Tag: coal

WERU News Report 1/28/15

Producer/Host: Amy Browne
Engineer/Reporter: John Greenman

Interactive news report covering issues with a local connection and taking calls. Today: Many Searsport veterans of the successful fight against a massive LPG tank in that town had just started a process of coming together with other residents to look at what kinds of economic development they DO want in town, when suddenly they found themselves faced with another proposed development that is raising alarms. We’ll be getting all the latest on that with our guests in the studio (Peter Taber and Harlan McLaughlin) and taking your calls as well. Before we start on that topic though, we want to take you to the University of Maine Trustee’s meeting on Monday where they made history by becoming the first land grant university system to vote to divest from coal.

WERU News Report 12/3/14

Producer/Host: Amy Browne
Engineer: John Greenman

Program Topic: The University of Maine System today took a big step toward becoming the first public land grant system in the country to divest from coal. Two of the students who helped make that possible are with me here in the studio today to tell us how they did it, and what other plans they have up their sleeves — and then we’ll open the phone lines to your calls.

Connor Scott and Brooke Lyons-Justus are members of Maine Students for Climate Justice. Along with another student, Catherine Fletcher, they are also the co-founders of Divest UMaine at UMaine Orono. They’ve been working on fossil fuel divestment of the entire University of Maine system, which is 7 campuses and Maine Maritime Academy. Connor is also the student representative for the UMaine-Orono on the Board of Trustees.

WERU Special – Coal Mining 1/24/12

Broadcast Time: 10am
Program Topic: coal mining in southern West Virginia

Key Discussion Points:
a)Coal companies have assaulted the landscape of southern West Virginia with large-scale surface mining operations, blasting off the tops of mountains. As coal leaves the state, so does the money it generates, leaving poor communities with polluted wells, respiratory ailments, flash floods, and unnecessary miner deaths.
b) Junior Walk of Coal River Mountain Watch shares what he has seen over the past twenty years including citizen efforts to relocate an elementary school, which sits below an impoundment filled with toxic coal waste.
c)Writer Denise Giardina describes growing up in a coal camp, community solidarity with striking mine workers, and her own love of the mountains.

Guests by name and affiliation:
A)Junior Walk, outreach coordinator of Coal River Mountain Watch
B)Denise Giardina

FMI: www.crmw.net, www.denisegiardina.com

Call In Program: n
Political Broadcast:y
Host:Carolyn Coe

WERU Special: Coal 1/12/12

Program Topic: Actions to demand corporate responsibility for human and environmental damage due to coal extraction

Key Discussion Points:
a) In December, WERU talked with Junior Walk of Coal River Mountain Watch and Ben Luckett of Appalachian Mountain Advocates who both shared what they and their organizations are doing to realize their visions for the Appalachian region.
b) Direct actions organized by RAMPS, including tree sits, have disrupted mining plans.
c) Legal action has proven essential for demanding coal company compliance under the Clean Water Act and the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act.
Guests by name and affiliation:
A) Junior Walk, outreach coordinator for Coal River Mountain Watch and activist with RAMPS
B) Ben Luckett, staff attorney for Appalachian Mountain Advocates

Call In Program: n
Political Broadcast: y
Host: Carolyn Coe

FMI:
www.crmw.net
www.rampscampaign.org
www.appalmad.org/

RadioActive 7/24/08

Producers/Hosts: Amy Browne & Meredith DeFrancesco

Topic/Guests:  Award-winning local artist and activist Robert Shetterly talks with Teri Blanton.  Blanton is a survivor of a Superfund toxic waste site near her home in Harlan County, Kentucky.  Her courageous stand against the abuses of coal companies has won her notoriety within her state.  An active member of Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, Teri’s personal mission is to reach out to her community about the issue of Mountaintop Removal Mining.    Teri Blanton will give the keynote speech at the 2008 WERU Full Circle Fair in Blue Hill, Maine on Saturday, July 26th, 2008.  Robert Shetterly will also be painting her portrait for his series “Americans Who Tell the Truth”.

FMI: www.ilovemountains.org, www.americanswhotellthetruth.org

**Please note that a typo in the Fair Guide states that Blanton’s keynote will be 2:30-3:30p.m. and that information was given on today’s show.  The correct time is 1:30-2:30pm.