December 2015 Alabama Sierran

Watch your mail for the 2016 Alabama Chapter Ballots 

2016 Candidate Statements. Vote for four candidates. Members having joint or family memberships should vote twice using both columns on the ballot.
Members having a one person membership should vote once using only one of the voting columns.


Rob Burton
Burton grew up outside of NYC and moved to Birmingham, AL in 2008 to live with his family, who are native to Alabama. He grew up an avid hiker, which is where he grew a love for the outdoors. As a cystic fibrosis patient, after moving to Birmingham he began to experience increased health problems due to environmental pollution, in particular from coal fired power plants. This firsthand experience evolved into a deep passion to fight for environmental justice. While studying at UAB he became involved with the Green Initiative and the Black Warrior Riverkeeper to lead a campaign to stop Shepard Bend Mine, a conservation and clean water, environmental racism, and environmental classism campaign. He also became involved with the Greater Birmingham Alliance to Stop Pollution and he is a voice for people suffering firsthand from environmental pollution and environmental ableism. While at UAB, Burton attended Summer Grassroots Training (SPROG), a youth environmental organizer training hosted by the Sierra Student Coalition (SSC). The next summer Burton became a trainer for the Southeastern SPROG. These experiences began his interest and involvement with the Sierra Club, and had major impacts on his development as an environmental organizer. After his successes with CASE, the Coalition of Alabama Students for the Environment, he joined Magic City Agriculture Project as the first Executive Director. A member organization of the Alabama Rivers Alliance, MCAP is an organization focused on addressing environmental, racial, and economic justice through leading a just transition movement in Birmingham, Alabama. MCAP is a grassroots organization consisting of black, white, and brown leadership. In 2015 MCAP released a 10-Year Organizational Strategic Plan to build a base for a just transition to a sustainable Alabama.

Charlie Cohen
For the past 27 years, I have been living in Huntsville, where I have been hiking with the Sierra Club and earning my living as a scientist. I do research in meteorology, using and improving computer models of the atmosphere. For the past eight years, I have been leading hikes for the North Alabama Group. As treasurer for the Alabama Chapter for the past four years, I have been promoting environmental causes by handling the Alabama Chapter’s money.  This is an essential job.  I have enjoyed the support of the Executive Committee, and I would like to continue in this position.

Robert W. Hastings
Bob Hastings has been a member of the Alabama Chapter of the Sierra Club since January, 2002, and a member of the national club since 1982. He is a dedicated environmentalist and has been active in a number of environmental organizations, including the Sierra Club. He has been a member of the Alabama Chapter Executive Committee for several years and currently serves as Chair. For several years he served as the Chapter delegate to the National Council of Club Leaders. His major areas of concern relative to the Sierra Club are environmental justice, protection of natural habitats, and environmental education. He was recently honored by the National Sierra Club with a Special Service Award.

Among his other services in environmental issues, he has served for several years on the Gulf Restoration Network Board of Directors. He also is a member of the Alabama Wildlife Federation editorial board and a member of the Board of Directors for the Autauga Creek Improvement Committee in Prattville (where he resides with his wife Diana). As a retired marine biologist, Dr. Hastings has received numerous awards for environmental education, including the National Wetlands Award in Education/Outreach by the Environmental Law Institute in 2002. He continues to make educational presentations to schools, summer camps, and other groups, including the Sierra Club, on several environmental subjects, including the snakes of the southeast (as Dr. Bob’s Traveling Snake Show).

Adam Johnston
Adam Johnston currently works as the Alliance Coordinator for the Alabama Rivers Alliance (ARA).  He also volunteers for many groups including the Alabama Sierra Club where he is part of the state executive committee, the Cahaba group executive committee, and leader of the Alabama Sierra Club’s only outdoor youth program, Birmingham Inspiring Connections Outdoors (ICO). Adam graduated from Auburn University with a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science.  Upon graduation, Adam served the U.S. Peace Corps for 27 months in the Republic of Vanuatu with their Department of Forestry as a community forestry advisor in a remote, jungle village.  He returned back home to work several years in environmental education at McDowell Environmental until becoming part of the ARA family. Adam is an Alabama native, born and raised in the beautiful, northern portion of the Black Warrior watershed along Clear Creek. He is passionate about the preservation of our state’s natural resources and educating others about them.  In his free time, you may find him doing anything and everything outdoors including floating, fishing, bird watching, hiking, and playing soccer.

Casie Jones
As a Biology teacher and nature lover, I’ve made a commitment to be a life-long learner. Being a part of the Sierra Club has provided me with an opportunity to meet interesting people and learn new things about our amazingly diverse state. As I hike along admiring Alabama beauty, I have many times been deeply inspired by conservation-minded Sierra individuals and the spiritual connections that I experience with the surrounding natural world. As John Muir meaningfully stated, “ in every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks.” I am interested in finding ways to serve my state and protect the land and all of its adornments. I believe the Sierra club has the ability to make a positive impact on the environment and the citizens of Alabama.

Urge your senators to support keeping dirty fuels in the ground!

Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR) has unveiled a new bill that would keep dirty fuels in the ground where they belong. His bill would end all new leases of coal, oil and gas on our public lands, and end renewals for non-producing leases. It would also ban production of tar sands or oil shale on our public lands, and block new drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic, Pacific, and Arctic Oceans. In short, this bill represents a necessary first step towards what scientists tell us we need to do to avoid the most catastrophic impacts of climate change: we must keep between two-thirds and four-fifths of known fossil fuels in the ground, untouched, and unburned.

Of course this won't be easy to pass in a Congress in which so many politicians are bought-and-paid-for by the fossil fuel industry -- but that doesn't mean it's not a fight worth fighting. We need to show our elected officials that we want an end to business-as-usual, an end to selling off the right to drill, mine, and pollute our public lands for pennies. It's time we get our government out of the business of selling climate change. To do that, we need to get as many senators as possible to co-sponsor Senator Merkley's "Keep It In The Ground" bill. Click here to send a message.

Take a moment to tell your senators to act on climate and end dirty fuel leasing on public lands. Urge them to become a co-sponsor of Sen. Merkley's bill today!

Sierra Club is the nation's largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization.

 

Tell President Obama to protect our coasts from drilling

Five years after the BP Deepwater Horizon oil disaster -- the worst in American history -- the Gulf of Mexico still bears scars from this tragedy. Yet Big Oil is on the verge of getting the green light to drill off our coasts again.

The impacts of the Deepwater Horizon disaster are heartbreaking. Eleven people lost their lives after the drilling rig exploded. In the 87 days that followed, 210 million gallons of crude oil gushed from the ocean floor, harming communities and wildlife throughout the region. Years later, scientists have discovered another environmental consequence -- toxic crude oil from the spill blankets the Gulf floor and is slowly making its way up the food chain. Our communities, fragile coastal ecosystems, wildlife, and climate are too dear to risk again.

Now, Big Oil hopes to drill in the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans. Rather than invite another disaster, President Obama must usher in a new age -- where offshore drilling rigs are relics of the past and clean energy, like offshore wind, is our reality.

Send your letter today. Tell President Obama to keep our coasts off-limits to oil and gas drilling.

Send a message today!

PROCEDURE FOR SENDING MATERIAL TO THE ALABAMA SIERRAN

Many thanks to Roe Hyche, Bob Hastings, Lucina Horner, and Peggie Griffin for agreeing to be the new newsletter committee.

The newsletter is put together monthly, and material for the newsletter should be sent to plgriffin@comcast.net, with a subject line of "For the Editorial Board" no later than the 15th of the month.

Group newsletter editors may continue sending group meeting information and calendars of events to Joe Watts at joe@joewatts.com, no later than the 25th of each month.

Guidelines for Material:

  • The newsletter committee is seeking articles about Alabama environmental issues, articles highlighting Alabama’s special beautiful places, and engaging write-ups about group and chapter activities.
  • Articles should be originally written for the Alabama Sierran, factual, and timely.
  • A link to another publication should only be used rarely, but if a link is to be used, a full summary of the information (at least a paragraph long) should be written, with the link provided for more detailed information.
  • The newsletter committee has the right to make any changes, so that material will meet these guidelines.

Don't miss any of the outings and events across Alabama this month

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