Dear friends,
Tuesday is the most optimistic day on the wiffij calendar, when we both reflect on recent struggles that have moved the needle in the direction of justice AND we make moves to win new campaigns.
Organizers from NY Renews are mobilizing coalition partners working for climate solutions to call legislators today. They deploy a clever system called a call relay, in which individuals commit to a time slot (this will take just a few minutes…really!) to light up the phone lines in Albany. It’s a great way to marshal our collective relentlessness to demand an investment in frontline communities and renewable energy.
Sign up here to participate in today’s call relay to get NYS leadership to include $15 billion in the budget to fight climate change. There’s a script!
We continue to play environmental whack-a-mole to shut down dirty fossil fuel projects. This one’s from my home state.
The Passaic Valley Sewerage Commission (PVSC) is moving forward with plans to build a major new fracked gas power plant at their massive waste treatment facility in Newark. This would be the third major power plant sited in this frontline community of color that is already struggling from the toxic impacts of a massive trash incinerator, airport, and the particulate pollution from thousands of daily diesel truck trips.
If you are in NJ, call Governor Murphy’s office to demand he stop the PVSC dirty energy power plant. 1-877-386-0172 or 609-292-6000. This action is from Food and Water Watch. Here’s the social media toolkit!
I recently reread my first post about Fair Pay for Home Care, which I wrote less than eleven months ago. The campaign is on fire and we are positioning ourselves to get a living wage for caregivers into the governor’s executive budget. This could be our next big win.
Attend today’s virtual press conference at 11 AM to support Fair Pay for Home Care in NY!
Every worker deserves a living wage. Columbia University’s Student Workers union has ended the strike they began in November having won most of what they asked for:
higher pay, better healthcare and stronger legal protections.
Among the new concessions are immediate raises for doctoral students ranging from 7% to 11% depending on the length of their appointments, with 16%, to 21% raises by the fourth year of the contract.
Hourly wages for instructional or research work will increase from $15 to $21 immediately.
After Mayor Adams expressed reservations about the bill to allow green card holders and Dreamers to participate in local elections, he allowed it to become law. Adams explained,
“… I’m a big believer in conversation, we have to start talking to each other and not at each other. And after hearing [colleagues’] rationale and their theories behind it, I thought it was more important to not veto the bill.”
Adams added: “In New York City, 47% of Brooklyn speak a language other than English at home. And so I think it’s imperative that people who are in a local municipality have the right to decide who’s going to govern them, and I support the overall concept of that bill.”
Three cheers for civil discourse.
It turns out that, as usual, young people are on the job. Teens Take Charge is publicizing a student walk-out this morning at 11:52 to call for a remote schooling option. I hope the Mayor will keep his commitment to listen.
It looks as though Chicago’s students will be back in schools tomorrow.
According to union and administration sources, two main issues that have slowed negotiations are determining the extent of testing — whether parents can opt-in or opt-out of having their children tested in school — and a blueprint on how to close down individual schools and pivot to remote learning in case of a Covid-19 outbreak.
The pending deal would commit the school system to secure the resources needed to test at least 10 percent of a randomly-selected group of students for Covid-19 at each school on a weekly basis. Students would have to consent to participate in testing, and school staff including nurses would be assigned to help increase the district’s testing capacity.
Note that in NYC, the new COVID-testing guidance, effective January 3, increased the number of students tested at each school AND still requires parental consent, however I am not clear about the percentage of students being tested, nor is it clear if the implementation is solid.
Learn about the free, Home Rapid Test Kits [public schools] are giving to any student (in grades kindergarten or higher) or any staff who exhibit COVID-like symptoms or have been in a classroom where a positive case has been identified. Additionally, beginning January 10, schools with 3-K and Pre-K programs will distribute these take home kits to any 3-K or Pre-K student who exhibits COVID-like symptoms.
You’ll still have to find them in the stores, but beginning on Saturday, private insurance will cover the cost of your home tests for Covid. The coverage will provide eight tests per month. In some cases, folks will have to lay out the money and obtain reimbursement.
Currently, state Medicaid and Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) programs must cover FDA-authorized at-home COVID-19 tests.
Medicare covers lab tests for COVID — both PCR and antigen tests — when they are ordered by an “authorized health care professional.”
In Washington, DC, libraries distribute four free antigen tests each day to any resident who comes to pick them up. As a library partisan, this is the kind of system I admire.
Here are some other hopeful signs of pro-democracy action (because functioning libraries are a sure sign):
Some folks in North Carolina are taking action to stop Madison Cawthorn from running for public office again. Their claim is that the Fourteenth Amendment disqualifies Cawthorn because it prohibits people from holding office if they have sworn an oath as a public servant and “engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the [US], or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.”
North Carolina law says “[t]he burden of proof shall be upon the candidate, who must show by a preponderance of the evidence of the record as a whole that he or she is qualified to be a candidate for the office.”
The Fourteenth Amendment was intended to stop those who supported the Confederacy from seeking public office after the Civil War. Cawthorn is a worthy target, having made a number of threatening remarks and exhortations to his audiences to “come after” those who were ‘stealing’ the election; he also voted against accepting certified ballots on January 6, 2021.
If you’ve been wondering why Republicans seem content with the onset of authoritarianism, you will be relieved? surprised? comforted? to know that there are some former Trump staffers who want to prevent the former president from ever holding office again. Apparently, they are meeting on Zoom this week. I hope it’s a productive meeting.
The Cyber Ninjas, who conducted the bogus audit of Arizona votes in the 2020 election and are facing huge fines for failing to comply with a court order to turn over documents, are defunct. The company has stopped paying its employees, including the lawyer representing them, who has asked the judge to allow him to withdraw from the case.
John Hannah, the local judge overseeing the case, warned that the firm could not escape having to turn over documents by shutting down.
“The court is not going to accept the assertion that Cyber Ninjas is an empty shell and that no one is responsible for seeing that it complies.”
We will end today with some climate-related good news. Apologies in advance for being long-winded. ; )
In the fall of 2019, I joined the staff of Brooklyn Historical Society and led school programs at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Two hundred years before I got that job, the first ocean-going vessels began to assist wind power with steam. Now, almost two years after I lost that job, it’s exciting to learn that a new age of wind-powered vessels may be upon us.
A 500-square-meter kite, the Seawing deploys automatically, first emerging from storage on a trolley, then raising up from the deck on a mast to catch the wind, and finally being released on a long cable to grab the steady, strong winds over about 200 m (656 ft) above sea level.
A French company is beginning six months of trials to determine if the Seawing will indeed reduce the fuel required to power a cargo ship by 20 percent.
A fun fact is that slowing speeds of cargo ships from 24 knots to 21 knots (a difference of less than 3.5 miles per hour) would cut fuel consumption by a third.
NOTE: On the advice of my favorite climate activist, I wrote to the International Maritime Organization yesterday requesting that they consider measures to regulate or somehow limit speeds of cargo ships. I will let you know if I hear back from them.
Keep your head up and your mask on!
with love,
L