Greening the Ridge is today! Head on down to 69th Street Veterans Memorial Pier!

From our friends at the SRWA:

GREENING THE RIDGE 2009!
SUNDAY, JUNE 14th, 2009 at Veteran’s Memorial Pier at 69th Street in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn
10am- 6pm

Festival Schedule:
9am-10am: Exhibitor setup
10am: Festival Opening Ceremony
10am-Noon: Xavier High School Jazz Band “Bailout”
11am, 1pm, and 3pm: Dance Performance Installation, “What We Can See From Here,” by Cassie Mey and Jesse Phillips-Fein
Noon: Dance Performance Installation- Kids Workshop!

2:00pm: OLPH Twirlers!
2:30pm: SRWA Green Youth Award Ceremony
Noon to 6pm: Pill Hill Radio and Musical Guests
6pm: Festival end

The Sunset-Ridge Waterfront Alliance is pleased to announce our Second Annual Greening the Ridge Festival in 2009! This annual summer festival will bring vendors, agencies, programs, and individuals to the pier for an educational festival on how to green our community.

Building upon the success of our First Annual GTR Festival in 2008, this year’s event will bring even more people, and more inter-active booths to the Veteran’s Memorial Pier at 69th Street in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. In addition, we are unveiling our Green Youth Award Program at this year’s festival, click here for more information!

Special music entertainment provided by: Xavier High School Jazz Band, and Pill Hill Radio with Musical Guests!

Special dance performance:
What We Can See From Here
Performance Installation by Cassie Mey & Jesse Phillips-Fein

Meet our current sponsors & exhibitors:

Petri Plumbing
Kettle Black
Alley Cat Exterminating
Green Spa
Ben Bay Realty Co.
Ben Bay Realty Co. of Bay Ridge

Smart Car Manhattan

Gallery 364
Bay Ridge CSA
Bay Ridge Food Co-op
Greenmarket
Center for Urban Greenscaping (CuGreen)
EPA
Narrows Botanical Gardens
Ella Vickers Recycled Sailcloth Collection
Petit Oven

Circles International Natural Foods
Bettencourt Green Building Supplies
WowGreen
Metropolitan Waterfront Alliance
Farm Sanctuary
Natural Resources Defense Council
FDNY Smoke House
GreenBrooklyn
CleanAir NY

Garden Direct
Xaverian High School Environmental Club
Scandinavian East Coast Museum
Transportation Alternatives
Life Scout Troop 20, Edward Maddalena
Bay Ridge Historical Society

Plus many more to be added!

This all-day festival is FREE to the public.

More info at SRWAlliance.org.

If you are interested in obtaining more information, please contact Heather McCown: heather@srwalliance.org / (917) 971-0007.

The Sunset-Ridge Waterfront Alliance gratefully acknowledges support from Councilman Vincent Gentile, Assemblywoman Janele Hyer-Spencer, Congressman Michael McMahon, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz, and State Senator Marty Golden.

If there was ever a time for New Yorkers to act, it’s NOW. On Wednesday, the Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) approved its “Doomsday Budget”, a measure that would impose disastrous fare hikes and service cuts to the more than 1.5 million New Yorkers who use public transportation on a daily basis. If the changes are implemented, prices will jump to $2.50 a ride and $103 a month, and two subway routes and 33 bus lines would be cut. We can still convince our elected officials to turn this thing around, but time is running out fast.

Currently there’s a plan (introduced by Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver) that would provide the MTA with the necessary funds to continue operating WITHOUT cutting subway or bus service, while keeping transportation fares low. This plan would also require public audits of the MTA’s accounting records, so that we’re not caught off-guard by another 1.258 billion MTA budget deficit.

We’re not going to sit back and watch while it becomes unaffordable for the average New Yorker to live and work in our city. Please join us! Sign this letter to our state legislators, check out our video on www.99problems.org, spread the word, and watch for more updates on what you can do to help!

This may be Gotham, but not everyone can afford a Batmobile. And New Yorkers don’t put up with no *(&$%.

Love,
Rachel, Steve, Sean, and all of the pissed off Brooklyn League of Young Voters Education Fund

As we’ve chronicled before here at GBK, NYC has a dearth of public recycling locations on the city streets and in parks.

Councilmember Bill de Blasio announces today that with the support of The Doe Fund, the Park Slope Civic Council, and the Department of Sanitation there will be a new set of blue and green public recycling cans located at the corner of 7th Avenue and 6th Street.

From the councilmember’s press release:

“If you’re out in the neighborhood and you finish reading your newspaper, you either have to throw it away or carry it home with you,” said Councilmember Bill de Blasio. “We all know that recycling is the right thing to do, but it needs to be more accessible to people in their daily lives. Today brings us one step closer. I would like to thank The Doe Fund, the Park Slope Civic Council, and the Department of Sanitation for working together to make this initiative possible, especially at a time when the city cannot afford to increase spending on basic public services. Despite tough economic times, the environment must remain a high priority.”

The “Men In Blue” — homeless individuals who are participants in The Doe Fund’s residential, work and job skills training program called Ready, Willing & Able — will be servicing the cans.

“The ‘men in blue’ are well-known in Park Slope and throughout New York City for their hard work making city streets and sidewalks cleaner. We are pleased to help Councilmember de Blasio in his efforts to make Brooklyn greener as well,” said Joanna West, The Doe Fund’s Director of Business Development.

Now it’s up to us! Use the bins, use them properly, and spread the word.

As I suggested almost a year ago, we have a Mayoral election coming up in 2009. Let’s watch what happens and make recycling, composting, and energy from biomass waste top issues in the campaign.

Here is the full press release:

**FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE** December 2, 2008

Contact: Gwen Rocco

212-788-6969/410-440-5808

De Blasio Announces Public Recycling Program Kick Off in Park Slope

Park Slope – Last week, the Department of Sanitation (DOS), in partnership with The Doe Fund, Inc., Councilmember Bill de Blasio, and the Park Slope Civic Council, launched a public recycling program in Park Slope, Brooklyn for metal cans, glass bottles, and paper products. Similar to the high end covered litter baskets DOS has placed in other locations throughout the City, the blue and green recycling cans will be placed at the corner of 7th Avenue and 6th Street in Park Slope. The cans will be serviced by the Doe Fund’s Ready Willing and Able program participants, who currently work to keep this busy avenue clean.

“If you’re out in the neighborhood and you finish reading your newspaper, you either have to throw it away or carry it home with you,” said Councilmember Bill de Blasio. “We all know that recycling is the right thing to do, but it needs to be more accessible to people in their daily lives. Today brings us one step closer. I would like to thank The Doe Fund, the Park Slope Civic Council, and the Department of Sanitation for working together to make this initiative possible, especially at a time when the city cannot afford to increase spending on basic public services. Despite tough economic times, the environment must remain a high priority.”

“The ‘men in blue’ are well-known in Park Slope and throughout New York City for their hard work making city streets and sidewalks cleaner. We are pleased to help Councilmember de Blasio in his efforts to make Brooklyn greener as well,” said Joanna West, The Doe Fund’s Director of Business Development.

“The Park Slope Civic Council is proud to have worked with Councilmember de Blasio, the Department of Sanitation and The DOE Fund to bring Commercial Street Side recycling to the community. In a community of individuals with such high environmental awareness, we are confident the program will be a huge success. We look forward to bringing other locations to fruition in order to further integrate recycling into the lives of Park Slopers,” said Bob Braun of the Park Slope Civic Council.

Now What? A Post-Election Discussion about Environmental Platforms and Promises

Thursday, November 20th
6:00pm – 8:00pm

Join us at our second “Third Thursday” forum to discuss post-election strategies and campaigns surrounding climate and environmental issues.

The forum will focus on the recent election’s impact on national, state and local environmental politics—including the role youth will play in ushering in a new clean energy economy by holding our newly elected officials to their campaign promises and demanding real solutions to the climate crisis now. Come to CUE’s Third Thursday to network, learn more, and take action.

Panelists:

• Josh Nachowitz — New York State Policy Director for the New York League of Conservation Voters
• Rachel Bishop — Brooklyn Organizer and Operations Assistant for the League of Young Voters
• Dave Shukla — Organizer with the Student Environmental Action Coalition and a Ph.D. student at the New School for Social Research.

Where:
Center for the Urban Environment
168 7th Street, Brooklyn, NY 11215 (btw 2nd and 3rd Aves)
718-788-8500

When:
Thursday, November 20th 6 pm - 8 pm

How:
Train: Take F train to 4th Avenue or R train to 9th Street. Walk over 2 blocks north to 7th Street and 1st Avenue west to 3rd Avenue.

Pricing:

$5 Students
$10/ CUE, New York League of Conservation Voters; League of Young Voters
$15/ Non-members

Limited Space. Please RSVP to rwelch@bcue.org by Wed 11/19

The First Family

Still in disbelief? I am.

I’m sure everyone is fully saturated with commentary about the historical meaning of the 2008 Presidential Election and the promise of a newer, greener life in America…

…but I would like to take this moment to personally thank every single person who did something to help get this extraordinary man elected. To everyone who put up with my political posts and rants, clicked on Obama-related links on GBK, made phone calls, knocked on doors, emailed their friends, or otherwise volunteered: thank you!

Before we get back to our regularly-scheduled green programming, Politico drops word of a spectacular photographic retrospective of the Obama campaign — from the lead-up to the now-legendary Iowa caucus to this Tuesday’s historical election. The photos are just a fraction of the incredible body of work produced by Brooklyn-based photojournalist Scout Tufankjian, and it is called (appropriately enough) Yes We Can: Barack Obama’s History-Making Presidential Campaign.

Yes We Can is a comprehensive and intimate portrait of this transformative campaign, ushering a new era in American politics. With more than 200 color photographs by Tufankjian, the book transports readers to each emotional stop on this historical journey, punctuated with highlights from Obama’s most memorable speeches. Tufankjian artfully captures the impact this amazing candidate had with Americans of all stripes.

From coffee shops and diners to auto manufacturing plants and bowling alleys, Tufankjian followed Obama as he wooed potential voters in middle class neighborhoods as well as in poverty-stricken Indian reservations. She covered the primaries, the debates, and the final weeks of the hard-fought campaign, shooting more than 12,000 images—compiling the widest variety, the most intense moments, and the greatest ecstatic receptions to greet the young politician on the campaign trail. Yes We Can is as much about Americans and their visions for America’s future as it is about the man that gave them voice—and hope.

There is a great video — a feature by NBC’s Brian Williams about Scout’s work — on the powerHouse Books page. Go watch it.

The book will be out on December 8th, and is being published by DUMBO, Brooklyn-based publisher powerHouse Books.

You can pre-order the book here.

And speaking of photos, check out a set of truly awesome behind-the-scenes pictures of the Obama family and the Biden family waiting for the election returns on Tuesday night. The photo at the top of the post is also from this awesome set on flickr, shots by photographer David Katz from Obama for America.

Thank you again, everyone. We did it! Now let’s get back to work advocating for strong green policies — yes, the change we need — for both Brooklyn and beyond.