STANISLAUS CONNECTIONS
Working For Peace, Justice, and A Sustainable Environment
Online Edition: January,1998, Vol. IX, # V
A Modesto Peace/Life Center Publication
January Events
2 FRI: Christmas tree pickup begins, Modesto. Cut into less than 6 feet in length and place in green yard waste recycling to allow to be composted and reused. (No green waste pickup November 14- December 31.) Info: 577-5332.
5 MON: PFLAG. Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays support group. 7 pm. 527-0776.
Peace/Life Center Board. 720 13th St., Modesto. 7 pm. 529-5750
7 WED: Ecology Action meets at the Modesto Peace/Life Center at 7 p.m. 526-4256
8 THURS: Coalition of Parent Support (COPS). Non-custodial parents support group. 847-4227.
La Leche/Modesto. 10 am. 538-3862 or 545-8444.
9 FRI: Song Circle, a Peace Life Center Activity. All ages and voices welcome. 7 pm. Call 529-5750 for info on location.
10 SAT: Central Valley Inventors (encourages innovation) 10 am, Manteca Library, Info: Sharon 599-6328; Greg 645-2576
11 SUN: "Sunday Afternoon at CBS" Joe Ben Izzy, storyteller. Folk lore & stories from throughout the world. 3 pm, at Congregation Beth Shalom, Sherwood Ave, Modesto. Info & tickets: 571-6060.
Green Party meeting, 2 pm. Call Don for info. and location, 523-8871.
13 TUES: Stanislaus County Library Discussion of Future Plans-Library Advisory Board. 4:30 pm at the Library McHenry Room, downstairs.
15 THURS: Martin Luther King's Birthday. Reception at Modesto City Hall Multipurpose room for guest of honor GregAlan Williams, award-winning actor, 5 to 7:30 pm.
PFLAG: Parents & Friends of Lesbians and Gays Sonora/Mother Lode group, Sonora Unity Church, 326 W. Stockton, Sonora. Info: 533-1665.
NAACP. King-Kennedy Center, 601 N. Martin L. King Jr. Dr., Modesto. 7:30 pm. 577-5355.
Domestic Violence Coordinating Council. County Administration Building, lower level training room, 11th & H St, Modesto. 4-5:30 pm. 525-6348.
16 FRI: Sierra Club Annual Member's Slide Show (visitors welcome) 7 pm. Modesto Jr. College.
GregAlan Williams will speak at Modesto High School and Mark Twain Jr. High School.
17 SAT: Fourth Annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Commemoration at King-Kennedy Center, 601 N. Martin Luther King Dr., Modesto. GregAlan Williams featured speaker. Many sponsors.
19 MON: La Leche Turlock 7:30 pm, 537-;1243 or 669-9274.
FEMALE: Formerly Employed Mothers at the Leading Edge- support group, 6:30 to 8:30 pm at YMCA, 2700 McHenry Ave, Modesto. Info: 549-9441. Free.
20 TUES: PFLAG, Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays support group 7 pm. 527-0776.
Peace Camp mtg., Peace/Life Center. 7 pm.
24 SAT: 150th Anniversary of discovery of gold in California. Grand Opening of Great Valley Museum's GOLD RUSH! exhibit. Numerous hands-on activities pertaining to gold rush. 10 am- 4 pm at Great Valley Museum. Free.
JAN 24-MAY 31: Great Valley Museum GOLD RUSH! Exhibit. Tuesday-Friday, 12 noon-4:30 pm. Saturday, 10 am- 4 pm. Exhibit at Great Valley Museum, 1100 Stoddard Avenue. Museum fee-$1/person, $3/family, children 6 and under free.
26 MON: Epilepsy Support Group. Memorial Medical Bldg, 1800 Coffee Road, Modesto (north of the hospital). Info: Mary Harris, 521-9737. 7 pm.
Peace/Life Center Board. 720 13th St., Modesto. 7 pm. 529-5750 Call before coming; meeting may not be held)
27 TUES: Mujeres Latinas de Stanislaus, Doctors Medical Center meeting room, 6:30 pm, Info: Maggie Mejia, 527-l9l4.
30 FRI: "Active Hawaiian Volcanoes" by Susan Owen of
Stanford Univ. 7:30 pm, MJC Forum 110. Free. (For people over 13
yrs old.)
Looking Ahead
JAN 19 thru February: Poetry and Calligraphy display, Modesto-Stanislaus County Library.
FEB 10 TUES: Peace Essay Contest meeting, Sample home, 7:05 pm. 529-5750.
FEB 15 SUN: Selected readings from The Gold Rush Anthology will be presented. 1:00 pm, The Bookstore in McHenry Village. Free.
FEB 21 SAT: Peace Life Center Annual Meeting at 720 13th St. office.
FEB 22 SUN: The Great Valley Museum's TULE FOG FETE. A celebration of the famous valley fog! Family event in lovely oak woodland-riparian park. Guided Nature Walks, obstacle course, kids activities, pea soup contest, live animals. 11 am- 3 pm, Caswell State Park, Ripon. $4/person or $12/carload(8 maximum).
FEB 27 FRI: MAPS Seminar Lecture- Women of the Gold Rush by Joann Levy, author and lecturer. 7:30 pm, MJC Forum 110. Free.
HOLISTIC LIFE CENTER: Classes start in January. Register now; call for catalogue, 544-8272. Learning body chemistry/nutrition/herbs/reiki/ all healing components of mind, body, and spirit.
MAR 20 FRI: Peace Essay Contest Awards Reception, Forum Building 110, MJC East, 7 pm
JUNE 26-28: Peace Camp for all ages, Camp Peaceful Pines,
Strawberry area.
Ongoing
PEACE/LIFE CENTER: Weekdays or by appt. 720 13th St. Open 2-4:30 pm 529-5750.
CHILDREN'S STORY HOURS: Stanislaus County Library. Modesto: Tuesday & Wednesdays, 10 and 11 am. Family Story Time, Tuesdays, 7 pm. All 12 library branches have morning story hours. Call for info.
LATINO COMMUNITY ROUND TABLE, La Fonda restaurant, every Monday, Noon.
Info: Maggie Mejia, 527-1914.
STORY TIME AT THE BOOKSTORE: Saturdays, 11 am, ages 2 to 8 accompanied by adult, some bi-lingual, English-Spanish. McHenry Village
STORY TIME AT BARNES AND NOBLE: Tuesdays, 11 am. Thursdays, 4:30 pm. McHenry Avenue
THE BOOKSTORE POETRY READINGS second & fourth Fridays 7 pm featuring central valley poets, listeners invited. Info: 521-0535. McHenry Village
HISPANIC LEADERSHIP COUNCIL, Every Friday, Acapulco Restaurant, 7 am. Info: Maggie Mejia, 527-1914.
GAY-LESBIAN SUPPORT GROUP: Thursdays, 3-5 pm. 526-1440.
THERAPEUTIC INTERVENTIONS: Gay men's HIV support group. Every Wednesday at 1 pm and Thursday, 11 am. Free. Info: 529-5279
SENIOR CITIZENS POTLUCK LUNCH AND ACTIVITIES, King-Kennedy Center, Wednesdays. Noon. Free.
SERRV: Fridays and Saturdays. International gifts from developing countries, 10 am-3 pm. Church of the Brethren, 2301 Woodland, Rm #4, Modesto. 523-5178.
STANISLAUS WRITERS AND FRIENDS: All people interested in writing encouraged to attend. Call Gerry 529-6021 for time and place of meeting.
STANISLAUS INTERNATIONAL FOLK DANCERS: Every Friday 7:30 to 10 pm Sylvan School Auditorium 2908 Coffee, Modesto. Fee $2.00 per night. Children welcome. Info: Kropps, 847-4439.
NATIVE AMERICAN BASKET COLLECTION: A new exhibit from North America on display thru Jan 31 at Great Valley Museum, College & Stoddard, Modesto. Open Tues-Fri, 12-4:30 pm and Sat 10 am-4 pm. Info: 575-6196.
YOGA WITH NEVA AND JOCELYN: Mondays, 7 pm, First United Methodist Church, 16th & I, Modesto. 523-0155 or 524-3246.
MODESTO FOR RACE UNITY: Uniting humanity through social activities, constructive dialog and community participation. Call Gerry, 529-6021 or Renaldo, 544-6797 for times and events location.
BROWN BAG GROCERIES for low income senior citizens. Salvation Army and King-Kennedy Center on Martin Luther King Drive, first and 3rd Fridays monthly.
SENIOR CITIZEN DROP-IN PROGRAM: Mon, Wed, Thurs 9 am to 5 pm at Senior Citizens Center, Scenic & Bodem Ave, Modesto.
CHILD HEALTH MOBILE SERVICES: At Maddux Youth Center, Third and Sierra Drive Modesto, fourth Fridays, noon to 4:30 pm. Call for appointment, 525-6282.
ADULT CHILDREN OF ALCOHOLICS: First Christian Church Modesto. 14th and L St. 7 pm. Info: 527-2469 or 537-6571.
ACTIVITIES FOR DISABLED YOUTH: Saturday night gym program, Tuesdays: Adaptive Wheel Chair Basketball, 6:30 pm.
CITY OF MODESTO PARKS & RECREATION: Dept. has a wealth of activities for adults and children. Catalogues and info: 577-5344, 801 11th St. Modesto.
MJC ART GALLERY: Open noon to 8 pm Mon-Thurs, and 1 to 5 pm Friday. Free.
GREAT VALLEY MUSEUM EXHIBITS: Native American Basket
Collection, College & Stoddard Ave, Modesto. Open Tues-Fri
12-4:30 pm. Sat 10 am-4 pm. Many special programs for children.
575-6196.
DEADLINE TO SUBMIT ARTICLES TO CONNECTIONS:
Tenth of each month. Submit peace, justice and environmentally friendly event notices to P.O. Box 134, Modesto, CA, 95353, or call 522-4967 or 575-4299, or email to costello@ainet.com. Free listings subject to space, availability and editing.
Winter Nature-Watching in the Central Valley
By MARGERY FLETCHER
Popular knowledge might lead us to expect that most of the
birds in our yards, rivers and countryside fly south in winter.
Yet, here in the Central Valley, our opportunity to see birds is
better in winter than in any other season. While a few species of
birds who depend on flying insects or flowering plants for food
leave us for warmer areas, several dozen other species replace
them, fleeing snow and ice-covered lands to feed on the seeds,
fruits and critters still plentiful in our wetlands, forests and
fields. We are the "South" for many birds migrating
from Alaska, Canada, and the Northern United States, as well as
the nearby Sierra, leaving us an opportunity to observe well over
one hundred different kinds of birds in Stanislaus County and its
neighbors this winter.
Where and what to see:
Spectacular, Easy to Find and See: The largest of the winter
visitors, Sandhill Cranes, White Pelicans, Tundra Swans, and
Geese (five different kinds) are the most exciting to see,
especially for young people. All these birds choose wetlands for
their winter habitat and can be seen in Merced County at the
Merced Wildlife Refuge.While you may get a quick glimpse of these
birds in Stanislaus County as you drive out Highway 132, near the
confluence of the Tuolumne and San Joaquin Rivers, currently
there are no safe places to park and watch the spectacle. With
proposed land additions to the newly established San Joaquin
Wildlife Refuge, watching these birds may become easier.
While you are watching the cranes, you will also get a chance
to see a wide variety of ducks, shorebirds, egrets and herons. An
added attraction to visiting the Merced Wildlife Refuge is the
presence of a flock of White-faced Ibis, a special treat for
crossword puzzle fans. Large numbers of birds attract predators.
Coyotes lurk on the outskirts of the flocks waiting for their
chance at goose or crane dinner. A hawk or falcon flying low over
the marshes may stir up a sudden cloud of frightened ducks or
shorebirds. Peregrine Falcons are occasionally seen at the Merced
wetlands.
Merced Wildlife Refuge is open for visitors every day of the
week from sunrise to sunset. Wednesdays and Saturdays are hunting
days at the refuge so schedule your visit on other days, or after
the hunting season is over on January 18th. To reach the refuge
from Stanislaus County, take Hwy 99 South to Merced and exit onto
Highway 59. Travel south on Highway 59 approximately 8 miles,
then go right on Sandy Mush Road (which is paved). Travel west
about 6 miles and you will find the Merced Refuge on the left
side of the road.
Spectacular, Not as Easy to see: Eagles, Osprey, Hawks,
Falcons: Because these birds are loners, it takes a watchful eye
to spot them. They are easiest to find after the sun is out and
rising columns of warm air provide them an easy means to soar and
glide while they seek prey. The dry hillsides of eastern
Stanislaus County are the best places to see hawks and falcons.
Bald Eagles and osprey, who like fish, stay close to lakes and
rivers. Eagles often feed on the carcasses of dead salmon, making
the Tuolumne River at LaGrange a good place to look for these
spectacular birds. Don't ignore a "kettle" of circling
vultures. A check with binoculars may reveal an eagle in the
crowd.
Songbirds: You need binoculars to get good views of many of
these smaller birds. What they lack in size, they make up for in
charm. Open fields, telephone wires, brush piles, trees and
bushes are often alive with flocks of small songbirds.
A surprising number of different kinds can be seen in ordinary
backyards. Sparrows, juncos, finches, woodpeckers, doves,
warblers, jays, mockingbirds, hummers and magpies are birds you
may have already seen in and around your home. Attracting birds
with feeders, birdbaths, and special plantings (while providing
protection from cats) can increase your enjoyment of the birds
with whom you share habitat The only trick is identifying them. A
guided field trip is a good way to get started.
The Stanislaus Audubon Society holds regular winter field
trips. Copies of the Valley Habitat, which lists upcoming trips
can be found at The Bookstore and the Great Valley Museum. You
can also check the Audubon website at www.ainet.com/sas, or call
Audubon's message phone at 521-0108.
By NANCY DIMOND
This recipe will fit well with the lighter faire of post-holiday cravings. Admittedly I haven't tried this yet, but when the holiday season winds down and time isn't at such a premium, this dish is at the top of my list. I've gleaned this recipe from Cooks Illustrated, the January/February 1998 issue, "Noodles with Winter Greens," by Eva Katz.
Mustard Greens and Udon Noodles
1 1/2 cups chicken broth
1/4 cup rice wine vinegar
1/4 cup mirin (Japanese rice wine)
2 medium garlic cloves, crushed
1/2 pound shiitake mushrooms, cleaned and sliced thin
1 1-inch chunk fresh ginger root, halved and smashed
1/2 teaspoon Asian chili paste
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon sesame oil
salt and ground black pepper
1 1/2 pounds mustard greens
1 package (14-ounces) fresh udon noodles
1. Simmer chicken broth through sesame oil in saucepan over high heat until liquid thickens and reduces in half, 8 to 10 minutes. Turn off heat, remove garlic and ginger; season with salt and pepper to taste, and cover.
2. Meanwhile, add 1 tablespoon salt and greens to 5 quarts boiling water; cook until greens are almost tender, 4 to 5 minutes. Add noodles; cook until greens and noodles are tender, about 2 minutes longer. Reserve 1/3 cup noodle water; drain noodles and greens and return to pot. Add sauce and reserved water and cook over medium-low heat, stirring to meld flavors, about 1 minute. Adjust seasoning and serve immediately. Serves 4.
NOTE: If using dried noodles, in step 2 cook the noodles first for 5-6 minutes and then add the mustard greens, cooking for an additional 4-5 minutes.
By DON LUNDBERG
With the very real prospect of another Gulf War in the offing, I ask myself, "What are we in the Peace/Life Center doing to deter this probability?" I search in vain for an article in Connections that addresses this issue. Certainly readers of Connections are aware that in the Gulf we are building a formidable strike force that is ready, and perhaps spoiling, for action with or without United Nations approval, which is a repeat of the Vietnam War disaster where we charged in alone without U.N. support.
From the perspective of the United States decision makers, it is probable that some of them would like to again prove the superiority of our weapons in a mini-war. We are the number one exporter of war material to other nations and would like to retain this dubious honor. Our weapons are undoubtedly the best in the world.
The US is in the embarrassing position of owing 1.6 billion dollars to the United Nations for past and current obligations. This is more than one half of the 2.8 billion dollar debt owed by all other U.N. member states, according to the United Nations Day Program Manual 1997.
Public opinion polls indicate that the public supports payment of the US debts to the U.N. The Wirthlin Group found in a nationwide poll in April 1996 that two-thirds of Americans (64 percent) believe the U.S. "should always pay its full dues to the U.N. on schedule," while just a quarter (28 percent) believe the U.S. should withhold dues to pressure other countries into accepting U.S. proposals for reform.
Putting our $300 million assessment in perspective, it amounts to slightly more than $1 per American. This is a small investment in firewalls for peace and security to complement the roughly $1,000 the average American is taxed to maintain military readiness in case these firewalls fail. According to government officials, U.S. spending on the entire U.N. system (1.8 billion in 1996) representing one tenth of 1 percent of the current U.S. defense budget. Seriously, is the U.S. Congress truly interested in peace?
From my perceptive, international cooperation through the United Nations has become a necessity in efforts to fight terrorism and the proliferation of weapons, control disease, counter drug trafficking, stimulate trade, stem the tide of refugees, and improve the quality of our environment -- all these concerns have a real impact on American families.
How many of us have corresponded with our congressmember regarding the peace/war issue and our $1.6 billion debt to the U.N.? Our assessment is 25 percent of the U.N. budget, and our continued failure to honor our commitment seriously impedes the functions and effectiveness of the U.N. It could eventually threaten the very survival of the organization. There is no other organization to take its place; it is the only world organization committed to peaceful solutions for international problems.
The U.S. speaks with a loud voice, and we carry the biggest sticks in the world. Can we have peace if the electorate doesn't register its concern regarding the arms buildup in the Gulf and our failure to pay our arrears to the United Nations, which is the only world forum devoted to peace?
ACTION: To show my concern I have sent to Congressman Condit a check for $5.40 payable to the United Nations to cover my share of the U.S. arrears to the U.N. It is my hope that other readers will do likewise to dramatize their displeasure with the recent decision by Congress, prior to their adjournment, not to pay our arrears to the United Nations.
Place and the Literary Imagination
By LILLIAN VALLEE
No one believed
that what mattered here was fields
barley flooded and docile
the persistence of gopher
the ambition of weed
Jon Veinberg, "Terra Bella"
The anthology, Highway 99: A Literary Journey Through California's Central Valley, has just gone through a fourth printing. Even after a year of readings, reading and discussion sessions, and interviews with thirteen Valley writers, the anthology continues to inspire exhibits and events testifying to the importance of the literary imagination in shaping regional identity.
Highway 99 was hailed as "eloquent testimony to the telluric powers of place," and people came to learn about the Central Valley's spectacular natural history of wild rivers and flyways, to hear about its human and cultural diversity, to reflect on its bittersweet narrative of migration and labor, and to express their desperation to preserve both its natural and invented gardens.
Residents of the San Joaquin Valley will have two more opportunities to exercise their literary and bioregional imaginations. Two exhibits, "Hardworking Rivers: The Streams and Wetlands of San Joaquin County," and "The Voices and Faces of Highway 99," will open in early January and mid-February, respectively, in Merced.
"Hardworking Rivers" will feature the black and white landscape photography of Modesto photographer Roman Loranc. The focus will be local wetlands, rivers, and restoration efforts, many of them at the San Luis National Wildlife Refuge in Merced County. In an adjacent gallery will be the color wildlife photography of Gary Zahm, U. S. Fish & Wildlife's Project Leader for the Grasslands Ecological Preserve. Zahm's photos are noted for capturing the exhilirating densities of wildfowl, resident and migratory, that animate area refuges.
Both exhibits are part of a public education campaign whose goal is to encourage area residents to become familiar with and value the singularity of Central Valley wetlands shadowing the Pacific Flyway, corridor to hundreds of thousands of migratory geese and ducks, including the entire population of Aleutian Canada geese. The exhibits will include other activities, such as a lecture on wetlands and tours of refuges, and will culminate in the Wild on Wetlands (WOW) weekend (March 13-15) organized by the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Los Banos. The wetland exhibits will be on display at the Merced County Arts Council Center on Main Street in downtown Merced through March (for further information please contact Joan Sortini, (203) 388-2090 ).
The second exhibit, "Voices and Faces of Highway 99," funded by the California Council for the Humanities and curated by Andrea Metz of the Merced County Courthouse Museum, will open in mid-February and travel in the spring to Lodi, Tulare, and Bakersfield. This exhibit will feature historical photos from the museums of all four cities and contemporary portraits by Merced photographer Roger J. Wynan. The "voices" of the exhibit will range from familiar selections from the Highway 99 anthology to additional texts by authors such as Jean Janzen (see sample below), Omar Salinas, David Mas Masumoto, and Wendy Rose, just to name a few. Wilma Elizabeth McDaniel, Poet Laureate of Tulare, whose work will also be included, will give a reading of her work along with other area writers at the Merced County Courthouse Museum on Sunday, March 8.
If it is true that places die first in the imagination, then perhaps we still have a chance in the Central Valley. In spite of tremendous population and development pressures, the place with all of its human and natural richness is alive and well in the human imagination; if only we could summon as much regional affection and political will as we have literary energy!
As State Librarian Kevin Starr has remarked, the nineteenth century belonged to San Francisco, the twentieth to Los Angeles, and the twenty-first could belong to the Great Central Valley. Perhaps the critical question is whether or not Valley residents will be able to live up to their literature. Will the values embodied in Highway 99--a tenderness for the defeated, a love of the land in its natural and invented forms, an unblinking view of those who have labored and sacrificed on it, and lamentations that we have not done better by a place that has been endlessly accomodating--work their way into our daily acts?
I think a lot about the white pelicans that residents of the Tulare basin tell me still circle, circle, looking for Tulare Lake, once the largest freshwater lake west of the Mississippi. A lake whose shores were inhabited by native peoples for 6,000 years was gone in little more than a century. It died first in the imagination and the distinctive identity of the Tulare Basin died with it.
I would like to think that we can live up to the literature. I would like to think that the pelicans still looking for Tulare Lake are signalling to us a memory of place deeper than our own. I remember the pelicans and the words of poet Wislawa Szymborska at the same time: "My faith is strong, blind, and without foundation."
Among Orange Trees
By JEAN JANTZEN
Today in the orange grove across the street
A man parked his car and pounded his fists
Into a woman. She sat swollen with her unborn,
Guarding her face and belly in a jerking dance;
The March grass stood green around them
And the sun was high. What had he lost
In this fertile season, falling and rotten in the furrows?
All afternoon the trees glowed boldly in their satin leaves,
And I wondered how tenderness is born and kept.
I remembered my father caressing my mother,
His calm responses to trouble. How once
Someone paid his way to California, and when we met him
At the train depot, he reached into his satchel
For a small bottle of cologne which I have kept
Unopened to this day. From the crushed orange blossoms,
He said, as he opened my hand and put it there.
Local Poet and Calligrapher Join Talents
Now showing (Jan 19 thru February) at The Modesto County Library is sponsoring the poetry of Lee Nicholson and the Calligraphy of Jean McKeon. The exhibt is entitled: Twelve Witnesses on Behalf of Plants.
Twelve pieces consider twelve poets: Dickinson, Yeats, Stein, Eliot, Plath, Dante, Burns, Blake, Wilde, Porter, Soto and Angelou.
Calligrapher Jean McKeon has taken local poet Lee Nicholson's text-musings and translated them into another form, via her various languages of calligraphy. She has parelleled the words with her visual styles, expanding their complexity. Says Nicholson: "What emerges from this fusion, for the careful reader, is a bee-pasture in the mind, buzzing, we hope."
Lee Nicholson, an instructor at Modesto Junior College, has sonnets included in *Highway 99: A Literary Journey through California's Great Central Valley*, published in 1995. Jean McKeon's studio is the Writing Well in Modesto and she has work in Berkeley's VIVA GALLERY.
By DON MCMILLAN
Longtime International Workers of the World (IWW) member, singer, tramp and folklorist, Utah Phillips, makes the struggle for workers' rights and dignity entertaining. His show, "Loafer's Glory: Hobo Jungle of the Mind," airs weekly Sunday evenings at 5 on KPFA. While bringing an eclectic mix of history, tall tales, taped sessions of seldom-heard folk musicians, personal recollections, and sound effects to his broadcast, Phillips never strays far from his unifying thread, an admiration for the wit and tenacity to be found among working folk. As down-home as Walt Whitman, Phillips stitches a populist patchwork of America and particularly of the western states that inspires pride, not in the wars the state has fought, not in the environmental degradation centuries of pillage have left, nor in the fortunes of those who profited, but in plainer folks who survived.
At once passionate and knowledgeable, Phillips salvages a heritage and a present for this country from a scrap heap neglected by historians and journalists who mostly laud the feats of those who own the machinery and employ those Phillips celebrates. While listening to his show, one could hardly doubt Phillips' affinity with common folk; nonetheless, because, like the owner- and employer-dominated historians and journalists, Phillips tends to ignore rather than denigrate members of other groups. His show is more likely to foster respect for those he represents than to spark alienation and hostility. When allied governments and journalists adulate those who have concentrated the most wealth and scramble to free these winners to dicker for the cheapest labor, messages like Utah Phillips'--fostering appreciation for the traditions and continuing spunk of those who survive in spite of the billionaires' march toward ever greater consolidation of power--are essential but mostly absent from media licensed to serve the public interest.
Phillips has recorded for the Rounder, Red House, Alcazar, and Smokestack labels.
Yo, anyone at KUOP tuned in to this, one of your local community-supported print counterparts? KPFA doesn't exactly boom in the northern San Joaquin Valley. Your station might bring Phillips' important perspective to your listening area. You already carry plenty of programming that honors this era's capitalist winners: "I'm Doreen McAlister with this NPR business update É," To feature a countering perspective in the piquant way Phillips presents it would not only help to balance your programming but demonstrate your openness to diverse voices in an atmosphere of respect. You're not afraid McDonald's or Albertsons or Long John Silver's would withdraw support of Metro Traffic if you broadcast a labor advocate who protested the Gulf War by refusing to drive, are you?
ACTION: With some effort at positioning your FM aerial, you may be able to tune in KPFA at 94.1 MHz with a somewhat static-plagued but mostly intelligible signal. From southern Stanislaus County southward, you may have better luck tuning in KPFA's satellite, KFCF Fresno at 88.1 MHz. For more information on Utah Phillips, check his web site at www.hidwater.com/utah/ or phone (800) 989--DUCK and request information on Utah Phillips' "Loafer's Glory." KUOP's phone number is (800) 800--KUOP.
Recycling Revisited: Stanislaus County's Status
Compiled by Myrtle Osner and Indira Clark
During the late 1980s, the California State Legislature became concerned that some cities were running out of landfill space. In 1990, AB 939 was passed, mandating that counties and cities reduce their waste (garbage) stream by 25 percent by 1995 and 50 percent by the year 2000.
How are we doing in Stanislaus County?
Turlock: The Cadillac of Recycling
Turlock started its system several years ago with three cans, a blue one (68 gallons) for all recyclables, a green one (105 gallons) for yard waste, and a 33 gallon toter for all other garbage.
Tom Farr, Staff services analyst for Turlock Municipal Services, said that their system is considered the premier recycling program in the Central Valley, separating at the source the various components. This keeps the recyclables clean. The different can sizes innovatively represent the percentage of each portion in Turlock's total solid waste.
Problems exist occasionally in a mobile society. Newcomers don't get the message about how to separate their trash. Constant education is necessary. On the positive side is the ability to recycle many different items by having a separate can.
Turlock is well on its way to meeting the goals of the state; they are now up to a 43 percent diversion rate. (State law requires 50 percent by 2000.)
Farr cautioned, as did Richard Gilton of Modesto's Gilton Solid Waste, that recycling is a market-driven business. No matter how much residents sort their garbage, if there is no market for the items, they will not be sold and reused. All garbage haulers have limited storage space.
Mr. Farr's comments on composting were also interesting: "As time goes on, people will learn the value of using compost in their gardens, and recognize how good for the soil it is." Currently, Turlock Scavenger Co. disks the green waste under on property they own or lease. Sale of compost is not feasible unless there is a regional facility for marketing, Farr believes.
In a recent program sponsored by the California Alliance for Family Farmers, several speakers lauded the value of compost on their farms, reducing the need for fertilizers, adding biological elements, and lightening heavy and sandy soils.
-- Myrtle Osner
Ceres Closes the Loop
Kay Dunkel, head of recycling for the City of Ceres, is pleased that the leaves and limbs collected in the city's fall curbside pickup program are once again being composted. For the first time, Ceres' green waste is going to the Modesto Composting Facility and will be returned for residents to use. The city's recycling committee is currently working on the details for distributing this compost.
According to Ceres resident Allison Boucher, the downside is that during the rest of the yea, yard waste goes into the regular dumpster along with the non-recyclables and ends up at the county incinerator.
Boucher, however, is enthusiastic about Ceres' on-going curbside recycling which includes glass, plastic, aluminum, and paper, including cardboard. "They even take my junk mail," she says.
Dunkel is pleased with a pilot program involving 500 homes in an automated pick-up program which has increased recycling by 33 percent in the test area. Residents are provided with a second black toter bearing a recycling label. All recyclables are tossed in, unsorted. This is picked up every other week. Another 450 homes have just been added, bringing this pilot program to 11 percent of city homes. Dunkel has applied for a Department of Conservation grant to fund the program for the rest of Ceres residents.
-- Indira Clark
Buckets for the Eastside
The recycling programs of eastern Stanislaus communities are being enhanced with the addition of recycling buckets to regular curbside residential pick-up. According to Michele Sackman of the Stanislaus County Department of Environmental Resources, a grant of $32,000 from the California Department of Conservation was made to purchase l9,856 recycling buckets for Denair, Hughson, Waterford, Empire, Hickman, and La Grange. Each household is receiving four buckets and instructions for separating food cans, aluminum cans, plastic milk jugs and soda bottles, newspapers, glass bottles and jars. Used oil will also be picket up.
"In the spirit of closing the loop and purchasing
recycled products, the Department. was able to locate and
purchase some off-specification industrial buckets which
otherwise might have been trashed at the landfill or
incinerator," said Sackman.
"Willie (Will He) Recycle" chosen as new mascot
The buckets for the new eastside recycling program are decorated with the new countywide recycling cartoon mascot character. A contest to name the mascot received 684 entries from school children. The Solid Waste Local Task Force selected Heather Fletcher's submission for first place. The Teel Middle School seventh grader was awarded a $200 savings bond provided by the Stanislaus Disposal Association with $100 savings bonds for the four runners-up.
The contest was sponsored by the Stanislaus County Department of Environmental Resources, the Stanislaus County Office of Education, the Stanislaus Disposal Association, and the cities of Hughson, Ceres, Newman, Oakdale, Patterson, Riverbank, Turlock, and Waterford.
-- Indira Clark.
Modesto System Changes; Residents Dissatisfied
Modesto was the first city in the United States to institute residential curbside recycling. Started by Ecology Action Educational Institute a quarter of a century ago, for the past decade the garbage companies have been picking up separate buckets of sorted recyclables in special trucks with three compartments. A separate truck picked up garbage can or toter contents.
Beginning in February l997, residents were told to quit sorting. All recyclables were to be tossed into blue garbage bags and then into the regular toter with all other garbage - except yard waste. For the first time, a separate toter was provided for green waste.
The separation of green waste was applauded, the blue bags were booed.
The rationale for this change is driven by the state law requiring 50 percent diversion of solid waste by 2000, and green waste is far and away the largest portion of residential garbage. It must, however, be uncontaminated (by other garbage) to be compostable. In addition, traditionally Modesto's street drains have frequently been plugged in summer by grass clippings placed in the street awaiting garbage company collection. The green toters have contributed much to clean streets, less flooding, and resident satisfaction.
Also, nearly all the county's solid waste has been burned in an incinerator, albeit one of the first in the country to meet current standards for clean air emissions. The waste-to-energy plant produces mega-watts of electricity as a by-product and does not pollute the air. Diverting the large amount of green waste from the incinerator improves its burning efficiency substantially.
When asked about how successful the new garbage collection system is, Karen Rodrigues, Recycling Coordinator said that she was not hired until July, well after the system began, and that eight months is not sufficient time to judge its success. Diversion rates for recyclables will not be available until early 1998. However, she assures us that, because of the removal of green waste, we are right on target to meet the state mandate by 2000.
Richard Gilton of Gilton Solid Waste stated that the new system gives him more flexibility to respond to demand for some items for which there may be only sporadic markets. It allows more types of recyclables to be separated out; the old system was limited by the three compartments on the recycling trucks. He suggested that manufacturers must make more items out of recyclables if markets are to increase.
-- Myrtle Osner
Sierra Club Asks Modesto City Council for Changes In Recycling Program
(This letter to the Council appeared in *The Modesto Bee* and was mailed to all Council members. Ann Ralph submitted it for the Sierra Club and Ecology Action)
It's been almost a year since the city instituted the blue bag recycling program. As the Sierra Club and Ecology Action anticipated, recycling efforts have dropped sharply--to levels inconsistent with Modesto's history and commitment to a strong recycling program. While we commend the ongoing efforts to improve the program, it's time for both a public accounting and a detailed prescription for improving both recovery of material and citizen participation.
With waste disposal companies only responsible for a 2% return on recyclables and recycling dependent on markets, we have little assurance that material in blue bags will be recycled at all. We have formally endorsed the following adjustments to the city's current garbage management and recycling program:
* The diversion percentage of material recycled, excluding green waste, should be increased from the two percent required now to at least twenty percent
* Material defined by the city as recyclable and appropriately contained in blue bags must be recycled, current value notwithstanding.
* "Waste to energy" incineration is a separate type of garbage management and should not be considered recycling.
* To encourage the generation of less trash, a small can option with reduced garbage rates should be offered.
* A toxic waste pick-up should be offered at least twice a year.
* To discourage illegal dumping, curbside pick-up for large items should be offered at least twice a year or the public should be allowed free use of the landfill on a similar schedule.
* Efforts should be made to educate all segments of the population, including businesses, organizations and school children, with emphasis on source reduction, reuse, and consumer use of recycled materials.
* The City Council should present a public progress report at
least every six months until the city meets the fifty percent
reduction mandated by state law.
ACTION: Recycle, wherever you live, but also practice pre-cycling by considering what you buy and its packaging, before you buy.
Put only recyclables in the blue bags or the buckets or the blue toters. Resist the urge to use them for garbage. Keep green waste clean, no plastic, paper, etc., only yard waste goes in green cans.
By DAN & BARBARA POLLOCK
Dear Friends and Fellow Gardeners,
As you know, I have for years urged people to consider alternatives to chemical pesticides when confronting a pest problem in the garden. One of the problems for those of us who want to grow organic gardens, has been the lack of support from the universities and the chemical companies in the development of alternatives to the use of petro-chemical pesticides.
Perhaps the issues of liability, environmental concerns, and human health have prompted the universities and the chemical industry to find more biologically sound materials for use by the farmer and the consumer. Although there is a long way to go in the development of chemical pesticides alternatives, some progress is being made.
There is a new biological insecticide on the market called 'Success' formulated by a DowElanco microbiologist who found the active ingredient 'Spinsodad' in soil at an abandoned rum still in the Caribbean. Similar to Bacillus thuringiensis (BT) which has been around for many years, it targets chewing worms such as beet army worm, diamondback moth, and cabbage loopers, but will also control leafminers and thrips in citrus. One of the big differences in effectiveness between the bacterium in 'Success' and 'BT' is that 'Success' is absorbed by the insect pest on contact and is thereby able to control worms in all the stages of larval growth. BT must be ingested by worms that have a developed gut. There are cautions regarding 'Success' and insect resistance, and growers are being urged to use other materials in rotation with 'Success'. There is also some concern that 'Success' will kill some of the good parasites and that BT should be used in rotation to protect the beneficials. Regardless of the downsides, a naturally occurring bacteria like 'Success' is a far cry from the use of organo-phosphates in the control of lepidopterous insects.
I haven't checked to see if it's available yet, but DowElanco also manufactures a product called 'Conserve SC' which has the same active ingredient in 'Success' and is formulated for worms in turf and ornamentals. I have requested more information and will keep you posted.
More good news: a team of USDA Agricultural Research Scientists (ARS) have found that the venom from a tiny parasitic wasp Euplectrus comstockii is deadly to many serious plant pests, cotton boll weevil, fall armyworm, cabbage loopers, and European corn borer. The wasp venom causes insects to stop molting and development causing death. The ARS are trying to find a virus as a way to carry the venom to the destructive insects.
More and more biological pesticides are being reviewed for registration by CAL/EPA and The Department of Pesticide Registration, and while this seems good, our goal should be to foster a natural balance within our gardens, creating a harmonious and healthy accord between the plants and insects and all who live and die there. The application of any pesticide should only be the last resort when all else fails.
Barbara and I wish all of you a New Year filled with happiness, health and beautiful gardens.
By JIM HIGGS
Best Wishes for a peaceful, active new year, dear readers!
I am writing this during finals for the Fall semester at Modesto Junior College. One of the most difficult issues to "instruct" to my students is the fact that our society has lied to them. The environmental issues are seldom dealt with in schools, unless students are taking ecology or environmental courses. In my English 103 course, Writing and Critical Thinking, I have used two books which made a major impact upon the thinking of the students. They are: Al Gore's book, Earth In The Balance:
Ecology and the Human Spirit and John Kenneth Galbraith's The Culture of Contentment .
One student wrote: "Since 1971, at least five potential threats to the ozone layer have been identified. They are: the supersonic transports (SSTs), the space shuttle, nuclear war, bromides, and chloroflourocarbons (CFCs)."(Between Earth and Sky by Seth Cagin and Philip Dray, Pantheon Books, 1993.) She goes on to itemize ways we have ignored these conditions. We are leaving our students, our children and our grandchildren a tragic legacy. The abalone off the California coast are depleted; farming has its share of responsibility for our plight and corporations such as the Modesto Tallow works ignore laws and regulations and pouring bones, feathers and rancid fats into the Tuolumne River.
Both Gore's and Galbraith's books talk about choices. Gore illustrates the climatic changes throughout history and their effect upon human civilization. Later on, he talks about a Global Marshall Plan which would have countries pay for the necessary and long delayed repair work. Galbraith makes a very convincing case for a culture that values contentment beyond anything else. Both the upper and middle classes want fewer taxes and more ability to save, spend and squander. He posits that we pretend we are a classless society that has equal opportunity for all. He persuasively and articulately proves just the opposite. Money is necessary in order to make money. Capitalism requires that the "underclass" do the menial work for subsistence and below subsistence wages and the corporations and the well-off rake in the profits. He further refers to "bureaucrats" as those functionaries who work with the poor. The term " bureaucrat" is never used to refer to managers or CEOs of corporations. They are "entrepreneurs".
The recent global warming summit in Kyoto where some one hundred and fifty nations met to determine how to reduce and eventually eradicate greenhouse effects ended with an abysmal, watered down agreement. A day or two after that, there was a front page Modesto Bee article about the problems in farming, specifically in the dairy industry. On that same front page was an article from the National Dairy Association in which a spokesperson denied that the greenhouse effect even existed. The spokesperson went on to explain that any regulation of the dairy industry would be a disaster and the ruination of dairies.
I would only comment that if we are to solve our environmental problems, ALL of us are going to suffer. Milk and meat prices might well soar. Gasoline prices might well become prohibitive for many if not most. I believe, along with auteurs Gore and Galbraith that we will not solve these tragic problems until we have a populace that is willing to change national priorities. Only when we decommission the military-industrial complex, only when we regulate and properly tax both corporations and those individuals who make their millions from corporate and small business profits will we have the income to hire the regulators and tax the wealthy. The current system is an unfair one. The wealthy do not pay appropriate taxes and the poor are soon to be without either subsistence or healthcare. Eventually, there will be a revolt and it will be a horror. Many of us dare not go into sections of major cities throughout the world. Cruise ships (ugh!) take people to safe enclosures and warn about wandering too far into those areas where the "underclasses" grovel. Is this what we want to leave for our children and grandchildren? I say no.
Happy New Year. Let's get to work!
1. Abolitionist and Retentionist Countries
Amnesty International's latest information shows that:
* 58 countries and territories have abolished the death penalty for all crimes
* 15 countries have abolished the death penalty for all but exceptional crimes such as wartime crimes
* 26 countries can be considered abolitionist de facto: they retain the death penalty in law but have not carried out any executions for the past 10 years or more making a total of 99 countries which have abolished the death penalty in law or practice.
* 94 other countries retain and use the death penalty, but the
number of countries which actually execute prisoners in any one
year is much smaller.
2. Death Sentences and Executions
During 1996, 5,139 prisoners are known to have been executed in 39 countries and 7,107 sentenced to death in 76 countries. These figures include only cases known to AI; the true figures are certainly higher.
As in previous years, a small number of countries accounted for the vast majority of executions recorded. AI received reports of 4,367 executions in China, 167 executions in Ukraine, 140 executions in the Russian Federation and 110 executions in Iran. These four countries alone accounted for 93% of all executions recorded by AI worldwide in 1996. AI also received unconfirmed reports of 123 executions in Turkmenistan. AI received reports of numerous executions in Iraq but was unable to confirm most of these reports or to give an exact figure.
Stanislaus County's persistent unemployment studied
Excerpted from Center for Public Policy Studies press releases
Striving to become the premier applied policy research and public education center in the area, California State University, Stanislaus (CSUS) has established the Center for Public Policy Studies (CPPS). CSUS believes it is time to extend its services to the region by utilizing the talents of the faculty to assist policy makers and residents in the northern San Joaquin Valley and the University's six-county attendance area to better understand such critical issues as land use, economic development, population growth, and job training, according to Dr. Steven Hughes, CPPS Director and a Politics/Public Administration Professor.
A faculty research team with the CPPS is currently conducting a major study of unemployment and economic growth in Stanislaus County. The research, funded by the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors, addresses four interrelated topics: (1) the reasons for high unemployment; (2) the characteristics of the unemployed; (3) the anomaly between high unemployment and fast-paced employment growth; and (4) the characteristics of social service recipients who will enter the labor force as a result of welfare reform.
By addressing these matters, the research team will be in a position to increase public understanding, inform policy-makers, and provide officials with appropriate policy options. There is widespread interest in this project because it is considered an important step in the design of cost-effective employment, unemployment, and welfare reform.
CPPS is currently studying business needs and expectations in Stanislaus County. A survey has been mailed to businesses and organizations covering a number of topics, including job-related skills, hiring expectations, job training, unemployment, and welfare reform.
ACTION: For information, contact the Center for Public Policy Studies, CSUS, 801 W. Monte Vista Ave., Turlock, CA 95382, phone (209) 667-3359, or fax (209) 667-3724.
-- Edited by Indira Clark
University Professors and Staff Offer Expertise
By INDIRA CLARK
Need a speaker for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day? Women's History Month?
Earth Day? Local land use issues?
California State University, Stanislaus professors and staff are available to speak at events on a variety of topics and comment on a number of current events.
As guest speakers they can "provide information about important issues ranging from world affairs, the economy, lifestyles, and social issues to science and other topics of public interest," said Dr. Walter Strong, Vice President for Development and University Relations.
The University's new Speakers Bureau Guide is designed as part of a community relations program in the University's six-county region. More than 30 topics are listed, according to Don Hansen of University Communication, and honoraria are reasonable. "Many speakers will come for a meal and the use of a slide projector," he said.
Arrangements can be made by contacting the individuals through listings in the guide. "All carry full-time loads," Hansen cautions, "so the number of speaking engagements they can make is usually limited and requires that arrangements be made well in advance of the scheduled date.
ACTION: For information about the Speakers Bureau and the guide, phone CSUS University Communication, (209) 667-3391.
Crosswalks, Fareboxes, and Handlebars
By DON MCMILLAN
Your turn!
I would like to run one of this series of articles with short contributions from CONNECTIONS readers. Here's what I'd most like to run in the February issue:
Reader comments about how they get around Modesto or elsewhere in the county without cars. Submissions should be short (50 words or less) and may be edited for style, taste, or length.
Some questions you might address would be: What are some of the best streets for bicycling? How have you found public transportation recently? Has it gotten better or has it deteriorated? What changes would you want to make to transit scheduling? How would you rate your neighborhood for your ability to get around on foot? What services are you able to reach within an easy walk? What employers, businesses, houses of worship, and government agencies have made it easy for you to arrive other than by car? What are the biggest hazards you face getting around by foot, wheelchair, bus, or bike?
Action: send your wit, praise, or gripes to me at P.O. Box 4501, Modesto CA 95352-4501 (please include return address, signature, and phone number) or by email<mcmillan@ainet.com> (again I need to know your snail address and phone number) or phone 523--8871. If you'd like to make your city or neighborhood more accessible without adding to congestion, pollution, and sprawl by driving, contribute here!
Community Garden Equals Healthy Lifestyle
By BARBARA ENITI
With the turn of the new year, the Modesto Garden Project will again offer fresh healthy locally grown organic vegetables to the general public. The winter greens which thrive in the garden during this season include lettuce, Swiss chard, beets, carrots, and of course the cabbage family - broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, kale, collards and turnips. All are recommended for a healthy lifestyle and some should be included in each day's five servings of vegetables.
The Garden Project is four years old now - incorporated as a non-profit organization designed to train disadvantaged persons to become self-sufficient with a marketable skill which will also provide them with good nourishing food. Hands-on instruction is provided through the care of an organic garden, and the food produced is made available to the public through the sale of shares in the garden. This share money is used to provide salaries for trainees (earn while you learn).
We feel the need to work with nature to replenish rather than deplete the earth's soil, and do this through the use of our compost (made on site) in lieu of chemical fertilizer. No pesticides, synthetic fertilizers, fungicides nor fumigants are used in our garden, thus eliminating their presence in the soil and water as well as in the foods we grow. A commitment to organic farming means a healthier planet for all of us.
Shares in this organic garden are available to Stanislaus County residents on a sliding scale which runs from as little as $5 per week for a person who picks his/her own vegetables to $22 per week for a large family-sized share picked by the staff and delivered to your door the same day. A seasonal variety of herbs and cut flowers may be included, and some fruit is harvested during the summer. Excess production is given to the Salvation Army for their noon meals program for the homeless.
ACTION: Participate in this training program by reserving a share in the garden's bounty. For information, call 604-6011 during weekday working hours, or Jan at 572-3622, evenings or weekends.
Sketch of late auto age: book review
By DON MCMILLAN
Jane Holtz Kay. *Asphalt Nation: How the Automobile Took Over America and How We Can Take It Back*. New York: Crown, 1997. 418 pages.
With a bag full of books Yesterday's Books couldn't use over my shoulder I would scarcely have undertaken the walk to donate the books at the Hope Chest thrift store if my memory's map hadn't misplaced the latter a stone's throw from the McHenry-Standiford-Sylvan intersection. Nor would I have strayed into the concrete maze of a car wash.
While the bag's straps cut deeper into my shoulder, I traversed more parking lots and a used car lot. The width of the sidewalk I followed up McHenry lent an impression of emptiness, even though I did count some eight people on foot there and on side streets. A telephone service worker in orange union suit crouched in a hole as wide as the sidewalk, leaving detours only across bark mulch to the east or tarmac to the west. Like scutes of some post-industrial dragon, the descending belly of evening fog glared with silver mercury-vapor lamplight and yellow-orange sodium vapor light. Across seven lanes of heavy traffic and a wide parking lot, fluorescent-backed plastic signs of Circuit City and Barnes and Noble might have been harbor lights on the horizon taunting my life raft without motor, oars, or sail, if I had cared to reach them.
My dissatisfaction with the waste of land, money, and sense of community that this setting evokes has multiplied since reading Kay's diatribe on automobile-dependent culture. I have been sensitized to the injustice of a system that easily exacts more than $10,000 as an initial investment in mobility, excluding those without the means. Now I look carefully for ways public thoroughfares are engineered to make way for more cars while erecting barriers for those who rely on non-automotive transportation. Modesto has repeatedly vindicated Kay's vision, though hardly alone among American cities.
Many who have grown up steeped in car-favoring propaganda launched by interests from automakers--and allied industries--to governments will find Kay's dissection and refutation of prevailing wisdom shocking if not a touch revolutionary and liberating. In place of photos celebrating plush interiors, Kay portrays the automobile as a mobile "pollution machine," documenting, beyond the obvious fuel and oil, a gamut of toxins used in such diverse things as seats and brake pads. But the awareness of environmental degradation she transmits is not limited to the hulk between bumpers.
An architecture critic, Kay dwells to considerable length on how building cities for automotive access above all else has gutted their capacities for vibrant civic and communal life. Not only public places have been overrun by the categorical imperative to increase roads' traffic capacity, private spaces, too, have suffered the invasion. Homes have become in her view little more than taxi stations where harried parents pick up and drop off children whose mobility is restricted by dangerous rivers of traffic. People who, through aging, have lost driving privileges lead isolated lives often with little company but the TV set in Kay's "nation in lifelock." Even those lucky enough to be mobile rely on gadgets--tape and CD players, cell phones, and cup holders--to salve the isolation of long hours in traffic.
The book's prose sparkles with the author's verbal playfulness. Ironic twists often catapult from catch phrases: a familiar song gives punch to the subhead "At Home as We Range" for a section describing how Americans personalize auto interiors, reflecting the inordinate time they spend restrained there. In the same section Kay plays on an epithet for desert pack animals: "the car has become the ship of the highway desert." Bread and circuses, used to placate the Roman Empire's masses, becomes in Kay-portrayed megamalls "overwrought cake and circuses within."
Perhaps not intentional but engaging nonetheless is Kay's frequent alliteration which escaped notice until my second reading. Especially potent is her repetition of b-sounds: "a series of bigger-than-ever boxes bound by asphalt."
Sometimes Kay provides grist for resistant readers' mills. For example, she states that the trash from fast-food restaurants equals the amount of oil transported through the Alaska oil pipeline. This claim lacks anchors in specificity. Does it mean that the petrochemicals that make up the refuse equal the amount of oil through the pipeline? Or does it mean that manufacturing the trash requires as much potential energy as the pipeline transmits? Does it mean that Americans litter their highways daily with as much fast-food trash as could be produced by the pipeline's resources pumped in the same day?
New England-based Kay appears to idolize pre-automobile European-American settlements. "By duplicating the style and density of three hundred years of settlement before the car was dominant, we might live and move in harmony." Frequent allusions to frontiers pepper the book. Her vision doesn't appear to extend to ideas for communities held by descendants of cultures displaced by those of us who "settled" their land. Indigenous cultures have survived on this continent far longer than immigrant settlement frontiers. In their wisdom might reside remedies to current cultural ailments.
Shortcomings notwithstanding, the book offers those who find more trouble than joy in automobile dependence plenty of encouragement. Based on research not constrained by academic field, it provides widespread leads to relevant knowledge. In the peroration set off by the book's last subhead, Kay's rhetoric peaks in hypnotic cadences that goaded me to read aloud both times. "From weary commuters and shop-and-drop wheel spinners to environmentalists and preservationists, from advocates for walking and biking to local and national politicians É malcontents in our autocentric environment multiply. And we must list and enlist ourselves among them." This appeal for unity in a cyclone of auto-induced isolation epitomizes what makes this book one to read and treasure.
By TINA ARNOPOLE DRISKILL
The Institute of Noetic Sciences and the Fetzer Institute are making $50,000 in funds available in 1998 "to support projects which use "art as a transformational and healing tool for individuals, communities and the environment."
The purposes of the Arts and Healing Community Grants Program are: To support projects that explore the interconnectedness between art, healing and community; to acknowledge the integral role that arts can play in addressing identified needs within a community.
to recognize the artist as a creative source for change; to encourage the creative partnerships between individual artists and cultural, educational or healthcare organizations and businesses in their communities; to enable artists to serve their communities and, in so doing, to awaken the collective spirit from which societal healing can take place.
The $1,000 to $5,000 grants will be awarded to individual artist(s) who are US citizens, at least 18 years of age and whose projects have art and healing as their primary focus, are experiential in nature, actively engage a specified community, and benefit and be accessible to the public. The Noetic Sciences (IONS), founded in 1973, is a research foundation and educational institution which focuses on the noetic sciences "interdisciplinary study of the mind, consciousness and diverse ways of knowing, focused especially in the fields of science, mind-body health, psychology, the healing arts and sciences, the social sciences and spirituality."
"The Fetzer Institute is a nonprofit private operating foundation that supports research and education exploring the relationship of the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual dimensions of life" with a "special interest in how health and healing are influenced by the interaction of body, mind and spirit and how understanding in this area can improve health, foster growth, and better the human condition.
Action: To obtain an application, which is due by Jan. 30,1998, write: The Institute of Noetic Sciences, 475 Gate Five Road, Suite 300, Sausalito, CA94965, attn. Arts & Healing Community Grants Program, or phone (415)
331-5650, FAX(415) 331-5673 or email to www.noetic.org
World Wide Web sites for activists
By JAMES COSTELLO
The internet is brimming with web sites useful to activists of all kinds. Below is a sampling taken from the Institute for Global Communication's recent newsletter. IGC, the world's leading network committed to disseminating information regarding social justice issues, will be profiled in a future issue.
Email and the internet have become vital tools in
communication. If you are not online yet, why not?
23rd National Conference on Women and the Law
http://www.womlaw.org/
Organized annually by women law students and law professors,
attorneys and judges, legal workers and activists, this feminist
Conference has been held twenty-two times between 1970 and 1990,
bringing thousands of women participants together to address
women's issues that relate to the law.
ACORN: The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now
http://www.acorn.org/community/
ACORN (The Association of Community Organizations for Reform
Now) is on the streets, in the neighborhoods, in the workplaces,
on the airwaves, and now on the World Wide Web, organizing and
building power for low and moderate-income Americans.
http://www.corpwatch.org
Corporate Watch is a website devoted to providing journalists,
activists, and everyday Internet users with tools to track,
analyse, and act on the activities of transnational corporations.
Their current Feature is "Blood, Sweat and Shears,"
which looks at sweatshops in the U.S. and around the world.
http://www.equalrights.org/
EQUAL RIGHTS ADVOCATES (ERA) is one of the country's oldest
and most respected women's law centers. Based in San Francisco,
ERA is dedicated to the empowerment of women through the
establishment of their economic, social and political equality.
The Farm: Life Inside a Women's Prison
http://www.igc.apc.org/thefarm/
The Farm: Life Inside A Women's Prison is one journalist's
view of women in prison, based on over two years with complete
access to the women's prison at Niantic, Connecticut. This site
includes excerpts from the book and an exhaustive list of links
involving women in prison.
http://www.fund.org/
The Fund for Animals was founded in 1967 by prominent author
and animal advocate Cleveland Amory. Dedicated "to speak for
those who can't", the Fund is now, and always has been, one
of the largest and most active organizations dedicated to the
cause of animals throughout the world.
http://www.igc.org/inkworks/
The site includes a brief history of this unique project (a
worker-owned and operated Union printshop serving the movements
for peace and social justice since 1974), a gallery of posters
they have produced over the years, news of exciting ongoing
publishing projects, and loads of useful technical information
about offset printing and digital file preparation.
International Project for Sustainable Energy Paths
http://www.ipsep.org/
The IPSEP web site is a haven for cutting-edge research on
energy and development policies that reduce carbon emissions
while saving money, boosting jobs, and improving economic output.
http://www.mwi.org/
Mediation Works Incorporated (MWI) is a non-profit dispute
resolution service and training organization dedicated to working
with individuals, communities, universities and corporations in
their efforts to understand and address conflict.
Oil, Chemical & Atomic Workers (OCAW)
http://www.ocaw.org/
OCAW, the union originally founded to represent oil and
chemical workers, has grown to include workers in a wide range of
energy, chemical, pharmaceutical, and allied industries.
On the Issues: The Progressive Woman's Quarterly
http://www.igc.org/onissues
On The Issues is an independent journal well known for its
fresh feminist thinking. In their current issue, read Phyllis
Chesler's story about Jewish women's struggle for the right to
pray at Jerusalem's Western Wall against fierce Orthodox
resistance.
http://www.ploughshares.org/
The Ploughshares Fund supports the efforts to build global
security in the nuclear age by providing financial support to the
best efforts they could identify among the many people and
organizations working to eliminate the threat of nuclear war and
weapons.
Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition
http://www.igc.apc.org/svtc/
Since 1982, Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition (SVTC) has worked
to document and expose the hazards of the high-tech industry and
to promote environmental and economic sustainability and
accountability in the electronics industry, the fastest growing
manufacturing sector in the world.
http://www.ufw.org/
For more than a century farmworkers had been denied a decent
life in the fields and communities of California's agricultural
valleys. The UFW is changing that.
Thanks to Dan Onorato for the idea for this article.
Emmy winning actor and activist to lead annual Martin Luther King Event
By JAMES COSTELLO
On April 29, 1992, Los Angeles erupted in a violent convulsion that would quickly be called, "The Los Angeles Riots." Many cannot forget the brutal beating of Reginald Denney, caught on videotape, as he was dragged from his vehicle at the chaotic corner of Florence and Normandy. What fewer know, however, was that a second person was savagely wrenched from his car at the same corner minutes later. While that man, a Japanese-American, was being kicked and beaten, a stranger stepped into the raging crowd and pulled him to safety. With the help of other ordinary people, nameless and seemingly unlikely "heroes," this rescuer made sure that this bleeding and severely injured human being made it to a hospital.
This stranger was actor GregAlan Williams, and out of this pivotal experience came his critically acclaimed book, A Gathering of Heroes, and a commitment to promoting justice and rebuilding communities.
GregAlan Williams, a riveting speaker and dramatist, will participate in a series of events culminating with the Fourth Annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Commemoration on Saturday, January 17, 1998 at the King-Kennedy Center, Modesto.
Mr. Williams will be the guest of honor at a reception at the Modesto City Hall multipurpose room on Thursday evening, January 15 from 5:00 to 7:30 p.m. On Friday the 16th, he will speak and engage students in a lively dialogue at Modesto High School in the morning and at Mark Twain Junior High School in the afternoon. In the late afternoon, he will meet with student activists and leaders.
On Saturday, the 17th, beginning at 8:30 a.m., GregAlan will lead the Martin Luther King Commemoration. Music, speech, and dialogue will highlight what promises to be a memorable program.
Mr. Williams is a recipient of the 1996 Anne Frank Humanitarian Award and first recipient of the Salem Award for Justice (1992) His most recent book is Boys to Men, Maps for the Journey.
After seven seasons as the only African American cast member of the successful television shows BAYWATCH and BAYWATCH NIGHTS, GregAlan left these in 1996 to pursue his own work in film, television and on the stage. This spring will see GregAlan opposite Mario Van Peebles and Ben Gazzarra in the feature film, STAG, and shortly thereafter, opposite Latina actress Maria Conchita-Alonzo in the action adventure TRUE BLUE.
GregAlan Williams' one man show, THE LIFE AND TIMES OF DEACON A.L. WILEY, continues to air on PBS and in 1994 was awarded the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame Award. This winter saw GregAlan reprise his performance as Dr. Martin Luther King in THE MEETING with Harry Lennix in Chicago. In addition to appearing in such films as IN THE LINE OF FIRE (with Clint Eastwood) and THE PACKAGE (with Gene Hackman) and on such television shows as L.A. LAW and THE FRESH PRINCE, GregAlan Williams received an Emmy Award for his performance in the made-for-television movie FAST BREAK TO GLORY (1985).
In addition to his acting and writing, Mr. Williams is the HIV/AIDS Education Spokesperson for the American Red Cross and a resource speaker for the education organization Facing History and Ourselves. He has also worked with many groups including Apple growers in Wenatchie, Washington, African American congregations in Atlanta, school kids in Newark, incarcerated boys in Minnesota, at-risk youth in Albuquerque, the Anti-Defamation League, the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS), the NAACP and the Urban League.
This free event is sponsored by: King-Kennedy
Memorial Center of the City of Modesto Parks and Recreation
Department, City of Modesto Human Relations Commission, Modesto
Peace/Life Center, Modesto Church of the Brethren, King-Kennedy
Memorial Center , the Martin Luther King, Jr. Committee, the
Modesto-Stanislaus NAACP, the Associated Students of Modesto
Junior College, and The Modesto Bee.
