Breaking News From the Courts

Federal Judge Overturns Mining Permits 

In March, Judge Robert C. Chambers of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia overturned four mountaintop removal mining permits issued to Massey Energy subsidiaries by the Army Corps of Engineers. In all, the four permits would strip about 3,800 acres of hills and hollows, and bury more than 12 miles of streams, according to court records and West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection data. Earthjustice and the Appalachian Center for the Economy and the Environment represented the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, Coal River Mountain Watch and the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy in a lawsuit challenging the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ decision to allow stream and headwater destruction by mountaintop removal coal mining. In the words of Trip Van Noppen, Vice President for Litigation, Earthjustice:

Mountaintop removal mining is one of the most environmentally destructive practices still allowed in this country. To date more than 1,200 miles of Appalachian streams have been buried under millions of tons of rocks and dirt from the mountaintops during mining, according to a government survey. The Corps has allowed this practice despite its duty under the Clean Water Act to ‘maintain the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the Nation's waters.’ Overall, the judge found that the Corps' approach has ‘fundamental deficiencies’ and sent the permits back to the Corps for a more scientifically grounded and thorough analysis. Although he did not directly outlaw the practice of mountaintop removal mining, the judge indicated significant skepticism that the permits could be re-issued by the Corps in a way that is faithful to its duties under the Clean Water Act.

Federal Judge Stops New Roundup Ready Seed 

Sale of Monsanto’s newest addition to its Roundup Ready line of genetically engineered seed – alfafa resistant to the chemical manufacturer’s herbicide – was halted by Federal District Court Judge Charles Breyer, in San Francisco. In March, Judge Breyer ordered the temporary injunction following an earlier ruling, which found the U.S. Department of Agriculture in violation of the law for failing to prepare an environmental impact statement before approving the crop in 2005. The lawsuit, brought by the Center for Food Safety and co-plaintiff’s, including the National Family Farm Coalition and Cornucopia Institute, charged the agriculture agency with failing to examine the potential for the genetically engineered alfalfa to contaminate organic and conventional crops, and asserted that such contamination would jeopardize export markets and the environment. Judge Breyer is expected to decide whether to impose a permanent injunction.

Alaska Community Action on Toxics and its allies won a big victory in February, when the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation denied a permit to the Alaska Railroad Corporation for the spraying of herbicides along its more than 600 miles of right-of-way. Over 1,500 water bodies, including rivers, streams, and creeks are within 225 feet of the tracks, making salmon and salmon habitat vulnerable to contamination from herbicides. ACAT worked with the Eklutna Tribe and the Montana Creek Native Association, providing technical information on the environmental and health effects of the proposed herbicides, and helping with the writing of a resolution opposing the railroad spraying plan. Other local tribes, municipalities and borough governments issued formal resolutions proposing alternatives, rather than the use of chemical herbicides. More than a thousand people and organizations wrote letters last year, in large part opposing the spraying, according to state officials.

This is a big victory for people who have fought the railroad's use of herbicides for several decades," said Pamela Miller, ACAT’s executive director. "We felt the chemical mixture proposed by the railroad would harm water quality, salmon habitat and people's health." ACAT uses a combination of community organizing, scientific and technical information, and testing to help communities throughout Alaska address the effects of toxic chemicals. 

Local governments and tribal associations opposed to the railroad's proposal included Anchorage, Eklutna, Seward, Talkeetna, Birchwood and the Montana Creek Native Association. The Kenai Peninsula, Mat-Su and Denali boroughs also opposed it.

Cornucopia vs. Dean Foods

The Noyes Foundation made a grant of $2,000 to the Cornucopia Institute to purchase stock in Dean Foods for the purpose of raising issues with shareholders regarding Dean’s sourcing of factory-farm milk for its organic products. Working with allies like the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, Cornucopia intends to file a shareholder resolution with Dean Foods regarding its use of factory-farm products and the impact of that practice on shareholder value.

[Note: The Noyes Foundation will make a small grant to a grantee interested in including shareholder activism as part of its organizing efforts.] 

Fighting a multi-headed hydra like King Coal and its governmental buddies takes multiple strategies. Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, with its allies throughout Appalachia, is in a long, uphill fight against the devastation of mountaintop removal coal mining - the technology that has destroyed more than 400 mountains and brought danger and contamination to hundreds of coalfield communities and ecological systems. So back-to-back victories are especially worth celebrating and on-going battles are worth watching.

A December 2006 jury awarded $200,000 to two OVEC members in a major Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation (SLAPP suit). Two outspoken OVEC leaders were sued by Pocahontas Land Company claiming that the couple was trespassing on company land. For the past two years, the couple’s time and resources were tied up with legal wrangling over the ownership of one-half acre of land, deflecting their focus from local mining and flooding issues. The jury declared that not only did the couple establish ownership of the property, which had been in the family for decades, but also that the land company was guilty of trespass. Jurors indicated that the land company had acted with gross fraud, malice, oppression, wanton, willful and/or reckless conduct or criminal indifference to civil obligations affecting the couple’s rights. 

The West Virginia Legislature passed a resolution directing the state Department of Environmental Protection and Bureau of Public Health to study the effects of coal slurry injection into abandoned coal mines on drinking-water wells and the environment. Coal slurry, also known as coal sludge, is a toxic liquid that results when coal, which contains naturally occurring toxic heavy metals, is washed with water and chemicals in preparation for market. Washing coal helps reduce the amount of non-combustible materials (like heavy metals) from the coal. As a “cheap” method of waste disposal, the coal industry likes to inject it back into the ground where it’s out of sight, out of mind, and may end up in well water.

News from the frontlines: In March, thirteen OVEC members and allies, including members from Coal River Mountain Watch and Ed Wiley (show below in red jacket), who walked 455 miles last summer from Charleston, WV, to Washington, DC, on behalf of his granddaughter’s school, were arrested for refusing to leave the governor’s reception area until Governor Joe Manchin agreed to relocate the Marsh Fork Elementary School. The school building, situated beneath an active mountaintop removal site, sits just 225 feet from a coal silo and 400 yards downstream from a leaking 385 foot tall sludge dam holding back over two billion gallons of toxic sludge (industry’s other favorite method of dealing with slurry waters). One member was taken to the emergency room, others were sore and bruised, including one dragged off by her handcuffed hands.

Missouri Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice rejoiced over the March 3rd, Columbia Daily Tribune front page article, Group Has Faith in Women’s Choice. The article connected personal stories by spiritual leaders and medical providers to public policy. A growing number of clergy said they do a considerable amount of reproductive health-related counseling. The bottom line for these activists is preventing the reversal of laws protecting legal abortion and public access to scientifically accurate reproductive health information that is not driven by religious interpretation. Recently, MORCRC's executive director, Rev. Rebecca Turner, appeared on CNN's Anderson Cooper 360° to discuss "science, sex and salvation."

Advocates Get Emergency Loan Fund for Fresno Farmers 

While many read about the devastation wreaked on California’s orange crop by a late January freeze, few realized that this weather event almost ruined hundreds of Hmong and Lao small producers in the Central Valley. The University of California’s Cooperative Extension reported that a majority of Fresno’s 324 Southeast Asian small farmers suffered crop losses of between 80 and 85 percent.

The National Hmong American Farmers, Inc., came up with an innovative response. Chukou Thao, NHAF’s executive director, said:

We want USDA to provide crop insurance to our community, but that’s a longer term goal. In the meantime, we needed a creative way to help farmers stay in business now. We went to meetings and made our voices heard. Our friends at Cooperative Extension helped us demonstrate that Southeast Asian farmers are important to Fresno’ s economic life. We fill the farmers’ markets, sell at swap meets, and supply packing houses. We helped the City realize it could step in and create a partnership to provide interest free loans of up to $20,000 to affected farmers to help them get back on their feet. We’re grateful to the Council and to the Mayor for their swift support in creating this innovative program.

Now that NHAF has succeeded in getting a local response to the crisis, it is helping to ensure the program’s success. NHAF provides weekly workshops to inform farmers about the new loans, assists farmers in filling out the two-page application form, and helps them assemble necessary supporting documents.

The Northern Plains Resource Council and Western Organization of Resource Councils  are putting their money where their values are. Their new home on the range office building includes recycled materials, solar panels, energy-efficient heating and cooling, and a composting system for toilets. The parking lot contains about 30 tons of crushed recycled glass that won't damage tires. Unlike asphalt, the glass system will allow rainwater to percolate into the ground instead of running off into the city's storm water system. The building will be the first commercial office building in the state to qualify for the U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design gold certification, a voluntary certification for high-performance, environmentally friendly buildings.

"We are living our values. We are embracing energy efficiency, water conservation, renewable energy and sustainability," said Mark Fix, a Tongue River rancher and NPRC board chairman. "We need to change our direction away from old technology that is inefficient and contributes to global warming pollution." The opening ceremony included a rousing chorus of "Home on the Range," to new words that sang the building's praises:

Home home on the range
Where nothing is wasted or lost
Where the planet is saved
And the parking lot's paved
With glass at hardly a cost.

The first ever United States Social Forum (USSF), which will bring the successful World Social Forum process to this country, will be held June 27 - July 1 in Atlanta, GA. Among those expected to attend are thousands of young, energetic emerging activists. It’s not surprising, then, that outreach is including not only the traditional organizing, media hits and attendance at movement events, but also a YouTube video, "Affect Change," produced by Jo Ann Gutierrez-Bejar of the SouthWest Organizing Project.  The one-minute piece features voices of grassroots folks saying why they plan to participate.  

Majora Carter, founder and executive director of Sustainable South Bronx  was featured on a January 28th episode of the PBS series, NOW, The Heat Over Global Warming.

Interviewed by award-winning journalist Maria Hinojosa about Sustainable South Bronx and the continuing challenges of working for environmental justice in an urban environment, Majora connected grassroots struggles against polluters and prison expansion to efforts to stop global warming. The half hour show also featured Laurie David, producer of the documentary An Inconvenient Truth.

The Ms., Third Wave and Tides foundations explored how to use their collective grantmaking strategies to strengthen the domestic reproductive justice movement. The outcome was Building the Pipeline: A Shared Vision for Growing the Reproductive Justice Movement, which highlights their common threads, and articulates the distinct role each plays within the activist and funder communities. Like the Noyes Foundation, this threesome often funds underrepresented groups that use community organizing and advocacy strategies. This paper calls for more general support grants and capacity-building funds to ensure long-term organizational sustainability. These grantmakers don’t hesitate to identify themselves as a new breed of “activist – funders” – a strong and delicate position. Building the Pipeline will help funders understand the importance of, and need for, a diverse leadership and grassroots base with sufficient power to shift public policies.

Diane Takvorian, co-founder and executive director of the Environmental Health Coalition was appointed to the Environmental Justice Advisory Committee on Climate Change by the Air Resources Board. The committee is mandated by the landmark California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, which establishes a statewide target for greenhouse gas reductions by 2020. 

Quick, You Want to Be an Agriculture Policy Wonk? 

The Community Food Security Coalition was one of four collaborators on Seeking Balance in U.S. Farm and Food Policy, a comprehensive policy statement on how American agriculture can be renewed. 

Legislative Priorities for the 2007 Farm Bill and the Federal Policy Advocacy Handbook explain how to effectively participate in the policy-making process.

The Rural Coalition’s Farm and Food Policy Diversity Initiative Policy Priorities Discussion Paper focuses on recommendations for the U.S. Department of Agriculture to improve equity in program delivery, better meet the needs of minority farmers and ranchers, and ensure that farm workers have a designated office to go to within the agency. 

The Sustainable Agriculture Coalition’s No Time for Delay: A Sustainable Agriculture Agenda for the 2007 Farm Bill, argues against an extension of the 2002 Farm Bill in favor of reforms and new initiatives addressing new farmers and ranchers, commodity program reform, insurance, credit, competition, conservation, energy, marketing and rural development, value-added producer grants, and other programs. It can be read in synopsis form or as a full text.

The National Family Farm Coalition’s Food from Family Farms Act addresses the connection between domestic agriculture policy, international trade and the need to respect food sovereignty (the right of every country to establish its own food and farm policy and meet its basic food needs through domestic production). The Act details how market price supports, farmer-owned reserves, and conservation compliance can work together to ensure fair prices while meeting food security, humanitarian, and energy needs. 

National Campaign for Sustainable Agriculture’s Federal Sustainable Agriculture Program Primer explains all the programs funded through the Farm Bill: what they do; who administers them; application and eligibility guidelines; funding and status; where to go for more information; and even how to take action to preserve or improve them.

Farm and Food Policy Principles and Criteria is an evaluation tool compiling a comprehensive list of over a dozen principles NCSA and its partners believe should guide agricultural policy. Included are specific questions for assessing a policy proposal’s adherence to each of these principles. 

Additionally, under the What’s New menu button on NCSA's website, you'll find policy statements from its issue committees. 

Awards

2006 Jessie Smith Noyes Award 
The White Earth Land Recovery Project was selected for its leadership in promoting sustainable economic development and Native American spiritual and cultural heritage. Founded in 1989, WERLP is one of the largest reservation-based nonprofit organizations in the U.S. The White Earth Reservation in northern Minnesota is the homeland of the Anishinaabeg of the Mississippi Band, also known as the Ojibwe or Chippewa. WELRP’s multi-issue approach addresses the root causes of the problems faced on White Earth, including the loss of land, culture and self-determination. The award of $100,000 is designed to strengthen and sustain key organizations working to advance social justice. WERLP is the 21st recipient of the Noyes Award, which was initiated in 1998.

California Peace Prize 
Anthony Thigpenn, founder of Strategic Concepts in Organizing & Policy Education, was selected as one of the three 2006 Peace Prize recipients. The Prize is sponsored by the California Wellness Foundation and recognizes Californians for their outstanding efforts to prevent violence and promote peace in their communities. The prize comes with a $25,000 cash award.

Glynwood Harvest Awards
The New Entry Sustainable Farming Project received the Award for Connecting Communities, Farmers and Food. The Project helps immigrants and refugees, primarily Southeast Asians and Africans, use their farming backgrounds to re-activate idle farmland in central and eastern Massachusetts, and to start commercial farm enterprises. The awards are sponsored by the Glynwood Center to  highlight the creative work going on across the country that strengthens support for regional farmers and increases access to fresh, healthy food.

Goldman Environmental Prize
Craig Williams of Berea, Kentucky, received the 2006 Goldman Environmental Prize for his work in convincing the Pentagon to stop plans to incinerate old chemical weapons stockpiled around the U.S. Craig built a nationwide grassroots coalition – the Chemical Weapons Working Group – to demand safe disposal solutions and openness within the Pentagon’s program. Craig was also a co-founder of the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation, which won the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize for its international campaign to ban landmines. The Goldman Prize annually honors grassroots environmental heroes from Africa, Asia, Europe, Islands and Island Nations, North America, and South and Central America. Each winner receives an award of $125,000.

National Women’s History Project 
Monique Mehta, executive director of the Third Wave Foundation, was selected as a 2007 Women’s History Month Honoree by the National Women’s History Project. The 2007 History Month theme is Generations of Women Moving History Forward. Monique was honored for her leadership in helping women and their families deal with issues of immigration, reproductive health, domestic violence, human trafficking and low wage workers. NWHP provides information and training on multi-cultural women’s history. In 1987, it led the successful campaign to have March declared as Women’s History Month.

Noyes In Action

Board of Directors

Leslie Lowe, director of the Energy and Environment Program at the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, was selected as chairperson of the board. An attorney in New York State for over 20 years, Leslie previously served as executive director of the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance. She lives in New York City.

Chitra Staley, of Massachusetts, was selected as vice-chairperson. Chitra has worked in the investment field for the past 23 years and prior to that she was an environmental biologist working in wetlands protection. She is currently with The Program Works, assisting individuals and families in managing their wealth, and providing clients with guidance in philanthropy. 

Three new board members include: 

Jenifer Getz, a great, great–granddaughter of Charles F. Noyes and daughter of board member Ann Wiener, has worked in the aviation field for the last 17 years as a flight school owner and operator. She has been active politically and is an advocate of recycling and environmental issues. She lives in New Mexico. 

Betty Emarita is the founder and president of Development and Training Resources, which focuses on sustainable rural economic development, both urban and rural; philanthropy; policy development; training and curriculum design; strategic planning; organizational development and evaluation. A native of North Carolina, Betty lives in Minnesota.

Belvie Rooks is a writer, educator and producer whose work weaves the worlds of spirituality, feminism, ecology, racial and environmental justice, and a passion for dialogue. She is vice-president, special projects development, at Carrie Productions – Danny Glover’s production company. Belvie also was executive producer of Watts Up! Demaria's Journey from Watts to the Frontiers of Consciousness. And she is the producer/host of ConverZations that Matter: Frontiers of Race, Cosmology, and Consciousness, which brings consciousness studies down to earth, making them real and relevant for everyday life. She lives in California.

Congratulations to former Noyes Board Member – Linda Singer 
Linda Singer, who served on the Noyes Board from 1999 through 2003, and was chair in 2002 and 2003, was appointed as the Attorney General of Washington, DC. Linda was the director of Appleseed Foundation, a network of public interest law centers working to identify and address injustices in their communities. Good luck Linda.

What the Staff’s Been Saying and Doing

Vic De Luca gave a presentation at the Neighborhood Technical Assistance Clinic's 2007 Meet the Grantmakers Symposium, held on Staten Island. He also spoke in New York City to members of the Sustainability Practice Network on How Can Shareholder Activism & Engagement Change Corporate Behavior?

In February, Vic participated in the Council on Foundation’s 2007 Foundations on the Hill, a lobby day in Washington, DC. He joined 400 foundation representatives from around the country in visiting members of the House of Representatives and Senate to discuss issues related to foundation practices and tax laws.

Vic (center, back row) was part of a ten-person delegation from the New York Regional Association of Grantmakers (NYRAG) that met with representatives of six House members from New York City and the state’s two senators.

Vic also finished up a term as co-chair of a fundraising campaign for NYRAG – The New NYRAG: Tools for Philanthropy in the 21st Century - that raised $1.67 million from 75 institutional and 21 individual donors, two percent over the goal.

Wilma Montanez moderated a session at the February conference of Hispanics in Philanthropy, entitled, Stories in Philanthropic Leadership: What does it take to be a change agent within philanthropy?

Kolu Zigbi presented The Honest Truth: Lessons Learned from the Stories of People of Color in Philanthropy to the Increasing Diversity in Philanthropy Committee of the New York Regional Association of Grantmakers. The DVD was produced by the National Network of Grantmakers and used by Kolu to engage the NYRAG committee in a lively discussion.

Kolu is also serving on the Transition Committee of the National Network of Grantmakers, charged with determining the future of this progressive organization of grantmakers.

Millie Buchanan spent time this winter working with a team of funders and coalfield activists to plan and publicize a Mountaintop Removal Funders Tour for this June.

Noyes Numbers for 2006

• $60 million in investments 
• $2,966,000 in grants and contributions
• 282 total funding requests
• 91 grants awarded + 10 grants made through Food Policy Initiative = 101 grantees
• 72 percent of grantees have budgets under $750,000 (32 percent with budgets of $250,000 or less)
• 44 percent of grantees led and governed by people of color

Related News

Environmental Justice Act Introduced 

Two reports from the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Inspector General and one from the Government Accountability Office have noted EPA’s failure to implement Environmental Justice Executive Order 12898, which requires the agency to review its programs to determine whether they cause disproportionately high and adverse effects on minority and low-income populations. The Bush administration took the position that environmental justice should apply to all people and should not focus on those with the highest risk. Its budget proposal calls for a 28 percent cut to environmental justice programs. However, Congress is striking back. In March, EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson was called before a House subcommittee for the first time in his six-year reign and pressed for answers on EPA’s track record. The hearing followed, by less than a month, the introduction of the Environmental Justice Act of 2007, which would require EPA to fully implement the 1994 Executive Order. More than 15 community, environmental and labor organizations, endorsed the bill, among them former Noyes grantees Center for Health, Environment and Justice, Communities for a Better Environment, Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University, Southwest Network for Environmental and Economic Justice, Center on Race, Poverty and the Environment and Beyond Pesticides.

From the National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association

Dr. Eric Keroack has resigned as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Population Affairs at the Department of Health and Human Services. Keroack was a controversial choice to oversee the Title X national family planning program, based on a record showing him to be an ardent anti-choice ob-gyn, vocal supporter of abstinence-only education and even an opponent of contraception. His unexpected resignation comes only five months after his selection for the post. Dr. John Agwunobi, Assistant Secretary for Health, said in a statement that he had accepted Keroack's resignation after Keroack alerted the department to an action taken against him by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts' Office of Medicaid. Department officials had no further comment on Keroack's departure, although Keroack told his staff in a letter that the action was being taken against his private medical practice in Massachusetts. Evelyn Kappeler, a long-time staffer at the Office of Population Affairs, has been appointed as the Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary. Keroack's resignation presents Secretary Leavitt with an opportunity to appoint someone dedicated to carrying out and enforcing the goals of the Title X national family planning program.

A February report from the Association includes an update on the Abstinence-Only-Unless-Married Education Program. The President’s budget includes a 14 percent funding increase to support the administration’s $204 million faith-based agenda. These funds are targeted to support the unproven, ideologically-driven abstinence-only-unless-married programs, where the only permissible discussion of contraceptives is in relation to their failure rates. Next year’s funding is for three separate abstinence programs; 1) community-based, abstinence-only education campaign; 2) mandatory funding for the state-based abstinence education grants, used for the Adolescent Family Life Program; and 3) evaluations of abstinence programs. 

Diversity in the Nonprofit Field 

Check out The Women's Sector? Not Quite... This article, from the Future Leaders in Philanthropy, draws attention to major gender-related issues affecting nonprofits and demonstrates the benefits of greater gender diversity.