Obama's Speech

This article was cross-posted on the Georgetown Progressive.
I’m not going to lie—I was thrilled to see President Obama speak here at Georgetown last week. I took a gleeful picture of my ticket; I sent excited voicemails and texts to my family and friends; I skipped class to wait outside McDonough for two hours. I was freezing and hungry, but I hardly noticed. I was going to see President Obama for the first time.

At the same time, I wasn’t naïve about the speech he would give. I didn’t expect him to declare an all-out ban on oil imports, to call for the shutting down of all the nuclear power plants in the United States, or even to announce a new comprehensive climate-change bill. Not only did I understand that such demands would be unprecedented for Obama, for whom environmental issues have never been first priority, but I also acknowledged to myself that those demands would be unrealistic given the current legislature. So while I was thrilled at the chance to see Obama, I wasn’t idealistic about what he would say.

Yet I found the speech disappointing. I jumped to my feet like everyone else, cheering and clapping, when Obama walked onstage, but as he spoke, my excitement ebbed and was slowly replaced by frustration and ennui.

Recycling WINs and FAILs, Round 1

WIN spotted in a Copley common room, and FAIL spotted on Lau 3.

Send in yours to gu.ecoaction@gmail.com!

Upcoming EcoAction Events

The next EcoAction meeting will be Monday (tomorrow), March 21, in ICC 102 @ 8:15 PM. Bring your friends!

Our annual Recycling Raid will be Sunday, March 27, all over campus. Join EcoAction as we raid the waste disposals to see how much has or has not been recycled!

Learn about Oxfam Extractive Industries and Human Rights on Wednesday, March 30, location TBD. During the week of March 28, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights is hosting its 141st period of hearing sessions. Oxfam America staff and partners from Peru will be speaking on the topic of indigenous peoples and rural communities rights around oil, gas and mining operations. As the Peruvian presidential elections approach, Oxfam partners will discuss the issue of proper consultation with communities directly affected by mining. Join us to hear the case of the Rio Blanco indigenous community, in Central Peru, adjacent to the Majaz mining operation, which larger shareholder is the Chinese consortium Zijin.

More events after the jump...

Republicans and the Environment

This article was cross-posted on the Georgetown Progressive.

The Republican Party isn’t exactly known for its environmental activism. Reagan refused to take action on one of the biggest environmental issues of his era-acid rain-and systematically weakened the clout of the EPA. George H.W. Bush ended his term with a freeze on environmental regulations, and his son refused US support for the Kyoto Protocol.

Yet rarely have Republicans been so overtly hostile to existing environmental protections as the current legislators in the 112th Congress. Since the most recent election, Republicans in the House of Representatives have led a series of unprovoked assaults on the EPA. The attack has been two-pronged, with one focus on the EPA’s budget and the other on its powers of regulation.

Aramark Unionization

EcoAction is proud to announce its support for the unionization efforts of Aramark employees at Georgetown!

Last week, the Voice reported that Aramark employees at Georgetown—who work at Leo’s, as well as in Wolfington Hall, at Cosi and Starbucks, and at Dr. Mug—have announced to Aramark management that they plan to unionize. They plan to join Unite Here, a labor union of approximately 265,000 members in the U.S. and Canada that officially backed the efforts at Georgetown in July.

Power Shift 2011

The following post is by Ty Eldridge from Georgetown Energy Coalition.

When Energy Action Coalition first conceived of Power Shift 2007, it was one year out from the historic 2008 election. When we set out again in 2009 to draw young leaders from across the country to DC, it was in the immediate aftermath of President Obama’s election, and our mission was clear – to hold the President we had just elected accountable to the promises of a clean energy future.

As we embark on Power Shift 2011, the stakes are even higher, the
political backdrop more divisive than ever, and the urgency for bold leadership and vision more critical than ever before. Gone are the illusions that any particular political party or leader can solve the crisis before us. We now know that it will take unparalleled will from the people of this country to push our broken political system, which is ruled by dirty energy interests, to move past the short-sightedness of our leaders--a short-sightedness that leaves our generation in peril.

Recyclemania 2011

In case you didn’t catch the campus-wide email and the article on Georgetown’s website, Sunday marked the beginning of Recyclemania! Recyclemania is a national, ten-week competition to increase recycling among over colleges and universities. Schools like Georgetown report data about recycling rates and amounts of trash, and are ranked weekly according to four factors: the amount of recyclables per student, the total amount of recyclables, the amount of trash per student, and the school’s overall recycling rate.

The competition involves 630 schools, 6 million students, and over 1.5 million staff and faculty, in forty-nine states, Canada, and—of course—here in the District. Last year’s competition involved 607 schools, which collected over 84.5 million pounds of recyclables.

At Georgetown, Recyclemania is led by the Office of Sustainability, University Facilities, and the Office of Student Housing. Nationally, it is run by the College and University Recycling Council, with support from Keep America Beautiful and the EPA’s WasteWise Program, as well as The Coca-Cola Company, Alcoa, Waste Management, SCA and the American Forest & Paper Association.

Value [the] Meal Campaign

This Thursday, EcoAction will be teaming up with the Georgetown Garden Club to table for a Day of Action with Corporate Accountability International’s Value [the] Meal campaign. We’ll be asking people to sign postcards and call the McDonald’s CEO as part of the CAI’s Value [the] Meal campaign.










Corporate Accountability International is a non-profit, grass-roots organization based in Boston that has been conducting campaigns since the 1970s to challenge corporate abuse across the world. The Value [the] Meal Campaign was launched in 2009 in response to the gross misconduct of a fast food industry that collects massive profits by selling products that lead to obesity, heart disease, diabetes, hypertension, and many other health problems.

Clean-up at the Anacostia River

Monday, for Martin Luther King Day, I joined the Georgetown Conservation Corps on a clean-up at Pope Branch Park in Anacostia. It was organized by the Pope Branch Park Restoration Alliance in conjunction with several local and national organizations, and it was the Alliance’s fifth annual clean-up, in honor of Dr. King and the Alliance’s founder, Joseph Glover. We spent the morning picking up trash along the railroad tracks and residential streets near the park, which surrounds part of the Pope Branch Creek, a tributary of the Anacostia River.

The GCC, which is part of the Center for Social Justice, has an ongoing partnership with the Earth Conservation Corps, which is one of the groups working with the Pope Branch Park Restoration Alliance. According to Scott Breen (COL ’11), one of the group’s leaders, the GCC works on community service and environmental education events with members of the ECC. Their mission is the following: “To address issues of environmental justice by providing outreach and environmental education to communities and community organizations that lack sufficient resources.”

Food for Thought

Image source.

I don't plan on talking politics in my blog (I'll leave that to the other DC student blogs, thanks) but earlier today, President Obama signed the Food Safety Modernization Act, making it law.

Originally introduced in the Senate as S. 510 in March 2009, it was finally passed by the Senate in November 2010.  Amendments were presented and this act emerged in the House as H.R. 2751. People didn't expect it to go anywhere from there with the turnover of the House to Republicans and this act being put on the back burner.  Surprisingly, H.R. 2751 was passed in the House in June of 2009 and then passed in the Senate on December 19, 2010 (73 for, 25 against) - right before the turnover.

This legislation affects the FDA only, which regulates all foods except for meat and poultry, which is regulated by the Department of Agriculture.  This marks the first time that food regulation in the US has enjoyed major change since 1938.  It also marks the first time that the US has set food safety standards for imported foods.

Note: this post originally published on my personal blog.