​JPMorgan Chase is the largest funder of fossil fuels on Wall Street. In 2017, they even increased their funding of tar sands companies by 400%.[2] Massive infrastructure projects like the Keystone XL pipeline depend almost entirely on loans from major financial institutions. By cutting off the flow of cash, we can cut off the flow of oil and gas. [3]

We know what motivates big financial institutions like JPMorgan Chase — profit and publicity. Last year, activists and community members across the country (including some of you reading this now) got the World Bank to end financial support for oil and gas[4] extraction after a sustained campaign of pressure and shame. This strategy has worked before, and it can work again here.

People have already been fighting JPMorgan Chase tooth and nail from coast to coast for over a year. These days, CEO Jamie Dimon can’t go anywhere in public without being confronted by activists. [5] Let’s keep up the pressure.

You can help this campaign by flooding JPMorgan Chase executives' inboxes with demands that they stop bankrolling climate disaster.

Part of the strategy of driving the fossil fuel industry out of existence involves making them unwelcome at all financial institutions. By raising our voices as one, we can show JPMorgan Chase that the consequences of backing companies like TransCanada and Enbridge far outweigh any short term potential profits.

If JPMorgan Chase backs out of funding fossil fuels, it will send a powerful message to financial institutions worldwide that the time to pull out of the fossil fuel industry is now. We have the power to bring oil, coal, and gas billionaires to their knees, but only if we take action. Let’s seize the moment.

Onward,

Alec Connon - 350Seattle
​_________________________________________________________________________
[1]  Keystone XL pipeline, Bank Track
[2]  Extreme Fossil Fuel Investments Have Surged Under Donald Trump, The Guardian
[3]  To Stop the Keystone XL Pipeline, We Need to Stop the Flow of Dollars, The Stranger 
[4]  World Bank to end financial support for oil and gas extraction, The Guardian
{5]  Wherever Dimon Goes, Activists Turn His Speeches into Spectacles, Bloomberg
​_________________________________________________________________________
350.orgis building a global climate movement. You can connect with us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, and text 350to 83224to get important mobile action alerts.  Become a sustaining donor to keep this movement strong and growing.Looking for other ways to get involved? Check out our map to see if there's a local 350 group or event near you.

"As many as 100 people have been evacuated from the reserve of the Lheidli T’enneh First Nation north of Prince George after a pipeline explosion generated a massive fire that could be seen from the campus of the University of Northern B.C. (UNBC) on Tuesday."

Read more.

​Native American leaders continue to call for divestment from Wall Street banks heavily invested in the Dakota Access Pipeline and other fossil fuel companies, so in March of last year we started a divestment team to work on individual divestment. Shortly thereafter, we began working with the Friends of Public Banking Santa Rosa on public banking as institutional divestment.

JPMorgan Chase: Out of the Frying Pan, Into the Fire

The City of Santa Rosa has decided to divest from Wells Fargo, due to the downgraded “Needs Improvement” status by the DOJ last March. (For more info, go to this page and scroll down to "Wells Fargo Downgraded to Less Than Satisfactory CRA rating".)

So now that the City is leaving Wells Fargo, the City of Santa Rosa is switching to JPMorgan Chase, just as reprehensible, until or unless the city can get a public bank up and running.

According to a report put together by Rainforest Action Network, Sierra Club, the Indigenous Environmental Network and three other organizations, Chase is among the top three banks financing the expansion of extreme fossil fuel development overall at a total of $26 billion over the past three years. And Chase is among the top three investment banks in 3 of 5 categories, including tar sands, ultra deepwater oil and coal.

At the City's annual goal setting meetings at the beginning of the year, it was clear the city was already running out of money due to the cost of cleaning up and repairs, etc. after the October fires. Chase's bid came in at $40,000 less than Exchange Bank, over the five year period of the contract and Chase offered a $60,000 credit to offset the expense of transferring from Wells Fargo to Chase. But in terms of fossil fuel resistance, especially to indigenous peoples who are all too often on the front lines of fossil fuel resistance, choosing JPMorgan Chase is as bad than Wells Fargo - or worse. 

This November two measures to raise revenue for the city will be placed on the ballot: measures N and O.  Read the details on the two ballot measures here. However one or both measures could fail if the voters decide they don't want to pay. And the City is considered draconian budget cuts: " Six vacant full-time slots for firefighters are among those proposed for deletion," according to the Press Democrat. And even if both measures do pass in November, it's likely the city needs far more money than the funding these two measures could raise. How on earth will the city raise more money?

If the City starts a public bank, the City will not only be able to divest from fossil fuels. Half the cost of infrastructure is financing. By financing through its own bank, the City could save up to HALF the cost of infrastructure, as well as millions in fees currently being paid to Wall Street banks, and now JPMorgan Chase. Also, as a wholesale bank, a public bank would not compete with local banks but instead partner with local banks and credit unions to offer lower interest rates on loans - all desperately needed for rebuilding for years to come, not just in Santa Rosa. This would raise money for affordable housing, responding to the homeless crisis, and more. Surrounding towns and counties that need to rebuild after fires will also benefit from low interest loans, and keeping our money local. 

We continue to press city council and staff for a feasibility study, and to start a public bank as soon as possible. A feasibility study would help to determine if Santa Rosa is a large enough city to do this on its own, or if it would be best to partner with another city such as the chartered City of Eureka in a Joint Powers Authority (JPA) partnership. However to get talks of a partnership going, council members must commit to this project officially in order for discussions with elected representatives and city staff in other cities to even begin.

If you have not done so, please endorse our resolution for a public bank.

Write a letter to the editor asking city council and staff to move ahead as quickly as possible with the feasibility study.

Ask your company or organization to endorse the public bank.

Even if it takes 3 to 5 years to open a pubic bank, we need to get a public bank underway, the sooner the better. 

#PublicBank, #PublicBankSantaRosa, #NoDAPL

By Hoai-An Truong
​[Updated 10/7/2018]

For those of us who support Indigenous peoples in their crusade against fossil fuel industries and for climate activists, switching away from natural gas helps us move away from fossil fuels to clean, renewable energy. 

The City of Santa Rosa and its residents will be working on the post-fire rebuild for years to come. Members of the Sonoma County Climate Activist Network (a network of over 25 local climate action organizations including our group, Sonoma Solidarity with Standing Rock) are promoting a green, sustainable, fire resilient rebuild. As part of our commitment, we are campaigning to mandate “all-electric ready” construction for all new buildings in Santa Rosa. This promotes clean energy usage over natural gas, which is a fossil fuel. We are extremely fortunate in this county to be able to get our energy from community solar: Sonoma Clean Power. Switching to all-electric ready construction will also help our residents decrease utility bills over time as solar and battery technology improves, and production costs go down. 

Natural gas comes with high environmental costs: extraction via fracking devastates the environment and local communities. Fracking is a huge contributor to climate change.  Methane (CH4) is the main component of natural gas (around 85%) and methane is a major greenhouse gas (GHG). Over a time scale of 20 years, methane has a global warming potential over 100 times greater than that of carbon dioxide (CO2), the main greenhouse gas. 

In the last few years the scientific community has come to realize that the production of natural gas results in massive amounts of “fugitive emissions,” or unintended leakage of natural gas into the atmosphere. And it is an increasingly expensive process. Those costs - HIGH environmental costs as well as financial - are passed on to us: the consumers. 

For those of us who love to cook and even those who don't, we prefer cooking on a gas stove. Most of us have had terrible experiences cooking with electric stoves. Parting with a gas stove might appear to be the hardest part of the transition. However electric stovetop technology has evolved tremendously.

An induction stovetop burner can now be as responsive or even more responsive than a gas burner.  Induction stovetops heat faster, and are very fast to turn down the temperature, like a gas burner. An induction stovetop can be more easily, evenly and precisely controlled than a gas burner which is prone to hot spots and uneven heating. They have a smaller carbon footprint. 

An induction stovetop is also dramatically safer particularly if you have toddlers or young children, and even if you have elderly parents who might be succumbing to a failing memory or even Alzheimer's. It will keep your loved ones safer.

Note that the cost of natural gas will go up over time due to expensive extraction costs, but the cost of renewable energy will keep going down. Going all-electric ensures your costs will go down with time. It is a great choice financially -- especially for those approaching or in retirement, when many of us will be living on fixed incomes. 

Please support the mandate for all-electric construction for all future construction in Santa Rosa. It's best for the climate and our future. 

Here are two videos on the advantages of an induction cooktop vs a gas cooktop - and both are surprisingly fun to watch. The first video also shows you don't have to buy a whole new cooktop. You can buy a portable induction burner for around $70, and test it out for yourself. 

Are induction cooktops better than gas? by Dean Sharp - The House Whisperer

It's not just mobile phone technology that has evolved. Not only has stovetop technology vastly improved, oven technology has also come a long way. The following video compares convection ovens vs. conventional ovens. Convection ovens bake faster and are more energy efficient. Note: this video is from 2015. The price of convection ovens, particularly countertop versions, have dropped considerably. You can even buy a combination countertop microwave and convection oven as a very affordable option to replacing your full-size oven. Microwave ovens are great at heating but not at browning or baking. A convection oven allows the food to bake faster and to brown. A convection oven browns more evenly than a conventional oven, reducing or even eliminating the need for basting. Faster, less work - and saves energy. 

Something else to consider: when a natural disaster strikes, such as another fire or if the Big One hits (the next big earthquake), electricity is restored more quickly than gas (which could take up to 2-3 weeks to repair). 

​Scientists say we have until 2020 to make a huge shift to reduce and reverse climate change. Vote with your wallet, make your voice heard at city council meetings, email city council. Choose a sustainable future. For all of us!

"Last year, after the military-style assaults on the camps at Standing Rock, Human Rights Watch expanded its agenda to include a program focused on the environment as a human right. 

"Sustaining this awakening is the next great task.

"We need climate justice in everything we do."

Click to read article. 

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: jennyb 
Date: Wed, Feb 28, 2018 at 2:36 PM
Subject: [Sonoma-NoDAPL] Action alert: Stop drilling for oil off the California coast - deadline for comments March 9th
To: Sonoma-NoDAPL <sonoma-nodapl@googlegroups.com>

Stop drilling for oil off the California coast! The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) is proposing to sell leases to oil companies for drilling off the entire west coast and east coast of the USA and all around Alaska. Comments due by March 9th.

Very many thanks to Ann Hancock of the Center for Climate Protection for sending out the Action Alert below which provides a framework for comments.

On February 8th, the Sierra Club Sonoma Group organized a bus to Sacramento to the rally and the BOEM (Bureau of Ocean Energy Management) meeting where people could submit comments. The following talking points were provided so you can also use these as a basis for comments:

• I oppose the Trump administration’s plan to open every coast to offshore drilling. I urge you to halt your proposal to expand oil drilling in our public waters ー the Pacific, Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico and off Alaska. The Arctic and all of our oceans must be protected, not recklessly exploited for fossil fuels.
  
  
• Offshore drilling threatens coastal communities and wildlife with oil spills that pollute the water; damage the coast; and harm whales, polar bears, dolphins, sea turtles, fish, and birds. The plan increases the likelihood of oil spills by ten times the current offshore leasing plan, and an oil spill in the Arctic would be impossible to clean-up.
  
  
• The plan is controversial and strongly opposed. Nearly every coastal governor opposes the offshore leasing plan, and 150+ communities on both coasts have enacted resolutions opposing offshore drilling. 
  
  
• Oil spills cause significant economic damage. Coastal areas account for 40 million jobs; nearly 40 percent of our economic output; and these coastal economies rely on healthy ocean ecosystems for fishing, tourism and recreation.
  
  
• Trump’s drilling plan will deepen the climate crisis, offering leases for fossil fuels that could produce as much as 50 billion tons of carbon pollution.
  
  

Jenny

-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject:Action alert: Stop drilling for oil off the California coast ❗
Date:Tue, 27 Feb 2018 17:01:37 +0000
From:Ann Hancock <ann@climateprotection.org>


February 22, 2018
The federal government invites comments re drilling for oil off the California coast. Let’s let them know that Californians are opposed. Comments are due by March 9th.

Click on the "Take Action" button below, then click on the "Comment now!" button on the top right side of the page. 

Here's some sample text you can copy and paste into the comments section.

Why is the federal government planning on drilling for more oil off the coast of California? The amount of carbon already contained in the world’s proven coal and oil and gas reserves is five times the amount required to increase the global temperature by 2 degrees Celsius. The vast majority of the world’s scientific community and the 195 nations which signed the Paris Climate Accord agree that it is imperative to avoid an increase of average global surface temperature of more than two degrees. So if our current fossil fuel reserves exceed what we can safely consume, why would we want to drill for more oil and risk seriously damaging our vital coastal eco-system and California's tourism and fishing industries?

TAKE ACTION

Please also consider sharing this action alert on social media or
via email by clicking on the buttons below.
Share 
Tweet 
Forward                                                           

Thank you for all you do to make a difference!
 
Ann Hancock, Executive Director
Center for Climate Protection


Copyright © 2018 Center for Climate Protection, All rights reserved.
You have submitted your contact information to the Center for Climate Protection to be included in our email list.

Our mailing address is:
Center for Climate Protection
P.O. Box 3785
Santa Rosa, CA 95402
Add us to your address book

Please send in a comment ASAP within the next two weeks!

The Minnesota Department of Commerce just completed revisions on the Final Environmental Impact Statement -- but it's missing a key cultural resources survey, despite the fact that five Indigenous Nations have repeatedly asked for it to be included.

Send your comment now urging the Commission to include the impacts to Indigenous communities and sacred sites, and reject the Line 3 pipeline.

​Thanks!

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Mysti Babineau & 350.org <350@350.org>
Date: Wed, Feb 14, 2018 at 1:42 PM
Subject: Support Indigenous rights & #StopLine3

Friends,
Right now, there are 3 major tar sands pipelines on the table that, if built, would send our climate past a tipping point.

Keystone XL in the Midwest, Kinder Morgan in Western Canada, and Line 3 near my home in the Great Lakes would all bring tar sands from Alberta, Canada to market -- threatening Indigenous rights and burning more fossil fuels our climate can’t bear.

The last opportunity to weigh in on the Line 3 pipeline just opened -- can you submit a comment to the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission urging them to reject the project?

The Commissioners need to know that the world is watching this decision. The more people who submit a comment, the more pressure we can generate. Comments will only be accepted for the next two weeks -- so we need to act now.

The Minnesota Department of Commerce just completed revisions on the Final Environmental Impact Statement -- but it's missing a key cultural resources survey, despite the fact that five Indigenous Nations have repeatedly asked for it to be included.

Send your comment now urging the Commission to include the impacts to Indigenous communities and sacred sites, and reject the Line 3 pipeline.

Even without the results of this survey, the PUC has plenty of reasons to reject this pipeline. It's a catastrophe for Indigenous rights, clean water, and the climate, and it should not be built.

This fight is bigger than just Line 3 -- it’s about stopping the fossil fuel industry and its dirty projects that harm our communities and our climate. We need a just and equitable transition to 100% renewables, and we need it now.

This is the last opportunity for the public to weigh in on Line 3, prior to the PUC’s decision on the permits this June. Please add your voice and say 'no' to this dangerous pipeline.

With thanks,

Mysti Babineau
​
350.org is building a global climate movement. Become a sustaining donor to keep this movement strong and growing.

[Updated 1/16/18]
​
Hi folks,

This Thursday morning, Jan. 18th, may be the most important day ALL YEAR to ask Santa Rosa city council to start a public bank. Their annual Goal Setting meeting is coming right up: the city council's two-day session Thursday-Friday, 1/18 to 1/19 to decide what top 5 priorities they will be focusing their energies on ​in the upcoming year. 

As you probably know, Native American leadership continues to urge divestment from fossil fuels. However for cities to divest, there is NO alternative to Wall Street banks. Local banks and credit unions are far too small: they can only insure accounts up to $250,000. The ONLY option for cities to divest from Wall Street banks is a public bank, a bank run by the government that serves the public interest. 

The divestment team at Sonoma Solidarity with Standing Rock works closely with Public Bank Santa Rosa to urge the City of Santa Rosa to start a public bank.

Now this proposal takes on a new urgency - as the city attempts to fund the rebuilding of infrastructure destroyed in the fires. 

A public bank offers HUGE local financial gains:

• It will help cut the cost of rebuilding Santa Rosa infrastructure after the fires IN HALF. This can be achieved by financing through the city's own bank, eliminating interest paid on bonds and returning the earned interest to the city's own operating budgets.
• It will save millions in banking fees to Wall Street banks.
• A public bank is a wholesale bank and does not compete with local banks and credit unions. Instead, the Public Bank of Santa Rosa could partner with local banks and credit unions in providing affordable credit to fund small businesses, housing construction, student loans, public infrastructure and renewable energy programs.
  
• It will help keep money in our city and county.

In addition to trying to scrape together the money for rebuilding city infrastructure and the cost of clean-up after the fires, Santa Rosa faces huge problems and huge financial needs such as how to handle the issues of the homeless, which have grown worse since the fires. A public bank offers the biggest pot of money that the city can possibly go after.

Show up and please wear green on Thursday morning to urge city council and the city manager to fund a feasibility study right away, so we can reap these considerable benefits as soon as possible. This is crucial to institutional divestment and to the rebuild of Santa Rosa.

Our presence can make a difference! At the city council meeting on 1/9, there were around 20 speakers and 11 of those expressed their support for public banking during the public comments. As a result, we got into the Press Democrat! 

Note: If you plan to speak, note your time limit may be only 3 or only 2 minutes, so please plan accordingly.

City Council - Executive Team Sessions
10:00 AM to 5 PM
The public comments section is right after the mayor's welcome at 10am, this Thursday 1/18. 
Hyatt Vineyard Creek - Chalk Hill Room
170 Railroad Street
Santa Rosa

Ways you can support this proposal: 

• Endorse our proposal at www.publicbanksantarosa.org/endorse.html .
• We urge all businesses and community organizations to endorse our proposal.
• If you cannot attend on Thursday morning 1/18, please lobby your council member! Click for list of council members. 
• Write a letter to the editor of the Press Democrat (maximum length of 200 words) to letters@pressdemocrat.com . 

"Put your money where your solidarity is." -- Mazaska Talks

Thank you! 

Sonoma Solidarity with Standing Rock

Click for more info on public banking. 


#publicbanksantarosa 
#publicbanking
#divestment
#defundDAPL 
#MazaskaTalks

[updated 1/16/2018]

The state is about to do excessive logging as part of post-fire "emergency tree removal". The state is about to clear 300 FEET of trees around any permitted building! This is far in excess of what science recommends: the research shows 100 FEET of clearing is sufficient. PLEASE email or fax the Office of Administrative Law (OAL) to stop this excessive and unnecessary clear-cutting throughout Sonoma, Napa and Mendocino. Haven't Sonoma, Napa and Mendocino been through enough??

*** Deadline extended to at least Monday 1/22 ***

They finally say the comment period is now open but ONLY for the next five days. If they mean business days, then I suppose it means by Monday, Jan. 22. But I'm just guessing. So it would be good to get your comments in as soon as possible. 

Thanks! 

E-mail:
staff@oal.ca.gov and Eric.Hedge@bof.ca.gov (Cal Fire)

​Mail:
OAL Reference Attorney
300 Capitol Mall, Suite 1250
Sacramento, California 95814
Fax:
(916) 323-6826

RE: Public comment on the “Emergency Rulemaking to Facilitate Post-Fire Recovery Efforts within Counties of Napa, Sonoma, and Mendocino”
 
Dear OAL Staff Members:

We are concerned about the level of clear-cutting (“harvesting”) being proposed by the Board of Forestry and Fire Protection, dated January 5 2018. Removals proposed in the Emergency Tree Removal Documents are well beyond the level required for public safety, and would result in the removal of stored carbon, trees that could have survived, and valuable wildlife habitat, including habitat that supports wildlife protected under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). We urge you to reduce the area to be cleared around permitted structures from 300 feet to 100 feet of defensible space, as 100 feet is the current standard recommended by CalFire and many fire scientists who have studied the subject in depth.

We understand that your stated intent is to protect the post-fire environment. However, the proposed removal footprint appears to be more economical that ecologically relevant to a system that is currently in the process of regenerating after the fires. Therefore, the proposed actions do not represent good intent.

There are several fundamental issues related to the proposed removal of “all dead or dying trees” within 300 feet of any permitted structure, and there is inherent lack of balance between safety measures and environmental damage resulting from the proposed post-fire salvage logging. Proposed removal of “all dead or dying trees” could also include dead or dying trees being “chipped or piled and burned within forty-five (45) days from the start of Timber Operations.”

Our major concerns include (a) the excessive removal of trees around each structure, (b) the preliminary evaluations that are likely to underestimate the number of live and recovering trees, (c) massive amounts of carbon lost due to burning (e.g., for biomass) and other harvesting products, (d) the elimination of great swaths of wildlife habitat due to excessive removal of snags as well as trees that could be still alive, and (e) the elimination of natural regeneration and carbon sequestration processes that are already vigorous, and (f) massive erosion impacts resulting from mechanical operations.  

Your document includes an appreciation of the wildlife habitat created by stating the intended plan to “retain an average for the Harvest Area of not less than one (1) Decadent and Deformed Tree of Value to Wildlife, Snag, or Dying Tree per acre that is greater than sixteen (16) inches DBH and twenty (20) feet tall.” Many wildlife species, including species protected by the ESA, use the “snags” and one per acre is insufficient to provide adequate wildlife habitat that has been created by the October 2017 fires.

In a recent document, Dr. Richard Hutto stated that it is “abundantly clear that salvage logging has uniformly negative ecological consequences for the very species that are most restricted in their distribution to burned forest conditions (Hutto 1995, 2006, Hutto and Gallo 2006, Hutto 2008, Lindenmayer et al. 2008, DellaSala et al. 2014, DellaSala et al. 2015, Hutto et al. 2015, Lindenmayer et al. 2017, Thorn et al. 2017).”
 
Please note: there is a nine-fold difference (almost an order of magnitude difference) between tree removal operations conducted within with 100 feet around a permitted structure (approximately 31,400 square feet) to retain acceptable defensible space, and the proposed removal of 300 feet around a permitted structure (approximately 282,600 square feet). Our concern is that these operations are going to result in a massive loss of stored carbon and complex wildlife habitat created after the fires – habitat that is currently being documented by scientists. As summarized in your documents, 185,000 acres burned around approximately 9,200 homes, and damaged approximately 790 additional structures in Sonoma, Napa, and Mendocino Counties.

You also state the removal of dead and dying tree can “reduce the risk of fire to timberlands” and also “increase forest vigor and vitality of surviving stands of trees…” These notions have recently been disproved in the scientific literature by many empirical studies (e.g. 12-year study by Sarah Hart and others, 2015), and the Governor’s Scientific Advisor was informed about the results of those empirical studies. 
​
In summary, we have well-founded concerns about the level of clear-cutting (“harvesting”) being proposed in your Emergency Tree Removal Documents, which is well beyond the level required for public safety, and will result in the removal of valuable stored carbon that also serves as excellent wildlife habitat, and natural carbon sequestration processes that are currently in progress. In addition, clear-cutting operations are very likely to result in the removal of trees that could have survived the fires.
 
Please consider clearing within the acceptable 100 feet to maintain defensible space.

Best regards,

Maya Khosla
Jenny Blaker
Neil Hancock
Christy Sherr, John Muir Project of Earth Island Institute
Denise Boggs, Exec. Director, Conservation Congress

Heating Up: California Spotted Owls and Wildfire
Can large wildfire benefit spotted owls and other imperiled wildlife? An emerging science brings all manner of surprises, and a few tough questions.
https://boomcalifornia.com/2017/10/20/heating-up-california-spotted-owls-and-wildfire/