Maybe your last chance for community garden plots for Summer

community gardens boston, mass. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Still time for plenty of good growing if you hurry!
There are two new gardens open for your use!

St. Francis Community Garden 1820 Berry St. SE, Salem, OR
8’x4’ plots, $10 for the season, or $15 for two.
Contact Claudia Howells: 503-363-6587

Salem SDA Community Garden 4625 Cordon Rd., Salem, OR
10’ x 10’ plots, $10 for the season.
Contact Berta Mirandez: (503) 409-2014

Other gardens with availability:

Fuente de Vida 3295 Ladd Ave. NE
Coordinator: Pamela Lyons-Nelson

Hammond Community Garden 4900 Bayne St. NE
Coordinator: Michelle Bertholf 503-463-5975

Julie's Garden 590 Elma St. SE
Coordinator: Cindy Kimball 503-385-1876

Southeast Salem Neighborhood Garden 410 19th St. SE
Coordinators: Marcia Hoak & Nicole McDavid 971-208-5402

West Salem Boys & Girls Club Community Garden 925 Gerth St. NW
Coordinator: Erin Boers 503-779-5912

Goodbye to Bad Knowledge (Post-Peak-Oil Health Care)

http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2012-05-31/goodbye-bad-knowledge

The other major system crash that's coming, besides education, is in our sickness care "system," which is shot through and through with total dependency on economic growth fueled by the now-gone cheap energy.

In one sense, the end of cheap energy will mean better overall health.  America's obesity epidemic is really just a marker of how many energy slaves we all command.  Now that the once-per-planetary-lifetime cheap energy extravaganza is drawing to a close, so too will we see the end of the bad habits it produced, which all boil down to having machines do everything for us. 

BUT, there's a very rough transition ahead between now, when we have a huge overhang of people with bodies made sick by decades of dietary mistreatment and avoidance of exercise, and our future, when we won't be able to afford a sickness care system that continually spends a huge fraction of its total budget on people in their waning days, which ignoring the basic health needs of a giant and growing underclass of people.

Ultimately we are going to have to recognize that organizing access to health care through employment is a gigantic blunder, and that allowing the entire sickness care system to be structured around the profit motive is a recipe not just for lots more sickness and lots more profits, but essentially for making America a third-world country.   Given that Salem Hospital is laying off skilled workers even as people in Salem are increasingly shut out of affordable health care, the contradictions built into the system are soon going to be too great to ignore.

Get Ready for Another "Capital City Chicken Coop Tour" -- July 31

One of the most unappreciated things in Salem recently was the way a very small handful of folks worked very hard and for an absurdly long time to make a tiny step towards making Salem more resilient and better prepared for the hard times to come.  Sure, a small flock of laying hens in a few yards doesn't seem like much, but what CITY is really accomplishing is building connections, community, and (most important) capacity.  When the criminals on Wall St. finish their looting, a lot of people are going to be very, very insecure in their food; that's when having people around who know something about small-scale, urban poultry keeping is going to be a Godsend.

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CITY Newsletter - May 31, 2012 2nd Annual Capital City Chicken Coop Tour - July 21st Don't miss the 2nd Annual Capital City Coop Tour It's lots of fun - for just $8 per vehicle Tickets will go on sale in mid-June at the local businesses listed on the flyer.  They can also be purchased on the day of the event at Coop Tour Headquarters (1580 Roosevelt St NE in Salem) -- if not sold out by then. Ten backyard coops in will be showcased, all within 10.3 miles, stretching from Northeast to South Salem. Eight of the coops were not featured last year so if you went in 2011 you will get to see new coops this year. This is a self-guided tour, meaning you can visit some or all of the featured coops in any order you want, but we provide detailed driving directions along a suggested route.  It's fun to start off at Coop Tour Headquarters (Stop #1 on the map) for fun kick-off activities, refreshments, and a chance to meet Author, Gretchen Anderson, then continue on the tour as suggested. You can stay as long or little as you wish at each stop. There will be a variety of coop styles and different chicken breeds to see. This is a great way to get some ideas for what might work in your backyard if you don't have chickens yet and are considering it.  If you already have chickens, it's a great way to meet other chicken people, share your knowledge, and become involved in community activities. Owners will be present to answer all your questions and often let children feed the chickens through wire fencing. Feel free to wander and take pictures. At just $8 per vehicle this is a fun and inexpensive family ev event and proceeds support our annual Habitat for Hens project (see article below). A big THANK YOU to Shannon Ross and her daughter, Kendra, for making Salem's coop tour possible! Free Chicken Class -  July 22nd The day after our Coop Tour, author Gretchen Anderson will teach a FREE class called Backyard Chickens: A Beginner's Guide to Hen Keeping.  The class will be held Sunday, July 22 from 2:00 to 3:30 pm at a location in west Salem.  Seating is limited, so you must sign up in advance by emailing me at SalemChickens@yahoo.com.  Once you've signed up, a seat will be reserved for you and you will be provided with the address. Another Successful Habitat for Hens Every spring volunteers gather to do something amazing - construct a chicken coop for a family that wants to raise chickens but can't afford the start-up costs.  We call this project Habitat for Hens and it's something we are very proud of.  Not only do we build the lucky family a lovely coop and run, but we also provide the chickens, a waterer, feeder, oyster shell, grit, straw, pine shavings, bag of feed and metal storage container, and we even pay for their permit!  We just completed our third Habitat for Hens build in northeast Salem (pictured above) and our efforts caught the attention of a writer for Chickens magazine.  Look for our story in the Sept/Oct issue. This important project would not be possible without the help of my husband and Will & Kathie Thompson. Will kindly serves as construction leader, helping to draw the plans, purchase and deliver the materials, and oversee the construction.  Jon Hendersen, owner of Old Mill Feed & Garden, wasn't available to help build this year but generously donated all the chicken supplies and accessories. THANK YOU!  Beware - Lots of predator sightings! Chicken-killing predators like raccoons and opposums have been spotted recently in Salem neighborhoods, even during the day, which is unusual.  Be sure to keep garbage and pet food secured, make sure your coop is predator-proof, and don't leave free-ranging chickens unattended! Assortment of Pullets still available! Rhode Island Reds (12-14 weeks old) are available from a local breeder. If interested, email Brett at: waruaki@comcast.net. Last week the Old Mill Feed & Garden store still had the following breeds available: Ameraucanas Black Australorps White Leghorns Black SexLinks Golden SexLinks Buff Orpintons A word from a local Maran breeder Hello to all from Calapooia Wings and More. We are a small farm that has a long interest in poultry. We presently raise Maran and Sumatra in standard and Sussex and Spangled Old English bantams. The Maran is a great chicken to start the hobby with, they are hardy, friendly and lay the most beautiful chocolate colored eggs we have produced in the last twenty years. We have mature hens and started pullets that will not have to be brooded available now. There are many chicken varieties today but you can't go wrong with the charming Black Copper Marans. We have one of the largest Maran flocks in the state, and we have been producing these great gems for three years. If you have an interest in the Marans, give me a call. Thank you and have a great chicken year.  Gary Bennett 541-367-6853.   Blue Copper Marans     Black Copper Maran   Dark brown Maran eggs   Thank you! All these items were donated by Old Mill Feed & Garden for the 2012 Habitat for Hens.  Additional feed and grit was donated by Betty & Lud DeVito. A special thanks to those who made this year's build possible:  Will & Kathie Thompson and my husband Ken!

Chickens In The Yard • 851 Whitetail Deer St NW • Salem, OR 97304

http://salemchickens.com

 

A must-read warning

As Salem ponders pouring hundreds of million$ down the drain on a pointless third auto bridge, here's a bracing reminder of what a foolish blunder this is from Dmitry Orlov, who observed the collapse of the USSR in frequent visits to his native land.

What does tend to change rather suddenly is commerce. If you have enough financial and political shenanigans, high-level corruption and rule of law going by the wayside, daily life goes on just like before, for a while—until suddenly it doesn’t. In St. Petersburg, Russia, the difference between the summers of 1989 and 1990 was quite striking, because by the summer of 1990 commerce ground to a halt. There were empty shelves in shops, many of which were closed. People were refusing to accept money as payment. Imports dried up, and the only way to procure sought-after items like shampoo was from somebody who had traveled abroad, in exchange for jewelry or other items of value. And that occurred in spite of the fact that the USSR had a better overall business plan: theirs was: “Sell oil and gas, buy everything.” Whereas the business plan of the US has come down to: “Print money, use it to buy everything” (most consumer products, plus ¾ of the oil used for moving them and everything else around). The imported oil is, of course, the Achilles’ heel of US commerce. The US economy was built around the principle that transportation costs don’t matter. Everything travels large distances all the time, mostly on rubber wheels, fueled by gasoline or diesel: people commute to work, drive to go shopping, taxi their children to and from various activities; goods move to stores in trucks; and the end product of all this activity—trash—gets trucked long distances as well. All of these transportation costs are no longer negligible; rather, they are fast becoming a major constraint on economic activity. The recurring pattern of the recent years is an oil price spike, followed by another round of recession. You might think that this pattern could continue ad infinitum, but then you’d just be extrapolating. More importantly, there is a reason to think that this pattern comes to a rather sudden end.

WORD: Tom Murphy: Time to be honest with ourselves about our looming energy risks | Energy Bulletin

http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2012-05-15/tom-murphy-time-be-honest-ourselves-about-our-looming-energy-risks-0

Solarize Salem announces Round 3

http://solarizesalem.org/solarize-salem-announce-phase-3/

If you have a good solar capacity at your property, you have a unique moment in which to take advantage of a price meltdown and historically unheard-of low interest rates to make a significant investment in diversifying and strengthening Salem's energy infrastructure.  The more of us who feed into the grid, the more resilient and less polluting the grid will be.   

Stopped clock right this time: Stronger vocational education makes more sense than college for all | OregonLive.com

http://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/index.ssf/2012/05/stronger_vocational_education.html

Robert Samuelson is usually pretty bad, hovering down in George Will territory for vacuousness.  However, like a stopped clock that is right twice a day, he gets it right now and then.  The bursting of the higher ed bubble is one such moment, as people all over America are realizing that higher ed is not the driver of our well-being but an artifact made possible by the well-being that was powered by, mainly, less educated people having access to the amazing wealth provided by cheap energy.

Now that the cheap energy is a thing of the past, we can crank out all the degrees we like and we still won't bring back the growth economy.  The cargo cults of the South Sea Islands famously confused cause and effect, thinking that the Allied troops that brought all the cargo to the islanders could be lured back by thatch control towers that mimicked the ones that the troops had created when the war was on.  That's how most people think about education --- we rode a century-long oil boom to unimaginable prosperity and, in its wake, sent a lot of people into "higher ed" and gave out a lot of degrees.  But it wasn't the degrees that did it, and any attempt to keep the prosperity by continuing to overproduce people with degrees is going to send even more wealth into the black hole of nonproductive investment.

Not that we don't need educated people, badly.  But what we need is a serious upgrade in our understanding of what it means to be educated, and mainly for a revolution in our concept of education for citizenship.  The dominant paradigm in schools today is producing people capable of continuing on into higher ed, at great cost, for no obvious reason.  That is already failing, as the debt tsunami is taking that outmoded model out to sea.

Anyone interested in making a real, meaningful contribution to Salem's future should think about starting a charter school focused on giving young people the means and methods of educating themselves for the future.  Call it what you like, but the curriculum would be long on giving kids the analytical skills to understand what a gigantic ticking time bomb we've left in their beds, and the practical skills to cope with the effects of that, and the community building skills to nurture themselves as agents of their own destiny in a much more difficult world.  Done right, you'd combine the best of homeschooling with the best of cooperative education and apprenticeships and create some very formidable people.

Doubly Great Recycling ... Turn unused/outgrown bikes into better futures!

http://youry.org/news/recycle-your-bike-at-the-salem-y/

Click here to download/view the complete Bicycle Recycling Program Flyer

2^nd Chance Bicycle Recycling Program!

We have partnered with the Oregon Youth Authority to recycle unwanted, broken, or damaged bicycles back into the community for a nominal fee. These bikes will be repaired by the OYA youth residing in enclosed youth facilities. The youth will be learning bicycle repair skills and in turn will be giving back to the community.

Our bike donation will be held 10am-2pm, June 2^nd, in the Salem YMCA back parking lot! If you have any bikes that you would like to donate please bring them by on June 2^nd! We will be glad to take them off your hands and give you a donation receipt.

We are also in need of tools, a list can be found in the brochure (see link above this article).

You may also know of a child in the community or in your program that is in need of a bicycle. We would like to know their story and why they deserve a bicycle, we will have a limited amount of bicycles to donate back to the community. We plan to have repaired bicycles ready for purchase and donation by mid July.

It is our ultimate vision that the 2^nd Chance Bicycle Recycling initiative be self sustaining.  This initiative has a variety of positive outcomes associated with it.  Focusing on adding another educational component for OYA, providing bikes to children of low income households, encouraging and promoting physical activity, community responsibility, and sustainable transportation; all while recycling and reusing unwanted bikes.

More good Straub stuff: Tonight, 5/29, and Thursday 5/31

TONIGHT! Tuesday, May 29, 2012 6:30-8:30 pm

Climate Series:
Home Energy Savings Course

Straub Environmental Learning Center

The second installation of our Climate Series brings Gerry Munzing, a trainer with Conservation Services Group and Energy Trust of Oregon, to discuss Home Energy IQ. He’ll educate homeowners about energy efficiency, conservation, your house as a system, and the behavior changes that lead to reductions in energy use and energy-efficient improvements. He’ll discuss topics such as: the importance of weatherizing for health, comfort, safety and savings; water heating savings; energy efficient solutions; heating more efficiently; and figuring out which solutions are right for you. Munzing delivers educational workshops to consumers throughout the Pacific Northwest and is a primary driver in the delivery of online and classroom based training initiatives. Munzing proudly represents Energy Trust of Oregon by providing homeowners and residential professionals with education to make homes more energy efficient, comfortable and safe. The class is part of our six-course climate series but is open to the public. Class is $5. RSVP to 503-391-4145 or fselc@fselc.org.

Thursday, May 31, 2012 7:00-9:00 pm
Soil: What’s in it for me?
Straub Environmental Learning Center

In this two-hour workshop, Geercrest Farm owner Jim Toler will define healthy soil in terms of chemistry and biology and explain how and why organic or naturally grown foods are healthier than most of what we buy at the supermarket. Toler founded Willamette Organics LLC in 2003 to provide support for organic farms and landscapes. He began working with Oregon Tilth in 2006 to create an Accredited Organic Land Care program similar to the one introduced on the east coast by the Northeast Organic Farmers Assn. That program was introduced here on the west coast in 2010.

He is also president of GeerCrest Farm & Historical Society, a 501 (c) (3) non-profit based at the historic 1847 Geer homestead east of Salem. The non-profit is primarily engaged in preservation of the farm, local history and agrarian culture. Much of their activity is centered on farm-life experience classes for school aged children. No RSVP is required, but space is limited. Seats given on a first come, first served basis.

The Most Important Job Posting in a Long While

If you seek a job with meaning and a chance to do some world-class good, here's one:

HEALTH CARE for ALL - OREGON
Job Announcement: ORGANIZER

Are you ready to make history?

Health Care for All-Oregon is a new coalition of 45 organizations (and counting) mobilizing to win a unified, equitable, publicly funded, comprehensive health care system for everyone in Oregon and the United States. We have active chapters around the state, thousands of contacts, and a solid leadership structure, all of which has been built by volunteers. Now we are ready to hire our first paid organizer to help us solidify our organization and build our momentum.

Duties include but are not limited to:

1. Create leadership development program to identify, train, and support leaders in HCAO chapters and member organizations

2. Organize new HCAO chapters in priority areas

3. Assist existing chapters and member organizations in developing greater capacity through assessment, planning, leadership development, training, and ongoing support.

4. Assist board and executive committee in developing and implementing strategic plan, regional and statewide meetings

5. Coordinate maintenance of supporter database

6. Collaborate with Communications committee to produce effective communications to supporters and the media

7. Collaborate with Fundraising committee to raise funds through individual donors (major and minor), monthly sustainers, organizational contributions, events, grants, etc.

8. Perform other related duties as assigned by HCAO Executive Committee.

Requirements
· Minimum five years experience in grassroots organizing, including all aspects such as fundraising, coalition-building, leadership development, strategic planning, communications;

· Ability to work independently and under supervision, prioritizing numerous and varied tasks;

· Ability to inform and inspire others through public speaking, meetings, and one-on-one relationships;

· Experience developing new programs and projects;

· Valid driver’s license and dependable vehicle (mileage to be reimbursed);

· Willingness to work long hours, including evenings and weekends, and travel statewide.

Additional desired attributes

· Background in health care policy and advocacy;

· Experience working with diverse constituencies, such as rural communities, communities of color, low-income communities, small businesses, etc.

Compensation:
Salary of $40K+, depending on experience; health insurance; paid vacation.

To apply, by June 18, 2012
Send cover letter, resume, and three references as Word attachments to singlepayoregon at gmail dot com, with the subject “Organizer application."

For background on Health Care for All-Oregon, see the (soon to be replaced) Oregon Single Payer Campaign website: http://oregonsinglepayer.org/.