Dear friends,
We have achieved Friday. The sky is blue and the trees are glorious.
This week, the mayor revised his budget proposal to include $35 million to
place food waste drop-off sites at every city school over the next two years.
As you may recall, Adams’s preliminary budget cut the expansion of curbside composting. This is not curbside collection, but it is citywide.
On Tuesday, Councilmember Shahana Hanif introduced legislation to require organics collection from every residential building in the city by next year. It mandates residential composting by next June, but not for everyone.
No later than June 15, 2023, the department shall establish a mandatory citywide residential organic waste curbside collection program for the diversion of organic waste from group R-3 residential buildings as defined in section 310.1.3 of the New York city building code.
I had to chase down the building code, and it looks like the mandate would apply only to one- and two-family dwellings, group homes, and convents. The bill stipulates an education and outreach effort.
Again, we’d all have compost collection, but large buildings would not face fines if they don’t participate. It’s a bigger, better step than the mayor’s school-based drop-off plan.
Can we get this legislation passed and funded? Council Speaker Adrienne Adams is on board.
In its opening months, the new City Council has not shown much propensity to take on [Mayor] Adams by forcing through legislation he opposes. But it’s early in the term yet. And sanitation cuts, touching a nerve for lefty climate activists and urbanist wonks alike, have proved fertile grounds for advocates to rally. So maybe a good old fashioned trash fight will be coming to City Hall.
Our collective relentlessness is important in this fight! The action below has been updated to reflect new developments.
Please contact the mayor and your council member to let them know that you support universal organics collection. The action is ready-made!
There are two bills before the NYS legislature to address the environmental catastrophe of cryptomining. One of them is markedly better than the other, as it
would place a two-year moratorium on converting old fossil fuel power plants to energy-intensive “proof-of-work” cryptocurrency mines. [Assemblymember] Kelles and some environmental experts say that curtailing proof-of-work mining may be necessary if New York is to achieve its emission reduction targets to combat climate change.
That’s the bill that we need to throw our weight behind. The other calls for a task force to study the issue, without putting any restrictions in place. Both bills have passed the Assembly.
Tell your state senator that we need immediate action to curtail emissions from cryptomining. This 30-second action is ready-made.
A new generation of the working class—union members and unorganized workers alike, students, LGBTQIA+ people, immigrants, Black, brown, and Indigenous people—stands ready to meet this political moment and organize to demand a better future. Workers at the Amazon JFK8 warehouse in Staten Island recently won the first union victory at any Amazon facility, led by a Black supervisor who was fired after organizing a walkout to protest unsafe working conditions at the start of the pandemic.
Join a May Day march this Sunday at Washington Square Park with Workers Circle, Make the Road, the new Amazon Labor Union, and others!
Rabbi Ellen Lippman wrote to me this week about taking action here in Brooklyn, really early on Monday morning:
Right now, 40+ immigrant and Indigenous construction workers are preparing to do something courageous: March into their boss’s office on a Monday morning to demand respect and better working conditions. They’re asking allies to show up in solidarity and have their backs as they confront the people who sign the paychecks that feed their families.
Stand with workers really early on Monday morning! This action is organized by Jews for Racial and Economic Justice.
Have a great weekend!
with love,
L