Wednesday, March 8, 7:00-9:00 pm
Urban Growler, 2325 Endicott
Drop in to this monthly meetup: talk sustainability over a craft beer. Look for the table with the "T" sign.
Sustainable Food & Land group
Thursday, March 16, 7:00 pm
Help plan projects: visit
Introduction to Permaculture
Saturday, March 18, 1:00-2:30 pm
EggPlant Urban Farm Supply, 1771 Selby
Regenerative agriculture. $20. Details
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Workshop ideas due March 15 for Transition US July gathering
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What's your sustainability niche? Lead a workshop at Transition US conference in St. Paul, July 27-31.
Info
&
proposal form
.
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Compassionate. . . and practical
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Many have suffered along with loved ones who wished, as they neared death, for a more peaceful, less painful way to depart. A good many of us in the Transition move-ment hope to end our lives in a gentle way that also helps conserve medical resources that will be needed by others. A bill intro-duced late February in our state legislature and modeled after Oregon's Death with Dignity Act could provide such a path. To learn more, check
Compassion and Choices and, if you wish to support this bill, sign at Minnesota's
End of Life Option Act.
-- Ranae Hanson
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We'd like to protect our wilderness areas from mining and other ex-tractive industries. But when we do so without cutting our use of those resources, we're just pushing the eco-hazards elsewhere. And often that means Africa, Eastern Europe, or other areas without the environmental protections we (now) enjoy. This book by U of M bio-products expert Jim Bowyer makes a strong case for r
educing consumption-- and for asking, why not in our own back yard?
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Need a tool? Borrow, don't buy!
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The
St. Paul Tool Library
is open at 755 North Prior. Browse
inventory.
Hours:
Tues & Fri
5-8 pm,
Sat. 10-4.
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Community solar:
Barry Riesch
Home energy curtailment:
Tim Wulling
Housing options:
Phil Broussard
Reflective Circle:
Marilyn Benson
School liaison:
Mimi Jennings
Sustainable food:
Kit Canright
Transportation:
Pat Thompson
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Join our email list: send your address to Communications@TransitionASAP.org.
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Transition Towns will shine at Northern Spark
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by Regula Russelle
Exciting news: The Transition Twin Cities art project
Transition NOW! has been chosen for this year's Northern Spark. From sunset on June 10 to sunrise on June 11, Northern Spark 2017 is a free all-night art festival exploring the effects of climate change through participatory projects in neighborhoods along Metro Transit's Green Line. For this project,
dozens of volunteers will circulate through
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Sketch by Ruby Thompson |
the festival in T-shirts printed with
Transition NOW!
and symbols of resilience actions (like biking, sharing tools, composting). At our "Grove of Life" in St. Paul's Lowertown, visitors will add paper leaves to sculptural trees, each with a written commitment to a specific lifestyle change. This memory, and a hand-printed memento, will remind visitors that small choices add up to something great.
April 2: Calling all creative fun-lovers
Join us for work and play: screen-print T shirts, cut out paper leaves, and print tiny mementos on a letterpress. Stay the whole time or just for a while.
For info send an email with subject line "Northern Spark" to Pat Thompson or Regula Russelle.
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Northern Spark Prep Party!
Sunday, April 2
2:00-5:00 p.m.
Minnesota Center for Book Arts
1011 S. Washington Ave., Minneapolis
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Artist Regula Russelle is
shown here printing with a colleague at the Minnesota Center for Book Arts.
Transition NOW! is presented by the Center for Energy and the Environment
Northern Spark 2017, produced by Northern Lights.mn and with funding from the McKnight Foundation.
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Dispatch from the renewable energy front
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The St. Anthony Park Lutheran Church congregation is happy to report that our 40kW solar project is fully operational. When we successfully applied for the Made in Minnesota incentive program in 2015, the church voted unanimously to support the project, and our fundraising campaign had overwhelming response from the congregation and the neighborhood. Through the construction milestones and stumbling blocks that followed, the project team (affectionately called the "solar panel" by Pastor Glenn Berg-Moberg) worked to resolve the issues and move forward.
We finally flipped the switch last November, and we anticipate producing about half of the church's annual electrical usage. Monitoring software is tracking production minute by minute. We hope to extend it to track energy use throughout the facility, so we can target even greater energy savings.
Stay tuned!
-- John Seppanen and
Bjorn Gangeness
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Democracy in action: Speaking up for climate
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by Grecia Glass
During last month's congressional recess I attended two jam-packed, people-out-in-the-hallway town hall meetings. When they bring us informed, high-quality exchanges, town halls show democracy at its best.
First the Feb. 18 town hall hosted by Minnesota senate district 66 (which includes parts of North SAP, my own Hamline Midway neighborhood, and other areas:
map
). The crowd in Falcon Heights heard first from Sen. John Marty on Americans' energy use and our need to think of future generations. Rep. Alice Hausman (66A) discussed three unfavorable energy bills in the Minnesota House. (Here's how to take action to oppose them.
)
- A bill letting Xcel Energy bypass a review process that's intended to protect ratepayers, ensure public participation, and promote cost-effective investments in our energy infrastructure.
- A bill modifying net metering (the advantageous rates for clean power fed into a grid), which would discourage small-scale solar and wind projects.
- A bill ending the "Made in Minnesota" solar incentive program. Solar is booming here, with 2400 Minnesotas in solar-related jobs. MiM has funded 1,045 projects. Do we want to lose this momentum?
Rep. John Lesch (66B) reminded us of the true meaning of "sanctuary city," which applies to both Minneapolis and St. Paul. Both have a separation ordinance stating they won't use local resources to do a federal job (enforcing immigration laws). The US has no national police force, and our cities want to keep it that way.
Like most St. Paulites, my rep in Washing-ton is Betty McCollum
. At her Feb. 23 Town Hall on Climate Change (
video recap
),
thermal scientist John Abraham and clima-to
logist Mark Seeley shared data on trends globally ("climate whiplash") and locally: warmer, wetter, more volatile. Learn more at Seeley's
website
. McCollum discussed her work on House Appropriations and its environment-related subcommittee. (Read her
article on preserving the EPA
.) When
asked if she'd join the
Climate Solutions Caucus
,
she said she's interested, but given its bipartisan structure she'd need to invite a Republican to join too. How about Tom Emmer, Betty?
Grecia Glass is active with Hamline Midway Neighbors for Peace, Minneapolis Ambassadors Lions Club, and Women's Congress for Future Generations. She also recently attended St. Anthony Park's
Community Sing
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