permaculture

[Wesley Roe and Marjorie Lakin Erickson <lakinroe@silcom.com>]

[starhawk] Supporting the work  in New Orleans

Dear friends,

 If you ve been on this list for awhile, you ve been following our efforts 
to support some of the exciting works of change  happening on our globe 
today.  As I look back over the last year, I feel a definite change has 
occurred, which has been reflected in my own work and that of the groups I 
work with.

 A year ago we were reeling from the outcome of the elections dismayed at 
how easily the vote could be manipulated, depressed at the thought of four 
more years of the Bush administration, and disgusted that, rigged or not, 
millions of people actually did vote for the guy.

Now the Republican agenda is imploding.  It almost seems as if the country 
has woken up, shaken off some kind of spell of befuddlement, and returned 
to a bit of clarity.

 But this change has come at a terrible cost thousands of lives in Iraq, 
bodies floating in the streets of New Orleans, more subtle deaths from 
poverty and cutbacks in all the support systems that support the poor.

 My own work has taken some surprising turns.  I expected to, and did, 
teach permaculture courses in support of the G8 actions in Scotland, and 
help set up an ecovillage there for the thousands of protestors who 
arrived.  I thought I might go to Argentina for the FTAA, to the Climate 
Change conference happening now in Montreal, even to Hong Kong for the WTO 
meetings.

 Instead, I went to Camp Crawford to support Cindy Sheehan, and to New 
Orleans to help with relief, rebuilding and bioremediation efforts 
there.  In the vacuum left by official negligence and outright hostility, 
local grassroots groups like the Common Ground Collective began to 
self-organize garbage pickup, distribution of supplies, medical 
care.  Their efforts are tremendously exciting, because they bring the 
skills we ve developed organizing convergences and encampments to bear in 
supporting some of the most disenfranchised people in this land, and 
transforming a disaster area into an arena of hope.

 That work will continue this year.  The Alliance for Community Trainers, 
our new 501c3 organization, will help support efforts to clean up New 
Orleans using the natural methods of bioremediation: using bacteria, plants 
and fungi to break down toxins and restore the health of the soil.  A 
report on our first phase can be found on my website, www.starhawk.org 
<http://www.starhawk.org/> .  Our next phase, this winter and spring, will 
expand our efforts and include a training program for local people, with 
the aim of forming a worker s collective who can carry on the healing work 
as a source of right livelihood.

 And the lessons we learn in New Orleans will be invaluable for the 
future.  For climate change is real, and more hurricanes will come. Social 
safety networks have been dismantled, all over the globe, and more systems 
are likely to collapse. The skills of healing, growing and organizing will 
be needed more than ever.

 But the work needs resources.  So once again, I m asking you to share 
some of yours.  A donation to ACT is tax-deductible, and will go to support 
this valuable work.  ACT will help fund the bioremediation efforts in New 
Orleans, including training and documenting the work and producing 
materials that can be used by others.  ACT will fund scholarships to our 
Earth Activist Trainings that combine a permaculture design course with a 
focus on organizing skills and a grounding in earth-based 
spirituality.  And ACT will help provide the training and organizing 
support for actions and mobilizations on issues of global justice and peace.

 You can donate online at my website, www.starhawk.org 
<http://www.starhawk.org/> .  Or you can send a check made out to ACT to 
1405 Hillmont; Austin, Texas 78704.  Checks can be earmarked for special 
projects, like scholarships or bioremediation.  Online donations will go 
wherever funds are most needed.  Both are tax deductible.

 We have over $16,000 in scholarship requests for the January EAT course, 
and others coming up in May in California, July in England and September in 
Missouri.  www.earthactivisttraining.org 
<http://www.earthactivisttraining.org/> .  We need funds to set up 
biobrewers, spawn farms, to support trainings and produce visual materials 
and videos that can explain the biology to people who lack formal 
education.  And we need funds to help respond to issues and emergencies in 
the coming year.

 I know many of us are short on funds this year.  But money is like seed 
it needs to be spread to grow.  A donation to ACT will seed  projects that 
will return their value ten times over in health, empowerment, and 
hope.  We receive no government support nor big foundation grants we depend 
on individuals like you to make our projects possible.  Thank you for 
helping us to continue this vital work.

 Starhawk

www.starhawk.org <http://www.starhawk.org/>

 And if you are looking for holiday cards to send, or gifts, check out our 
CafePress stores that also support these vital projects:

 http://www.cafepress.com/earthactivist/?pid=4130928

 http://www.cafepress.com/belili/?pid=4130928
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Starhawk is a lifelong activist in peace and global justice movements, a 
leader in the feminist and earth-based spirituality movements, author or 
coauthor of ten books, including The Spiral Dance, The Fifth Sacred Thing, 
Webs of Power: Notes from the Global Uprising, and her latest, The Earth 
Path.

Starhawk's website is www.starhawk.org, and more of her writings and 
information on her schedule and activities can be found there.