Looking for a Good Cause?

The Power of Community was our first film Passive House: A Building Revolution is Next!

Please Join Us In Getting Out Our New Film!

Dear Friends,

This film, the second in the series, tells how to cut CO2 from buildings by 80 to 90%!

Today 48% of all US energy used and CO2 generated is from our buildings, 85% of that is in heating and cooling them.  Our new film on the Passive House addresses this issue.

I am reaching out to you again, most of whom have copies of our first film, The Power of Community.  If you found it inspiring and valuable, please help fund our new film.  I am working on final professional editing, sound, color, and graphics - all cost money.

There are two ways to help.  First, send a donation through our Kickstarter campaign at http://tinyurl.com/bgockyp or through our website at www.communitysolution.org and note it is for the new film.  Either place you can donate at whatever level you can - every dollar makes a difference.  Second, and this is very important, even if you can't help financially, share what we are doing with others and encourage them to join us on Kickstarter and in getting Passive House: A Building Revolution out!

It is a film that is very timely.

Thank you very much!
Faith

PS. Powell Smith wrote up a great support page for our Kickstarter Campaign:
http://mapawatt.com/2012/11/10/passive-house-design-a-worthy-project/ 

Passive House is a method of building and retrofitting that reduces heating and cooling energy use.

This film is nearing completion and we need your help Now!
We have 20 days to finish our funding on Kickstarter!

Quick Links...
Community Solutions -- Our Main Website
Passive House Film Website
The Power of Community Film Website
Kickstarter Film Funding Site

Community Solutions Contact Information
phone:  937-767-2161

Wonderful late fall dinner @ Pringle Creek Community

 In case your eyes are as bad as mine and struggle with low-contrast printing, it says:

Dinner with Pringle Creek
Join us for a dinner with Pringle Creek

We would like to invite you to join us for the second in a series of local eating events at Pringle Creek Community. This month our menu centers around foods from the Root Cellar, produce coming out of our garden & orchards with several supplements coming from vendors in and around Salem.

If you are interested in hearing more about what we are doing here at Pringle Creek, or you're just looking for a good meal, come to our Dinner at Pringle Creek

Friday, November 30th at 6:00pm.

 Our menu for the evening is $15 for Vegetarians and $20 for Omnivores with proceeds going to support our garden & orchard programs.

Space is limited, so RSVP as soon as possible either by email to info@pringlecreek.com or by phone at (503) 315-1055.

Autumn Harvest Menu

Appetizer
Spinach Puffs

Soup
Spicy Butternut Squash Soup

Entree
Pumpkin Shepherds Pie

Dessert
Apple Gallete
Pringle Creek Community, 3911 Village Center Dr, Salem, Oregon 97302

The real Greatest Story Ever Told

You don't have to be a Democrat to attend, just someone concerned for Salem's future

Greenwash This: Dumping 500 lbs of Coal at Bank of America (Photo credit: Rainforest Action Network)

Join us for lunch with Evan White---at noon, Wednesday, November 28.

Emerging Issues Series
The Road Forward from Election 2012
NOVEMBER: 

Evan White, speaking on

Coal Trains & Export Facilities -- 
Their impact on Salem and the Mid-Willamette Valley

Noon to 1 PM
Kwan's Cuisine, 835 Commercial St SE, Salem, Wednesday, November 28, 2012

White will speak on speak on local efforts to inform citizens on the impact of proposals to transport coal by rail through Salem to a proposed coal export facility in Coos Bay. 

Evan White was born in New York City, raised in Honolulu Hawaii, and went to college on "the mainland."  He has a BA degree in Economics from Claremont McKenna College, an MA in Economics from the University of California at Berekely, and an MBA from the Wharton School of Finance.  He served as a Finance Officer in the US Army, had a brief career in private industry, and then joined the staff of the Oregon Public Utility Commission as its first economist.

Evan has been a Salem resident since 1972.  Now retired, he works as the volunteer Land Use Chair of the Sunnyslope Neighborhood Association and does income taxes for seniors and low income persons through the volunteer AARP tax aide program.

Several months ago, he met a Beyond Coal advocate at the Salem Saturday market who recruited him to the effort to help educate Salem residents about the risks that coal trains would pose to our community.

Cost: $11.50 (Includes Buffet Luncheon, Tea & Gratuity)
Reservation Deadline-Tuesday, November 27

To make your reservation:  e-mail: mariondemoforum@yahoo.com(click link)
or call our message line: 503-363-8392

Please join us to hear Evan White. We encourage you to bring your questions and comments.  As always, we would like to welcome our guests with a large audience. You can assist us in planning a successful luncheon by MAKING YOUR RESERVATION EARLY. (Kwan's requires a headcount on the day before the luncheon to ensure adequate seating and food servings.)


To make your reservation for the Wednesday luncheon, please reply to this message at mariondemoforum@yahoo.com giving your name, telephone number, any special dietary needs, and the number of people who will attend.

You may also make a reservation by calling our message line at 503-363-8392 and providing the same information. Please indicate that you are making a DemoForum reservation and state the name and date of the event.

Related articles

• BREAKING: Risking Arrest for My Granddaughter
• Do Coal Plants Really Kill People?

Coal Trains and Selling Out the Willamette Valley

The Willamette Valley contains most of Oregon's population; it extends from Portland in the North to Eugene in the South. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Anyone who lives in Salem and environs needs to anticipate what coal exports really mean here:  Selling out our future for the empty promise of a few jobs.  Look at the states where King Coal has had its way (West Virginia, Kentucky, PA), and compare them to Oregon.  Now, which is the better model?

Coal exports down the Columbia and up to Bellingham and down to Coos Bay mean the destruction of livability in the Willamette Valley in service of global capital seeking to maximize profits by externalized costs (environmental devastation, climate disruption, reduced property values all along the routes of these behemoth coal trains), with no benefits to the people paying those costs (us).

Coal exports are a gigantic step backwards for the US.  Not only does it return us to the days of colonial status, exploited for our raw materials and stuck with the negative consequences, but it would help ensure a runaway carbon nightmare of the Six Degree C (11F) hotter global temperature average, which is pretty much a nightmare future in the best case.

Anyone with children or grandchildren or simply a modicum of concern for the future needs to realize what a serious threat we face from continued use of coal. 

Bottom line:  if the Iranians and North Koreans had a thousand 100-megaton nukes each and the means to drop them on any place in the world, that would only be a tiny fraction of the threat we face from coal.  It's only the limits of our primitive monkey-based brains that make it so easy for us to see threats from other bands of monkeybrains and so hard to recognize the much more potent and serious threats we unleash upon ourselves.

Related articles

• Red Means Stop for Big Coal Exports in the Pacific Northwest

We live in a wonderful state for eaters

Oregon: Thanks to our land use laws and dedicated watchdogs
"No Farms No Food" should not be an issue

Spread it Around: Just Label It!

WORD: If you want lower taxes and a better state, listen up! (Oregon Out of Balance)

This group, Partnership for Safety and Justice, is invaluable.  Spending on prisons is THE budget issue for at least the next 20 years.  And it boils down to this:  are we going to spend ourselves broke on policies that we know only fuel the crime and incarceration cycle, or will we support public officials who dare stand up and put out that the prison Emperor is not only buck naked, but is also stealing our future?

 

Related articles

• Oregon prison puzzle: Cut costs but keep public safe

WORD: 3d Bridge a Gigantic Boondoggle

Oregon State Highway 22 (Willamina-Salem Highway) intersects Oregon State Highway 223 in Polk Station. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

What's most interesting is that the most-reliably anti-tax groups in Oregon, the Chamber of Commerce and the Homebuilders -- two groups that fight ferociously against taxes usually -- got up and waved their hands about "future growth," and made empty claims about the need to build this monstrosity for the vague "future" needs.   Thus, they showed their true colors:  they aren't against making you pay higher taxes, just taxes that provide you with services.  If you have to pay higher taxes so they can make a lot of money, hey, they're all for that.

That tells you just about everything you need to know about this project:  It's nothing but a money grab by land speculators and developers who are salivating at the thought of sprawling all the way to Dallas and all the money they can make if they can buffalo the people of Salem into building them a bridge (and paying for it!) that will only hurt Salem and benefit them.

Not only do we not need this project, it's the epitome of making the problem worse at great expense.  Traffic counts over existing bridges are already declining and will continue to do so, and Salem's congestion problems are not a function of how many lanes go over the river but the idiocy of how we handle the traffic at each end.

Moreover, the Highway Lobby's refusal to apply least-cost planning methods to what little congestion we face in Salem for a couple of brief periods daily tells you everything you need to know -- this isn't a solution to a problem, this is a profitable project that they want to ram down our throats regardless of all other considerations.  If Salem had a serious congestion problem, it would be greatly reduced if not eliminated instantly just by staggering the start times for state government workers and offering good cross-river transit options.  A "fast-pass" electronic toll collection system on the existing bridges would not only provide all the money needed to address the problems with the existing on and off interchanges, it would also encourage carpooling and other reductions in cross-river trips.

Of course, these wouldn't put millions of dollars into the pockets of the land speculators and the concrete lobby businesses who care about nothing but taking your money and making it theirs.

Bridge project is a $687 million boondoggle

On Nov. 5, dozens of Salem residents filled the City Council chambers to say no to building a $687 million bridge and freeway from Highway 22 to Interstate 5.

Their testimony was eloquent and convincing about the fact that this project is destructive, too expensive, not needed and should be rejected by the council. They said we can relieve congestion by fixing the bottlenecks at both ends of the bridges and by improving transit, all at a much lower cost.

Alternative 4D, as the third bridge is called in the staff report, will not relieve congestion on the existing bridges and will destroy 160 residences and small businesses.

The only testimony in favor of the third bridge came from the homebuilders association and the Salem Area Chamber of Commerce, but when pressed by Councilor Chuck Bennett if they would be in favor of imposing tolls or raising taxes to fund the third bridge, they could not give him a straight answer.


The council will hold a work session on Nov. 28 and resume the public hearing on Dec. 10. I hope concerned citizens will mark their calendars and plan to be at the Salem City Council to continue to oppose this $687 million boondoggle.



Jim Scheppke
Salem

For Veteran's Day