RadioActive 5/19/11

Producers/Hosts: Meredith DeFrancesco and Amy Browne

Today we look at changing and extreme weather, the relationship to climate change, and the increased need for local governments and community responses.
Yesterday, the Union for Concerned Scientists held a telephone press conference to address the gathering increase in extreme weather, in the context of global climate change. The UCS press conference participants spoke to the work that’s beginning to be done in local communities and cities to integrate climate adaptation into their planning, and the work being done to shift costs from the public sector to the insurance markets.

Guests:
1)Katharine Hayhoe, Climate scientist and associate professor at Texas Tech University. www.climatechoices.org
2) Missy Stults, Climate Director, ICLEI Local Governments for Sustainability www.iclei.org/
www. chicagoclimateaction.org

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

RadioActive 5/12/11

Producers/Hosts: Amy Browne & Meredith DeFrancesco

Segment 1: Supporters of Maine-certified medical marijuana user Jeffrey Barnard plan to gather at the Federal Courthouse in Bangor Tuesday morning to ask Judge Woodcock to release Barnard, and to let him resume using marijuana. They say he has been a victim of a conflict between Maine’s medical marijuana law, and federal probation policies prohibiting use. We spoke with his wife, Vicki Barnard, and a family friend, Jeff Black, earlier today:

Segment 2: Last week on RadioActive we brought you part 1 of a talk about nuclear weapons that was held at Unity College last month. Today we bring you another of the speakers at that event. This is Colonel Richard Klass (USAF, retired) of the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation speaking at Unity College on April 19th, as part of the College’s Lapping Lecture Series Our thanks to Roger Fenn of Physicians for Social Responsibility, Maine Chapter, and to Unity College for making this talk available to WERU

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

RadioActive 5/5/11

Producers/Hosts: Amy Browne and Meredith DeFrancesco
Audio provided by Unity College and Roger Fenn

Dr. Ira Helfand, co-founder of Physicians for Social Responsibility, with a look at the medical perspectives on the use of nuclear weapons. He spoke at Unity college on April 19th, as part of the College’s Lapping Lecture Series. He is Introduced by Roger Fenn of the Physicians for Social Responsibility, Maine Chapter.

(NOTE: Colonel Richard Klass (USAF, ret) of the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation also spoke on this topic at Unity College that evening. We didn’t have time to bring you his comments today, but we’ll air that on “RadioActive” next week at this time.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

RadioActive 4/21/11

Producers/Hosts: Amy Browne, Meredith DeFrancesco, John Greenman

How do we maintain “Hope in Times of Fear”? Local peace and justice activists spoke about that issue earlier this month at the University of Maine. Ilze Petersons, the director of the Peace and Justice Center of Eastern Maine, and Libby Norton, Laura Nobel, Josephine Bright and Evan Livonius are members of a group that has been reading and discussing a collection of essays called “The Impossible Will Take a Little While: A Citizen’s Guide to Hope in a Time of Fear” edited by Paul Rogat Loeb. Here is what they had to say, starting with Ilze Petersons:

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

RadioActive 4/7/11

Producer/Host: Meredith DeFrancesco

Today we discuss five pesticide bills before the Maine legislature’s Joint Standing Committee Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry. Two bills being considered would essentially erase recently passed legislation. One would repeal the pesticide registry, which requires landowners to inform residents, within a certain distance, at the beginning of the season, that they can get on a list for aerial and air carrier pesticide spray notification. The second, would severely limit the distance within which landowners would be required to observe notification wishes, cutting it from a quarter mile to 100 feet.

Another bill before the committee seeks to restrict the use of herbicides and pesticides on the grounds of schools and childcare facilities.

This News Just In: The Maine Superior Court has just ruled to vacate the Land Use Regulatory Commission’s decision to grant Plum Creek’s development plan for the Moosehead Lake region. Attorney Phil Worden represented the Forest Ecology Network and RESTORE: The North Woods in this challenge to LURC’s decision. Chief Justice Humphrey called LURC’s action an “unauthorized, ad hoc procedure,” and concluded that the public was denied its legal rights to speak out on the final version of Plum Creek’s plan.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

RadioActive 3/31/11

Producer/Host: Meredith DeFrancesco

Segment 1: We talk with labor historian Charles Scontras, in the wake of the labor history mural removal from the Me. Dept of Labor, on Caesar Chavez Day.

In Maine, Governor Paul LePage’s active purging of labor history observations from the Maine Dept of labor building, includes not only taking down the mural depicting scenes from Maine’s labor history, but also orders the renaming of the rooms of the rooms in the Department of labor, one of which is named after Caesar Chavez. Another is named after Frances Perkins, the first woman to serve in a US Cabinet post and the longest serving of any member. Among the many scenes of labor history depicted on the mural painted by the artist Judy Taylor is a panel of Frances Perkins.

Dr. Charles Scontras, the labor historian that worked with Judy Taylor on what history to represent in the mural. Scontras is a retired professor from the University of Maine at Orono’s department of political science, history and modern society. He now works as a historical and research associate with the Bureau of Labor Education. Maine is currently embroiled in another such “right to work” effort, which would undermine the capacity of unions.

For more information on the Bureau of Labor education’s publications, you can go to their website dll.umaine.edu/ble or call 581-4123.

A rally and press conference to demand the return of the Maine labor history mural to the Maine Dept of Labor has been rescheduled due to expected weather. It will take place Monday, April 4th at the hall of Flags at the Augusta State House at noon.

Segment 2: We spoke earlier with Mike Belliveau, the executive director of the statewide public health organization, the Environmental Health Strategy Center.

He spoke with us about the recent unanimous vote by the Energy and Natural Resources Committee to support a ban on Bisphenol-A in products used by children in Maine, LD 412. he also discusses a proposed bill, whose intention is to essentially gut the Kids Safe Products Act.

For more information:
The Environmental and Health Strategy Center : www.preventharm.org
Alliance for a Clean and Healthy Maine : www.cleanandhealthyme.org.

You can listen to testimony by Rep. Jim Hamper, in support of his bill to weaken the Kids Safe Products Act, LD 1129 , in WERU’s archives from the Tuesday, March 29th WERU News Report. In his testimony he admits industry wrote his bill.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download