Keep up the pressure: PAUSE/350 meeting this week

[Sandy Steubing]

Thanks to the many of you who showed up yesterday for the march and rally which were both a terrific success.  I also thank all of you who helped out with the myriad of jobs that made our march a success.  Susan D. actually counted the number of people who marched and said it was close to 500.  I was especially pleased with all the children, as well as older students, who showed up.

We now need to follow-up our demands for Gov. Cuomo to declare a Climate Emergency in New York.  This requires your brilliant ideas and participation.  See attached letter.  This won't be easy but if enough of us put pressure on him, we can do it.

Please come to the PAUSE meeting this Thurs., Sep., 26th where we'll brainstorm how to best do this.  Also, the 50th anniversary of Earth Day is April 22, 2020.  We need to start planning for this as well.

Thursday, Sep. 26 from 5:30 - 7:00

Citizen Action

94 Central Ave.

Albany, NY 12206

Come one, come all, ☺

Sandy

518-368-7045

PS  If you can't come to the meeting, I would very much appreciate receiving your ideas on how to make our demands a reality.  Thx.

[Dennis Karius]

On Sat, Sep 21, 2019 at 12:12 PM Sandy Steubing <sst...@gmail.com> wrote:

Thanks to the many of you who showed up yesterday for the march and rally which were both a terrific success.  I also thank all of you who helped out with the myriad of jobs that made our march a success.  Susan D. actually counted the number of people who marched and said it was close to 500.

Not just 500, Sandy.  This said "More than eight hundred students and community members joined" \|/ our Rally yesterday.  Who organized it?  Next month, maybe we can have over a THOUSAND of us . . .

Thanks for saving our Planet ! ! !

Dennis Karius

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: dunleamark via People of Albany United for Safe Energy <people-of-albany-un...@googlegroups.com>
Date: Fri, Sep 20, 2019 at 5:16 PM
Subject: [PAUSE] More than 800 join Albany climate strike
To: <people-of-albany-un...@googlegroups.com>

Hundreds Join Youth Climate Strike in Albany to Demand Emergency Mobilization

(Albany) More than eight hundred students and community members joined the Albany Climate Strike at the State Capitol as part of the international Student Climate Strike.

See photos at https://bit.ly/2kxwHcA

450 protestors joined the march leaving from 79 Sheridan Avenue that called upon the Governor to declare a climate emergency, to halt all new fossil fuel projects and to immediately invest $10 billion in a Green New Deal program to build renewables and create jobs, with at least 40% of the funds targeted

Several hundred students marched to the rally at the Capitol from the SUNY Albany downtown campus. Students also marched from Albany High School.

After the rally a letter outlining the climate demands that was signed by fifty organizations was delivered to the Governor’s office.

The community march started at 79 Sheridan Ave., where the Governor announced this week he will no longer seek to add new fracked gas turbines to power the Empire State Plaza.  The march also stopped at the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation (stop permits for fossil fuel infrastructure), NYS State Comptroller’s office (divest the state pension fund from fossil fuel, TD Bank (stop financing fossil fuel projects like DAPL in North Dakota) and the Public Service Commission (stop allowing utilities to build more gas and instead required renewable heat.

The youth strike coalition, coordinated by Future Coalition, includes national youth-led groups such as Zero Hour, Earth Uprising, Fridays For Future USA, Sunrise, US Youth Climate Strike, and Extinction Rebellion Youth. More than 3,300 demonstration were planned Friday in 120 countries and all 50 states. More than two dozen events took place in New York State.

News reports said that millions of people joined in the strike. The call for the international climate strike notes that “Politicians and fossil fuel companies have known about climate change for decades. They have willingly handed over their responsibility for our future to profiteers whose search for quick cash threatens our very existence. Faced with climate catastrophe, armed with the sound of our voices and the weight of our bodies, we, as youth, must strike to make our presence known. We strike to protect a livable future, one that is no longer guaranteed.”

The overall demands of the day in the US include:

• A Green New Deal that immediately halts all new fossil fuel projects and transitions our economy to 100% renewable energy by 2030.
• Respect of Indigenous lands and sovereignty — the US government must halt all resource extraction on or affecting Indigenous lands, and recognize the Rights of Nature into law.
• Environmental justice for communities on the frontlines of poverty and pollution, and sanctuary for all migrants.
• Protect and restore 50% of the world’s lands and oceans; stop all deforestation by 2030.
• Invest in sustainable agriculture, not agribusiness.

The community groups delivered a letter to Governor Cuomo urging him to declare a climate emergency. Specific demands included:

1) Immediate ban on all new fossil fuel projects;
2) Immediate halt to all subsidies for fossil fuels from NYS;
3) Increase state funding to $10 billion annually for renewable energy and Green New Deal initiatives;  40% of such funding must target disadvantaged communities;
4) Convert all public buildings and vehicles to zero GHG emissions by 2023; and,
5) Amend building codes to require all new buildings be carbon emission free by 2023.

Quotes from organizations

“We need a WWII type mobilization to claw back our climate to some semblance of normal in the next 10 years.  After that we'll have reached the tipping point in which all living species including humanity is at risk.  This deadline of 2030 is from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. With alarming speed our current trajectory of fossil fuel emissions puts us beyond the tipping point.  It is imperative that Governor Cuomo respond to our call for a declaration of a Climate Emergency in NYS. New York can be a leader for the transition off fossil fuels for the nation and for the world but we must act right now!” Sandy Steubing for PAUSE, People of Albany United for Safe Energy

“It is time for all level of government to treat climate as the emergency it is. We need a Green New Deal to move to clean renewable energy by 2030 combined with an immediate halt to new fossil fuel infrastructure. It needs to guarantee living wage jobs and a decent life to all residents. We need New York to stop subsidizing and funding fossil fuels, including divesting the state pension fund from fossil fuels. We need lawmakers to ensure funding for this transition and to make polluters pay for the damage they have caused,” said Mark Dunlea, Chair of the Green Education and Legal Fund.

“Our spiritual and religious traditions call us to love and protect the earth, our neighbors, and future generations. We must hold the fossil fuel industry accountable for the greed, injustice, and wreckage they’ve financed and supported. Despite the many advances in human well-being since the dawn of fossil fuels and industrialization, we know that era is over and we need to move towards 100% clean and renewable energy to build the world of tomorrow.  As religious leaders and people of faith, we call on people of all faiths and spiritualities to join the world’s youth in demanding for a proper response to climate change. A response that is urgent, and just.” Said Ken Scott, GreenFaith Fellow and Capital Region Organizer.

“There have always been strikes by people seeking a better future for their community. Whether the strikes were for better working conditions, the woman's vote, or civil rights, the goal was always a better future for workers, women, or oppressed minorities. Today, we have a strike by young people who are seeking a better future, not just for themselves, but for all humanity. One difference in this strike for the future is that we are literally running out of time. We can not compromise with nature and the facts of climate disruption. There is no time for a gradual accommodation to changing weather. We must act now and we must act aggressively if we are to give our children and grandchildren a better future, as previous generations of parents have always tried to do,” said Albany County Legislator Bill Reinhardt, also with Solarize Albany.

Andra Leimanis, Communications and Outreach Director at Alliance for a Green Economy, said: "We are here to bring the climate strike to the utilities, and to the agency that regulates them.  Governor Cuomo's Public Service Commission is the state agency that controls how much the electric and gas utilities can charge you and what can happen with that money. We have been calling on the Commission to send a strong signal to the utilities that the era of fossil fuels is over and that it's time to fund the solutions."

Susan Van Dolsen from Stop the Algonquin Pipeline Expansion (SAPE): "New York must be a true climate leader by banning all fracked gas infrastructure projects. Our group was formed six years ago to oppose a huge fracked gas pipeline adjacent to the Indian Point nuclear power plant and we strongly support the youth who are speaking out today for climate justice."

“Members of the Watervliet Huddle strongly urge Governor Cuomo, to recognize that this only planet of ours is experiencing unprecedented global warming.  Scientists agree that global climate change is happening much faster than they’d anticipated.  It is the moral and political obligation of New York State to lead the rest of the nation by making rapid progress toward eliminating the burning of fossil fuels for energy and bringing clean renewal energy to levels that will sustain the energy needs of its citizens.  If you want to be known as a great governor, you must step up to the plate and act from the knowledge that this is not politics as usual.  The economy is not the fragile little child that capitalists want everyone to think it is.  The earth, on the other hand, is in the process of collapsing from the burdens of environmental pollution, extraction of resources, hyper-development and overpopulation that mankind has heaped on it, “ Lois Gundrum

“As a farmed animal sanctuary, we are on the front lines of the climate emergency. While personal choice is important, corporations and government complicity are causing this disaster. And as always, the harm is coming first to the most vulnerable of human and nonhuman populations. We must stop corporations from causing this outright harm…and we must stop our governments from bolstering industries like nonrenewable energy and animal agribusiness with lax policies, subsidies, and lack of oversight and regulation.  Join us in boycotting animal agribusiness and holding our government accountable by compelling immediate and lasting change for animals, our fellow humans, and the planet,” Executive Director, Rachel McCrystal: Woodstock Farm Sanctuary

Sponsors of the events included: Advocacy Committee of the Capital Region Interfaith Creation Care Coalition; AGREE: Alliance for a Green Economy; Aytzim: Ecological Judaism; Bethlehem Morning Voice Huddle; Bethlehem NY Indivisible; Campaign for Renewable Energy in Ithaca; Capital Women; Coalition of Capital Region Progressives; Clean Air Action Network of Glens Falls; Climate Reality Project: Capital Region, NY Chapter; Code Pink NYC; Evolve Nisky Democracy; Extinction Rebellion of the Capital Region; First Reformed Church of Schenectady Creation Care Committee; First Unitarian Universalist Society of Albany Green Sanctuary; Food and Water Watch; Greenfaith/Capital Region; Green Education and Legal Fund; Green Party of New York; Green Party of Nassau County; Hudson River Sloop Clearwater; Indivisible 518:Justice for All; Interfaith Impact of NYS; Mothers Out Front - Dutchess County; New Paltz Climate Action Coalition; New Yorkers for Clean Power; New York Interfaith Power and Light  (NYIPL); Northeast Organic Farmers Association of NY; New York Public Interest Research Group; People of Albany United for Safe Energy; Progressive Schenectady; Protecting Our Waters; Radix Ecological Sustainability Center; Sage Climate Crisis Center; Sane Energy Project; Saratoga Progressive Action; Saratoga Unites; Saugerties Democratic Committee; Save the Pine Bush; Solarize Albany; Stop Algonquin Pipeline Expansion; Sustainable Albany; Tricounty NY Transition; Troy Zero Waste; U-Sustain; UU Congregation of Binghamton Green Sanctuary; Watervliet Huddle; Woodstock Farm Sanctuary; Zero Waste Capital District; 21C4E: 21st century citizens addressing the 4 most important “e” s. Environment, energy, education and economic justice. 

 

 

Climate Emergency Declaration

for New York State

 

September 20, 2019

Dear Governor Cuomo:

We write to you in solidarity with the international Youth Climate Strike on September 20, urging you to declare a climate emergency in New York State.  

The call for the Youth Climate Strike states that “Faced with climate catastrophe, armed with the sound of our voices and the weight of our bodies, we, as youth, must strike to make our presence known. We strike to protect a livable future, one that is no longer guaranteed. Global South, indigenous, and frontline communities are already experiencing the devastating impacts of the climate crisis. We must enact swift change, to salvage not only their lands, but our land, and the lands of all life on earth. We strike against the notion that the wealth of select corporations and people should undermine the welfare of the many.”

The demands of the international Youth Climate Strike include:

•   A Green New Deal that immediately halts all new fossil fuel projects and transitions our economy to 100% renewable energy by 2030;

•   Respect of Indigenous lands and sovereignty;

•   Environmental justice for communities on the frontlines of poverty and pollution, and sanctuary for all migrants;

•   Protect and restore 50% of the world’s lands and oceans; stop all deforestation by 2030;

•   Invest in sustainable agriculture, not agribusiness.

Our rally and march in Albany have the following specific demands for steps to take in relation to declaring a climate emergency (see for example S5518 / A5399) in New York:

1) Immediate ban on all new fossil fuel projects.

We need to halt the use of fossil fuels and greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible. A critical first step is to stop the expansion of the use of fossil fuels, including natural gas. This starts with rejecting permits for projects such as the Williams Pipeline, Danskammer, Cricket Valley and CPV.

2) Immediate halt to all subsidies for fossil fuels from NYS

NYS provides an estimated $1.5 billion in various tax subsidies to fossil fuels (see A257/S2649). The International Monetary Fund estimates that governments provide more than $5 trillion dollars in subsidies annually for fossil fuel companies, mainly by not making them pay for the damages caused by their products. We need to enact polluter penalties (fee on greenhouse gas emissions; see A39 / S3608 or S3616). We must also stop utility companies from subsidizing the expansion of natural gas, including in heating and cooling homes, and instead increase subsidies for renewable heat such as air heat pumps and geothermal. 

3) Immediately invest $10 billion in the 2020-21 state budget in a climate transition with funding for renewable energy, efficiency and a Green New Deal. 40% of such funding must target disadvantaged communities.

Among the most critical goals established in the recently enacted state climate legislation (CLCPA) sets a goal of increasing the percentage of the state’s electricity coming from renewables to 70% by 2030. The state unfortunately has a long history of failing to meeting its climate goals. Since Gov. Pataki first set goals to increase renewable energy in 2002, the state has added less than 5% of its electricity from wind and solar. We must now match that increase on an annual basis. We must dramatically increase state funding to expand renewable energy, including investing in community energy and energy retrofit projects that directly assist environmental justice and low and moderate income communities. We must also create (guarantee) living wage jobs for these communities and existing workers in the fossil fuel industry.

4) Convert all public buildings and vehicles to zero GHG emissions by 2023

The state must be a model for our energy future by immediately moving to eliminate its own greenhouse gas emissions. We need to install solar, geothermal and energy efficiency measures in all public buildings. This includes converting the Sheridan Avenue power facilities for the Empire State complex to use 100% renewables. We need to convert government owned vehicles to zero emissions.

5) Amend building codes to require all new buildings be carbon emission free by 2023.

While the state has made progress in reducing emissions from electricity, this accounts for less than a fifth of the state’s carbon footprint; buildings and transportation each account for more than a third. California requires new residential buildings to be carbon free by 2020 (and buildings under 3 stories must incorporate solar); all new buildings must be carbon free by 2030. New York State must adopt similar building codes. 

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[Sandy Steubing]

Hi Dennis,

There were close to 500 in the march which is the portion that PAUSE organized.  When I promoted the march I also sent out links to the student organized rally all the time.  Together we were pushing 900.

☺

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[Dennis Karius]

. . . and this was on the FRONT Page in today's (9/21/19) Times Union Newspaper:

Albany Climate Strike joins global protest

Young and old marchers alike say they worry about climate change

By Rick Karlin

ALBANY — Saying they want large-scale, immediate action to combat climate change, hundreds of activists marched through the city Friday, stopping and chanting outside several state agency buildings before joining local high school and college students outside the state Capitol.

Friday’s Climate Strike was simultaneously going on across the nation and world as marchers descended on major cities calling for action. <SNIP>

Full report is at:

https://www.timesunion.com/news/article/Climate-strikers-march-through-Albany-say-14456202.php

THANKS AGAIN for Saving our Planet ! ! !

Dennis Karius

 

On Sat, Sep 21, 2019 at 2:02 PM Dennis Karius <denk...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Dennis Karius]

THANKS, Sandy ! 

     Did you see this \|/ in today's TU Newspaper? 

Albany Climate Strike joins global protest

Young and old marchers alike say they worry about climate change

By Rick Karlin

ALBANY — Saying they want large-scale, immediate action to combat climate change, hundreds of activists marched through the city Friday, stopping and chanting outside several state agency buildings before joining local high school and college students outside the state Capitol.

Friday’s Climate Strike was simultaneously going on across the nation and world as marchers descended on major cities calling for action. <SNIP>

Full report is at:

https://www.timesunion.com/news/article/Climate-strikers-march-through-Albany-say-14456202.php

===========================================================================================================

MANY THANKS for Saving our Planet ! ! !

Dennis Karius

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