Marion-Polk Food Share's Community Gardens Program

Merits your support. As we greet an uncertain future, the best thing we can do to help ourselves and our neighbors is keep the wolf of hunger away, preferably in a way that empowers people right here in Salem to take responsibility and pride in providing a more just, humane world.

We need community gardens in every Salem neighborhood and especially big and vibrant ones at every school and church, where members of those institutions can work with local people to ensure that everyone has access to enough food. We will all need the skills that are being lost as the older generation---the one that grew up when Victory Gardens were cool the first time--passes on and the younger folks don't know what to do with basic staple foods.

We live in what could be an agricultural paradise, but only if we start realizing that grass should only be grown in small areas and that, for most buildings, the most beautiful landscaping is the one that helps fight hunger.

Word

Here in Marion County, Oregon's top ag county, we are blessed to still have a vibrant agricultural community and, mostly, supportive laws that make loss of farm and forest land far less common than it would otherwise be.

But we are far from food secure. There is still hunger in Salem and the Valley, and we live in a country that is teetering on the brink of an economic abyss, as we learn that empires that squander all their money on military exploits and posts in distant lands come undone at the center, when their currencies no longer command respect and their disregard for agriculture, the basic project of civilization, comes back to haunt them.

Here is a great piece by two giants, guiding us to the right path. The message is clear and correct--cities like Salem will be, and can be, no healthier than the agricultural lands that support them.

A 50-Year Farm Bill

By WES JACKSON and WENDELL BERRY

THE extraordinary rainstorms last June caused catastrophic soil erosion in the grain lands of Iowa, where there were gullies 200 feet wide. But even worse damage is done over the long term under normal rainfall — by the little rills and sheets of erosion on incompletely covered or denuded cropland, and by various degradations resulting from industrial procedures and technologies alien to both agriculture and nature.

Soil that is used and abused in this way is as nonrenewable as (and far more valuable than) oil. Unlike oil, it has no technological substitute — and no powerful friends in the halls of government.

Agriculture has too often involved an insupportable abuse and waste of soil, ever since the first farmers took away the soil-saving cover and roots of perennial plants. Civilizations have destroyed themselves by destroying their farmland. This irremediable loss, never enough noticed, has been made worse by the huge monocultures and continuous soil-exposure of the agriculture we now practice.

To the problem of soil loss, the industrialization of agriculture has added pollution by toxic chemicals, now universally present in our farmlands and streams. Some of this toxicity is associated with the widely acclaimed method of minimum tillage. We should not poison our soils to save them.

Industrial agricultural has made our food supply entirely dependent on fossil fuels and, by substituting technological “solutions” for human work and care, has virtually destroyed the cultures of husbandry (imperfect as they may have been) once indigenous to family farms and farming neighborhoods.

Clearly, our present ways of agriculture are not sustainable, and so our food supply is not sustainable. We must restore ecological health to our agricultural landscapes, as well as economic and cultural stability to our rural communities.

For 50 or 60 years, we have let ourselves believe that as long as we have money we will have food. That is a mistake. If we continue our offenses against the land and the labor by which we are fed, the food supply will decline, and we will have a problem far more complex than the failure of our paper economy. The government will bring forth no food by providing hundreds of billons of dollars to the agribusiness corporations.

Any restorations will require, above all else, a substantial increase in the acreages of perennial plants. The most immediately practicable way of doing this is to go back to crop rotations that include hay, pasture and grazing animals.

But a more radical response is necessary if we are to keep eating and preserve our land at the same time. In fact, research in Canada, Australia, China and the United States over the last 30 years suggests that perennialization of the major grain crops like wheat, rice, sorghum and sunflowers can be developed in the foreseeable future. By increasing the use of mixtures of grain-bearing perennials, we can better protect the soil and substantially reduce greenhouse gases, fossil-fuel use and toxic pollution.

Carbon sequestration would increase, and the husbandry of water and soil nutrients would become much more efficient. And with an increase in the use of perennial plants and grazing animals would come more employment opportunities in agriculture — provided, of course, that farmers would be paid justly for their work and their goods.

Thoughtful farmers and consumers everywhere are already making many necessary changes in the production and marketing of food. But we also need a national agricultural policy that is based upon ecological principles. We need a 50-year farm bill that addresses forthrightly the problems of soil loss and degradation, toxic pollution, fossil-fuel dependency and the destruction of rural communities.

This is a political issue, certainly, but it far transcends the farm politics we are used to. It is an issue as close to every one of us as our own stomachs.

Wes Jackson is a plant geneticist and president of The Land Institute in Salina, Kan. Wendell Berry is a farmer and writer in Port Royal, Ky.

Our dire situation

Salem seethes with discontent about its livability, most of which is traceable to our sprawled-out footprint and our failure to overcome the consequences of auto-sprawl, which reduces quality of health and enjoyment of life throughout the city. The only answer the traffic engineers and planners have to the problems they have caused by putting the needs of cars ahead of everything else is to do more of it --- more lanes, more bridges, more signals, you name it. If you were to look at how Salem and most other cities actually spend money and set priorities, you could be forgiven for thinking that USA stands for United States of Automobility.

The folks who choose to live in Polk County, many in West Salem, deem themselves entitled to a $600+ million dollar bridge because, for a short period each weekday, traversing the Marion/Center span isn't instantaneous. Yet, stand at those bridges at rush "hour" (closer to 1/2 hour) some weekday and count the number of cars with just one occupant -- it's the vast majority.

Meanwhile, a city resident thinks that keeping some weekend bus service is a "frill."

So in the same paper we have folks complaining about the costs of providing transit services with property taxes and yet calling for hundreds of millions to be taken from all property owners to build a new bridge.

Luckily, the collapse of the Ponzi-economy has probably eliminated the fantasy that Salem can afford any part of the bridge scheme. Thanks to the credit collapse, it will be quite hard to fund anything--- even worthwhile projects that would reduce our carbon footprint and provide meaningful investment for the long term (rather than just a short term bump for bridge building). So a new Willamette River Bridge is probably not in the cards. The only question is how long it takes for ODOT and the local folks to wake up from the dream of ever-expanding pavement and to start facing up to the real task of the 21st C.: how to modify and improve the infrastructure left over from the massive buildout of sprawl in the last half of the 20th C. so that cars become optional again.

Bellingham & Whatcom County leading in race to prepare

Government and business leaders in Whatcom County, and around the world, are looking toward weaning the country off its reliance on oil. That means some local residents are looking to generate their own power as well as their own food. Bellingham Herald 01/04/2009

Still Time to Join

Northwest Earth Institute study/discussion groups are excellent ways to meet interesting people, increase your knowledge and sustainability resources, and to build connections in the community.

Menu for the Future: Northwest Earth Institute Discussion Groups in Salem - Winter 2009

Tuesdays – January 13^th to March 3^rd 2009, 6:30PM to 8PM at the Tea Party Bookshop

Saturdays – January 17^th to March 7^th 2009, 9:30AM to 11AM at the Marion-Polk Food Share

To register, call Melissa at (503) 566-4159, or e-mail community.dreamer@yahoo.com

$20 refundable book deposit

Biomimicry: Elegant simplicity

If there's one idea that Salem needs a lot more of, it's this: imitating nature in how we design our habitations and communities, not to mention our industrial processes. More great stuff from the Salem Public Library and the Friends of the Straub Environmental Learning Center.

Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature

An Introduction to the Concepts, Tools, and Power of Biomimicry
7 p.m. Thursday, January 29 Loucks Auditorium

Biomimicry is a method for studying and then emulating nature’s best materials, forms, processes, and strategies to develop sustainable design solutions. Emulating
photosynthesis in a leaf to design a better solar cell is an example of this “innovation inspired by nature.” The core idea is that animals, plants, and microbes have already
solved many of the design challenges that engineers and architects grapple with today.

This presentation will explore the whats, whys and hows of biomimicry: what biomimicry is; why we look at nature as model, mentor, and measure; examples of innovations inspired by nature; and how you can begin to integrate nature’s strategies into your own design process to create sustainable structures.

Presenter Denise K. DeLuca is outreach director for The Biomimicry Institute. In
this position, Denise is working to advance the tools of biomimicry and facilitate the integration of biomimicry into university-level education.

The presentation is free and open to the public through the support of the Charla Richards-Kreitzberg Charitable Foundation, Salem Public Library, City of Salem, and Marion Soil and Water Conservation District. More information is available from the Friends of Straub Environmental Learning Center at 503-391-4145 or at www.fselc.org.

The Friends of Straub Environmental Learning Center is a Salem-based non-profit organization dedicated to environmental education.

Also --- two weeks earlier, at Straub:

2008-09 FSELC Amateur Naturalist Series: Urban Tree Care
Thursday, January 15th, 7:00 pm – 8:00 pm
Straub Environmental Learning Center, 1320 A Street, Salem
$5 per person, RSVP required

Contact:

Lisa Olivares, Environmental Education Specialist
Friends of Straub Environmental Learning Center
p: (503) 391-4145 lisa@fselc.org www.fselc.org
Mailing Address: 765 14th Street NE, Salem, OR 97301

Calendar: More great stuff at Salem Public Library

Want to save money and have fun? Use your library more--we have a good one:

Like music?

The Midnight Serenaders look great. All of $5.

Feb. 6, 2009

$5 in advance/$7 at the door
On sale NOW at all Library Circulation Desks
The Midnight Serenaders perform an infectious blend of old-time jazz and early swing, offering up a sweet collection of songs and tunes from the early 20th century.

Fronted by guitar slinger/crooner Doug Sammons and ukuleleplinking chanteuse Dee Settlemier, this Portland, Oregon-based sextet transports audiences on a melodic, swing-crazy trip to the dance-happy era known as the Jazz Age.

Got kids? Help them discover the world beyond the video screen:

The Library’s “No TV in Salem Week” and the Great Library Camp-In have moved to January! Children who make and keep a pledge to turn off their TVs will be eligible to come with a favorite adult for a fun evening followed by a sleep over in the library.

The “Let Your Imagination Soar” Great Library Camp-In will begin Friday, January 30, with campers returning home after an early breakfast on Saturday, January 31. Youth Services staff and volunteers will entertain campers and their families with crafts and activities, including helicopter spinning, paper plane folding, spaceship soaring from 6:30-8 p.m. At 8 p.m., everyone will gather in the Loucks Auditorium for a special performance by Will Hornyak, storyteller extraordinaire.

To get in on the action, interested children and their families should pick up their “No TV” pledges at the Youth Services Reference Desk or at the West Salem Branch. Pledges must be returned to the Library by Sunday, January 25 for children to be eligible to come to the Camp-In.

Then, children who are keeping their “No TV” Pledge may make their reservations for the big event beginning Tuesday, January 27 at the Youth Services Reference Desk in person or by phone at 503-588-6088.

Another Great Resolution for 2009: Don't be a 'consumer'

Some people have been beating this drum for years. Nice to see someone in a major paper get on the bandwagon for refusing to define ourselves as "consumers:"

It's Time to Drop The Consumer Label

One of my New Year's resolutions is to stop referring to myself as a consumer.

The idea for the resolution actually came from reader Tom Krohn, who suggested that it's not just the country's spending habits that need to change for the better, but the language we use to describe who we are.

"We Americans are so used to being referred to as 'consumers' that we comfortably fall into that role and do so conspicuously," Krohn, a retired Navy submariner living in Arkansas, wrote to me. "Imagine an epitaph that read, 'Michelle Singletary -- A Wonderful Consumer.' Not very satisfying, is it?"

No, Tom, it's not how I want to live, or die.

We use the word consumer when referring to ourselves even when the topic isn't about consuming. But look at the word consume. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, consume means "to do away with completely; destroy, to spend wastefully; squander."

And yet we are no longer citizens but consumers. This recession has proved that things have to change, and still the message from many of our leaders continues to be that consumerism -- consumers -- will save the day. To be a consumer is equivalent to being a good American.

Consumerism has become a basic component of our American citizenship, contends Lizabeth Cohen in "A Consumers' Republic: The Politics of Mass Consumption in Postwar America."

"By the end of the Depression decade, invoking 'the consumer' would become an acceptable way of promoting the public good, of defending the economic rights and needs of ordinary citizens," writes Cohen, a Harvard University professor.

We track closely the results of the Consumer Confidence Survey. Ever wonder why it isn't billed as the survey of confidence among the American people -- moms, dads, engineers, teachers, social workers, bus drivers, doctors, church-goers, etc.? It's not billed that way because we've come to gauge where we stand -- for good or bad -- by people's purchasing intentions.

Why is our confidence driven down by how much less we can spend?

Consumer spending accounts for about 70 percent of the nation's gross domestic product. That's bad because much of that spending was made possible by the overuse of credit -- other people's money. Our economy is a mess today because too many people -- individuals and corporate executives -- believed it was financially savvy to use other people's money. In many ways, the country has participated in a colossal Ponzi scheme. A scam we obviously couldn't sustain. We ran out of other people's money. That's what makes a Ponzi scheme fail. You can't get any more cash.

Since the Great Depression, we've embraced and celebrated our consumerism. We have mantras such as "I shop, therefore I am."

I once was part of this madness. In my early newspaper career I had a column called "Born to Shop." I defended my passion and the reason for the column by arguing I was bargain shopping and therefore saving myself and others money.

But you never save when you spend.

Never.

When you buy things on sale you are still spending money.

National holidays are celebrated by shopping. We have Veterans Day sales. That's how we honor our servicemen and women -- by shopping, by consuming more stuff.

And we are passing this legacy of consumerism on to our children. More children go shopping every week than read, go to church, participate in youth groups, play outdoors or spend time in household conversation, according to consumerism expert and Boston College professor Juliet B. Schor, author of "Born to Buy: The Commercialized Child and the New Consumer Culture."

"Although children have long participated in the consumer marketplace, until recently they were bit players, purchasers of cheap goods," Schor writes in her book. "That has changed. . . . Children's social worlds are increasingly constructed around consuming." Schor adds: "Contemporary American tweens and teens have emerged as the most brand-oriented, consumer-involved, and materialistic generation in history."

Our children are courted as consumers even before they have full-time employment.

"The kind of consuming people have been encouraged to do is undermining, not enhancing, our economic situation," Schor said in an interview. "And all this consumption has become financially and ecologically unsustainable. Doing more of the same makes those long-term problems worse, even if it props up some failing enterprises in the moment."

Rather than keeping things the same, why don't we again become producers?

"Households and the country need investment, not consumption," Schor said. "We need to invest in energy conservation, degraded ecosystems, a sustainable food system, education, community building, human connection and skills for everyday living."

Aren't you weary of being a consumer with all the accompanying debt it requires to keep up this occupation? If so, make 2009 the year you stop defining yourself as a consumer.

The World According to Monsanto

The Salem Progressive Film Series folks have found another important film.

Great news for the New Year: Urban chickens are spreading!

Yet more press about the best rediscovered idea in a while---householders and urban homesteaders keeping laying hens):

Chickens given roosts in urban backyards

. . . He is among the growing number of city dwellers across the country choosing chickens as pets — raising them for eggs that proponents say taste fresher, for pest control, for fertilizer and, as the economy continues to struggle, for a cost-saving source of protein.

Enthusiasts have been pecking away at multiple local laws this year and have persuaded officials in cities such as Fort Collins, Colo., Bloomington, Ind., and Brainerd, Minn., to change the rules.

Ludlow, who began raising chickens five years ago, has become somewhat of an expert on the topic through his website, BackYardChickens.com, which, he says, has grown to a community of 19,000 members around the world the past two years.

Ludlow has tapped into what he and others say is a growing trend among residents from California, New York, Washington, Oregon, Colorado and elsewhere.

Their efforts, he says, are a sign of the tough economy and harken back to the victory gardens planted by Americans in previous economic downturns and during the two world wars.

"It's like that saying, a chicken in every pot. Well, I think it should be a chicken in every backyard," Ludlow says.

Longmont, Colo., city planner Ben Ortiz says elected officials in his city of about 85,000 near Fort Collins are considering whether to let residents raise chickens. Ortiz says many residents have cited financial sustainability as a major reason. "There may be some pent-up demand for this kind of thing," he says.

New York City, Los Angeles, Portland, Ore., and Seattle all permit urban chickens, Ortiz says. Such cities generally limit residents to five or fewer hens, with no roosters, a review of their laws shows.

. . . Chamberlain cites access to eggs produced without antibiotics, a fresher taste and a greater emphasis on locally produced food as benefits of backyard chickens. "For me, it's primarily a local foods and sustainability issue. My whole front yard is vegetables, and this is a natural extension of that," she says.

Ortiz says Longmont officials began considering the proposal after some residents noted that Fort Collins approved a similar law in September. "What precipitated this is the sustainability movement. That seems to be the rationale that a lot of these people are employing," Ortiz says.

Ludlow says the chickens eat leftover food and provide a daily lesson for children about where their food comes from.

Chamberlain says she took her request to city hall, drawing inspiration from friends in Portland, Ore., and websites such as Ludlow's and the Albuquerque-based UrbanChickens.org. Both sites discuss everything from the best types of food to how to answer neighbors' concerns.