank, a wholly owned subsidiary of the most bailed out bank in the world (RBS) which had recently settled for $137.5 million after being caught defrauding its low income customers, close its downtown branch and leave our city. To make this demand a reality, the local movement has been maintaining pickets four days per week in front of the branch, waving signs, unfurling banners, handing out literature, and encouraging the bank's customers to move their patronage to a cooperative, member-owned credit union. If you'd like to learn more about this campaign and help stick it to one of the world's biggest "Too Big to Fail" banks, join us at the corner of College and St. Paul Streets. They're every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 4 to 5 P.M. and on Saturday mornings from 11 until Noon. Citizens Bank is Closing!

Citizens Bank's parent company, RBS, was fined in excess of $200 million for their participation in the LIBOR affair.

"There was plenty of harm and plenty of foul," says Eliot Spitzer.

Photos credit LisaAnn Oberbrunner.

PLAYING CHICKEN

For today, two quotes from a local Vermont blog I have just discovered - a friend has posted/linked them on his Facebook. They are worth pondering.

"You ignore the cyclist making a frantic "stop/slow down" signal (left arm out straight, forearm down, waving frantically at the ground) and you maybe even hear him cry out "YOU HAVE NO SAFE PASS ! NO SAFE PASS! before accelerating around him. Then you make a panic braking/right merging movement so as to avoid a head-on collision with the oncoming maroon pickup truck."

...

"We have ingrained car culture so deeply in our psyches, we have assumed the risks of injury inherent in driving so completely, we don't even think about them any more."

Lordy, Lordy! The way some automobile drivers behave, it's like they're playing chicken with cyclists. I've seen it. "I double-dare you, sonofabitch," they seem to say to the cyclists. (While they play with their iPad app or text "Honey, I'll be late for dinner, because this guy on a bike is slowing me down!" ) :(

I respect cyclists on the road. I guess it's from my experience bicycling in The Netherlands (where there are real bike paths). I used to get miffed by the stupid bicyclists on roads in Burlington - the "share the road" graphics on the lane and signs advising that bikers can use the complete lane. Tap, tap, tap. Hurry the fuck up! Now I realise it's a way for us to slow down, too. I mean, I left Houston because of the dog-eat-dog, frenetic pace. Burlington's rush hour is a nanosecond compared to Houston's. Yeah, slow down, Jay. Now, if only the cyclists would take off their ear pieces and listen to what's going on, and realise they are driving vehicles (cyclists are not pedestrians according to Vermont law) and should stop at 4-way stop signs, too. Grrr.

BREAKING NEWS: SOUTH BURLINGTON CITY COUNCIL NIXES F-35!

Per Juliet Buck, blogger and activist (via Facebook): "South Burlington City Council just voted AGAINST basing the F-35 in Burlington by a vote of 4-1!!!!!!!!!! So this is what winning one feels like?"

A victory indeed. Juliet and the other activists have struck a blow against the evil jets of Lockheed Martin. The Feds, of course, can do whatever they want, but after years of propaganda and misinformation, the victory is that four city officials said NO!

Burlington's Embarrassing Regulations

Ridiculous bureaucracy.

What heppened to this couple is an embarrassment to the city.

Andy Bromage in Blurt/Seven Days: Burlington Couple Busted For Gardening Structures in Front Yard

"We want to control our own food as much as we can," says Rooney, who lives on South Willard Street near Champlain College. "Sustainable living. We live in Vermont. Grow your own food. All that stuff —– we believe in all of it."

But last month, the couple got a notice from the Burlington Code Enforcement Office that their gardening structures were a code violation and would have to come down to avoid penalties. The code office received anonymous complaints — three of them — about the homemade hoop houses.

Rooney says he was told that, under city zoning regulations, hoop houses qualify as "stable structures" and that the couple's raised garden beds qualify as "retaining walls" — both of which require permits from city hall. So does a two-foot-high metal fence that lines the garden to keep out hungry rabbits.

"This is ridiculous," Rooney says on a recent spring day.

Rooney and Dorn are master gardeners, certified through classes at the University of Vermont Extension School and hours of apprenticing. Their front yard on South Willard Street, a well-heeled part of town with stately colonial homes, has been turned into an urban gardener's paradise — with bountiful gardens, peach, apple and pear trees, and strawberry beds alongside the steps that lead up a slope to their front door.

But to at least one neighbor, the hoop houses are an out-of-place eyesore. Rooney says he doesn't know who made the complaint. He called one neighbor to inquire about it, but says he never heard back.

Urban agriculture is alive and well in the Intervale, why not allow it in other neighborhoods? City council, are you listening? As a friend remarked after reading this story, "What a great example for others in a tight economy: grow your own healthy food! Beat the high cost of quality nutrition! Find your own solutions, in a cold climate!"

OCCUPY BURLINGTON: OUTDOOR GENERAL ASSEMBLIES!!

The sun is shining and we're getting back to one of the things which makes this movement so amazing, occupying public space, with outdoor General Assemblies in City Hall Park!

New and Important: GA's are moving to Saturdays 12 Noon to 1:30 P.M., immediately after the bank picket (in front of Citizen's Bank, the recipient of the biggest amount of bailout money) and coinciding with the Farmers Market so as to facilitate maximum turnout.

Facebook link

"We are the next generation of Americans."

Burlington High School sophomore Jacques Okuka, at yesterday's student-organised direct action against systemic racism at BHS:

"We've been experiencing racism since I first came to America. I've been talking to teachers and nothing's been happening."

"We are the next generation of Americans. If we're going to make a change it's got to come from us, not from our teachers and our parents."

Yesterday morning I went to the demonstration to show solidarity with the brave Somali Bantu and Congolese students. Their action reminded me of Greensboro 1960.

Today's Burlington High School Action Against Racism

Brave Somali Bantu and Congolese high school students, who have self-organized a one day boycott of Burlington High School, were protesting this morning in front of the school against the systemic racism there. The power elite of the school admin and Burlington school board have decided to tackle the racism slowly and on their terms, rather than listen to the concerns of the students. I was present for about an hour in solidarity with the students.

BHS students chanting "we didn't fail the school, the school failed us.".

Systemic Racism in Burlington, Vermont

‎SEVEN DAYS

"The data [from nearly 26,000 traffic stops made over a two-year period by police in Burlington, South Burlington, Winooski and the University of Vermont] showed “statistically significant disparities” between black and white male drivers across all four departments. Black drivers in Burlington and South Burlington were twice as likely as whites to be pulled over. In South Burlington, the rate at which black drivers were searched after a traffic stop was five times higher than for white drivers."

At last Monday's City Council meeting (BURLINGTON FREE PRESS):

On the hot seat was Burlington schools Superintendent Jeanne Collins, who endured sharp questioning from Ward 3 City Councilor Vince Brennan on her commitment to equity.
[...]
Lindsay Reid, a former Burlington school district employee, said she was not satisfied with Collins’ responses: “She persists in protecting the delicate ego of white teachers at the expense of students and families that face discrimination.

Reid, who is originally from Burkino Faso, agreed with Brennan that it is time for new leadership in the school district. So did Jeanine Bunzigiye, an immigrant from the Congo and a former home-school liaison for Burlington schools. Many immigrant and refugee families are weary of talking about problems and want better academic outcomes for their children, she said. “I think they really want to see some action,” Bunzigiye said.

During public comment, about 10 speakers said the school district has a long way to go to eradicate racism. Reuben Jackson, a teacher at Burlington High School, said the district has made some notable efforts to address its historical homogeneity, but needs to go much further before students and staff reach real comfort levels."

There is a student walk out at Burlington High School tomorrow. They want us to show up in solidarity for the walk out at 8:00 A.M., so probably show up at 7:00. The students specifically asked for Occupy Burlington to come out. Let's not disappoint.

We need to unite the 99% to make the social change that will benefit all of us. The Burlington School Board holds the power to the leardership of the Burlington School District.

An open letter from Rabbi Joshua Chasen, Ohavi Zedek Synagogue. (Please share it with others via e-mail as well. ~ thanks. )

OUR COMMUNITY’S CHALLENGE

Racism is a disease of the soul, intractable, insidious. Most of us white people, myself included, do not understand the depth of this problem. We have a problem of racism in our schools because we have a problem of racism in our city, our country and world.

Twenty years ago, there were few people of color in Burlington and Vermont, and it was difficult to get a hearing for complaints about racism. Now, in part because we have welcomed to town many refugees of color, there is a greater willingness to hear about the effects of persistent racism. But, let's face it: there is still a hope in the hearts of many in our community that Vermont will stay as white as the driven snow. We won't. We're not.

Our schools are where these issues tend to surface first. Our teachers are challenged to work with children of a variety of backgrounds, styles of learning, levels of previous education. Let us recognize the challenge that they face and stand with them in their efforts to educate all of our children. The Diversity and Equity Task Force Report contains many helpful suggestions about how to move forward. It is not an attack on the competence of our teachers.
It does recognize the persistence of racism throughout our society, including our schools. Still today, too many teachers tell children of color to ignore racist insults, suggesting that they were not intended to be racist. Still today, children of color are fearful in our schools. Students who are classified as ELL (English Language Learners) hear the debate about the Diversity and Equity Task Force Report and feel that they are being called "stupid." Surely that is no one's intent, but it is what is happening.

We have come to a moment of truth in our neck of the woods, a time when we must acknowledge that we no longer are mostly European in origin; a time when we must celebrate our multi-racial, multi-cultural society. The change is not easy. Nothing is gained by calling each other "racists" or "anti-teacher." We always must seek strong leadership in such times, but nothing is gained by scapegoating each other.
Let's keep our eyes on the prize, the well being of all of our children. When a child of color is humiliated by a racist comment, the well being of every child in our city is diminished, as is the well being of every one of us of all ages.

This message must come from every pulpit in town. Each one of us is created in the image of God. Instead of focusing on the low level of language competence of children who have landed here after harrowing journeys out of violence and civil wars, let us focus on our own cultural competence, our capacity to be comfortable enough with other cultures so that we can create real social equity.

Not an easy task, by any means. Let us be grateful to the men and women who choose to take on this challenge in our schools. And let us hold every last one of us accountable to the fulfillment of the historic promise of our country to be a place where every child is given an equal chance to fulfill his or her dreams.

Obama's Reward

Barack Obama's wallet was pilfered on Friday while he was glad handing his supporters at a campaign event at the UVM Gutterson Field House. There's a reward amounting to 1% of the take from the event to the person who turns in the culprit and returns the wallet.

Solidarity with Trayvon Martin and his family

Burlington: Hundreds rally in solidarity with the cause of Trayvon Martin. This evening on Church Street at the City Hall steps. Citizens - high school students, parents, city officials - spoke about institutional racism that exists in Vermont.

 

Revival of Occupy Burlington: "The warmest love is a revolutionary love from solidarity and unity."

By Al Suarez, a fellow Occupier in Burlington, on November 18, 2011. This was posted on Facebook and shared around. I met Al this week and helped him remove the parts of the tee pee after BPD had ordered the dismantling of the Burlington Encampment, storing the branches of the tee pee in the back yard of another Occupier.

It is still very painful for me to delve into the tragedy at Occupy Burlington, I rather at this time focus on the positive, on the events that unfolded last night that were truly inspiring. Yesterday at about 5pm at City Park, several dozen of us set up a "free speech zone". A orange gate, we had encircled ourselves with, and led the march, followed by others with signs and what not, the homeless and with home alike, student and worker alike, all marching as equals, under the same banner of justice, of a just cause that cannot be silenced or wiped out, no matter how the city and the State come at us, our chants, from LA to New York, from Egypt to Spain, will be heard the world over.

We marched down Church St. to the surprise of many people, who have been hearing in the media our movement is dead, it is far from it. A man tried to break out free speech zone but we immediately reesembled it, and kept march, no one could stop us. Finally we reached the Post Office and sang solidarity with the union there against the cuts of the workers there. Then we headed down the road blocking traffick, to Edmonds Middle School, where Senator Palino, union leaders, students, and others were to meet together into the night.

Only 3 months ago in the Burlington where my sister worked and died, I spoke with her here about the new society I wanted, and we dreamed together of that new society, a better world for my niece. Off in the distance as I marched, suddenly I could see my sister's face, and I lit up, and could feel the energy of resurrection, of revival, all around us, and all the blisters in my feet, all the tiredness, went away, and all I could feel was energy, which is hard to explain, a revolutionary energy that charged us into our destiny, as we continued to defy the unjust system where the poor are left to die in the street. A wave of people came to reinforce us, old faces I could see, survivors of the storm, the storm troopers that stormed our camp in a most despicable manner, but we continue, unabatted, unintimidated, till final victory, so that no more Natashas may die from this unjust system, so that my sister may live in me...

Haik Bedrosian interviews Bram Kranichfeld

Burlington's Democratic caucus will choose its 2012 mayoral candidate next Sunday, November 13. My choice is Bram Kranichfeld, and fellow Burlington blogger Haik Bedrosian has interviewed him.

Richard Hooker, Priest and Theologian, 1600

The Episcopal church commemorates Richard Hooker, one of the great theologians of our tradition, today. Hooker's writings, in particular Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, stressed tolerance and inclusiveness and the middle way of Anglicanism between what he saw as the extremes of Catholicism and the Puritan movement.

And in recent years, I remember this day in 2007 when the presiding bishop preached about him at the Diocese of Vermont's convention Eucharist.

Hooker is a remarkable example of what wisdom in the flesh looks like—which is probably why he made it onto our list of saints. He wrote his most famous work in response to controversy with another wing of the church. And you don't have to look much beyond the first page to see the connections with current controversies in this church.

Richard Hooker was appointed Master, or Rector, of the Temple Church in London in the late 1500s. He had an assistant there, from the Puritan wing of the church, named Walter Travers. Hooker's duty was to preach in the morning. Travers followed him in the afternoon, and he took the opportunity one day to refute what the rector had said in the morning, when he preached about salvation and the possibility that all of us will be saved. The Puritan position, along with Calvin, believed that some may be damned even before they can do anything. Hooker insisted that that understanding took away the possibility of God's grace.

Hooker's focus on reason and tolerance and inclusion is foundational to that broad stream of Anglican thought. This isn't just academic theologizing. It has to do with the basic identity of our tradition—that we can be comprehensive and inclusive as we search for a larger truth. And that rather than being a cop-out, that focus on comprehension is a sign of the spirit at work.

That focus on comprehension lies underneath the challenging and uncomfortable place we are trying to stand in as a church today—affirming that gay and lesbian, bisexual and transgendered Christians are deserving of the best ministry of this church, AND that there is a place for those who take a different theological position. We say that we are willing to live in that uncomfortable and unsettling place because we believe that only God has truth in its fullness.

Wisdom, and the search for it, is one of the gifts and vocations that the body of Christ always needs. None of us ever has it all, and it is only in the wisdom of the body gathered that we can even begin to think that we might have the mind of Christ.

Hooker's statue stands outside Exeter Cathedral.

OWS Solidarity Rallies Today in Vermont and AMSTERDAM!

It's becoming Occupy World Street, as thousands of rallies started up today around the Earth. RT takes a closer look. At 2 p.m. in Burlington several hundred (looked to me like 200 or so) gathered in City Hall Park. Sara Lee Guthrie (Woody's granddaughter) and her husband Johnny Irion led the crowd in a rendition of "This Land is Your Land." Thanks to Shay Totten for the video. Then they led us up Church Street up the hill to UVM's Waterman Hall. About a hundred or so marched across the UVMM Green to the Fleming Museum - just outside the property boundaries of Fletcher Allen Hospital, in solidarity with the nurses union which is in contract negotiations with the hospital management. In Amsterdam, nearly 2,000 participants were at the Beursplein, next to the Beurs van Berlage, the former home of the Amsterdam Stock Exchange. The tram lines on the Damrak (Centraal Station is a major hub for most of the trams into the city centre) were closed. And the action doesn't seem to be ending as many have decided to spend (AT5's link is in Dutch) the night in the Beursplein. Frank Buis of AT5, the Amsterdam community television station has filmed a montage video of today's action.

Post Irene in Vermont: Mobile home parks destruction

VTDigger

Today it is a strange and somber ghost town, except for small beehives of activity where construction crews — actually deconstruction crews — are working to tear down and clear out mobile homes whose owners have decided they’re never coming back.

Once 80 families lived here. Now, along the U-shaped drive that they called home, blue and ochre and yellow mobile homes sit vacant, still displaying the gaily striped awnings or porches, American flags and flower boxes that marked stability and a sense of place. Amidst a sea of very green grass and soft mud, some homes have windows knocked out or tilted slightly askew, others appear hardly untouched, only the wrinkled siding or a dim mud line part way up the walls hinting at the fetid devastation that awaits inside.

Not surprising. Mobile home parks are usually not in the most "desirable" neighborhoods; people choose the location because it's affordable. This type of devastation is common whereever hurricanes land - flood zones in Florida, Lousiana, Texas, the Carolinas; where the rivers rise in the spring and summer (e.g. Mississippi); and also in the tornado alleys in the south and midwest.

Glad that Digger story corrects the stereotype that mobile home residents are trailer park trash.