Questions for the Public Advocate

The candidates for Public Advocate will be coming to CUNY Law this Tuesday. The Green Coalition has some questions for them (we sent these to the moderator; maybe they will get asked):

How can the public advocate connect the progressive local, sustainable food campaigns, cooperatives, CSAs, etc. and the city government to make the most nutritious and sustainable food options available for all of New Yorkers?

How can you as Public Advocate help to ensure that stimulus plan money, which is being directed at state and local governments, will be utilized effectively and in the service of the poor and minority communities of New York?

Can you comment on how stimulus funds for green jobs training would best be utilized to ensure that desperately needed pathways out of poverty are created?

Where are your economic development priorities and how can you connect them to the sustainability movement that is changing priorities within our federal, state and local governments such that long term ecological and social considerations share parity with economic planning?

Food Supply Chain Untraceable!

This article starts:
Most food manufacturers and distributors cannot identify the suppliers or recipients of their products despite federal rules that require them to do so, federal health investigators have found.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/26/health/policy/26fda.html?_r=1

Let's get busy!

Left Hook

Here's the lineup of 'green' panels for this year's Left Forum, which will be held at Pace University. I've been for the past couple years - its an eclectic mix of activists, intellectuals and concerned citizens looking to dialogue on contemporary issues from a left perspective - and that definitely means different things to pretty much everyone there.

ecology and environment

Capitalist Crisis, Energy and the Commons
The Debate Over Green Capitalism, Technofixes and Reforms
Reclaiming Life
Money, Barrels, and Change
Science for the People
Convergences and Strategies from the Emerging Global Climate Justice Movement
Building Sustainable Communities, Beyond Green and Into Social Sustainability
Overcoming Capitalist Ecological Degradation through Ecosocialism
Global Warming and Society- What changes should students fight for?
The Case Against Centralized Thermal (Nuclear and Coal) Power
Strategies for Addressing the Climate Change Crisis: A Challenge to the American Left
Withering Energies? Oil and the Financial Crisis
Yes We Will!: Organizing to Bring Real and Lasting Social and Environmental Justice

food

Political Economy of the Globalized Food System
Grow It, Sell It, Cook It, Serve It, Eat It: Sustainable Alternatives in Food Production, Preparation and Distribution
Food Sovereignty: Indigenous and People’s Control Over Their Own Food Production
The Food Democracy Movement: Organizing fo a Healthy, Sustainable, and Socially Just Food System

Queens Farm!

Can we take a field trip?
It's really close to school.

http://www.queensfarm.org/

Mr. Jones Goes to Washington

A heap of Appleseeds went to Reblaw this year at Yale and listened to Van Jones give the opening keynote address.

Van Jones has been a social justice advocate in the San Francisco Bay area for years and most recently focused his attention on supporting the green jobs movement as a pathway out of poverty for low-income people and minorities.

Now Mr. Jones is heading to the White House to work in the Obama administration.

You can check out commentary on the announcement here, here and here.

GMO seeds in Afghanistan and Iraq

Directing your attention to a brief up today at http://www.grain.org/briefings/?id=217

The soils of war

The real agenda behind agricultural reconstruction in Afghanistan and Iraq

GRAIN

In this Briefing, we look at how the US’s agricultural reconstruction work in Afghanistan and Iraq not only gives easy entry to US agribusiness and pushes neoliberal policies, something that has always been a primary function of US development assistance, but is also an intrinsic part of the US military campaign in these countries and the surrounding regions. Seen together with the growing clout that the US and its corporate allies exercise over donor agencies and global bodies – such as the World Bank, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) centres, which influence the food and farm policies adopted by the recipient countries – this is an alarming development. These are not unique cases born from unusual circumstances, but constitute a likely template for US activities overseas, as it continues to expand its “war on terror” and pursue US corporate interests.

Compost! Worms! At CUNY Law! In the Lounge!

Calling all composters!

Want to do something to minimize the amount of garbage you produce in your apartment? Come to the Green Coalition's Composting Workshop and find out how to compost right at home in NYC - Queens Botanical Gardens will even be selling the bins and materials you need to do this! And hear more about CUNY Law's composting program, beginning right after spring break, and find out how you can help.

When/Where: Thurs. March 12, SIT time (1-2:30), in the 2nd Floor Lounge

Feel free to pop in and out. See you there!

Lovely and Official

The Green Coalition was just listed on the CUNY School of Law website - and there's a link to this blog from there. CAUTION: This means that you can follow this link: http://www.law.cuny.edu/student/StudentLife/StudentOrganizations.html and link back to this blog and do that over and over and over until the end of life on this planet, which the Green Coalition is hoping to help extend for as long as ecologically possible. So, really, don't get trapped in the never ending hyperlink loop. Its just not healthy for you or the planet. That's free (completely non-legal) advice. You're welcome.