Tag: grassroots

Farmers Respond to Peer Pressure

  • Farming is big business in America's heartland. Many farmers say they want to be left alone to run their farms the way they always have - and they don't want government regulators or researchers dictating to them. (Photo by Rebecca Williams)

Farm pollution is the biggest water contamination problem in the
nation. But government agencies often struggle with getting farmers to
use less polluting farming methods. Many farmers say they don’t want
outsiders telling them what to do. Rebecca Williams reports one
grassroots project is trying to encourage farmers to change, by relying
on peer pressure:

Transcript

Farm pollution is the biggest water contamination problem in the
nation. But government agencies often struggle with getting farmers to
use less polluting farming methods. Many farmers say they don’t want
outsiders telling them what to do. Rebecca Williams reports one
grassroots project is trying to encourage farmers to change, by relying
on peer pressure:


(Sound of birds and buzzing insects)


The corn around here is way over knee high, and there’s a whole lot of
it. This is Iowa, after all. So, pretty much everyone farms corn and
soybeans.


But there isn’t as much farming happening today. Dozens of farmers are
hanging out by a creek that meanders through farmland. They’re
checking out the day’s catch.


(Sound of splashing around in bucket)


“Now there’s one really bright-colored southern red belly in here, kind
of the prettiest fish we’ve got in this stretch.”


Biologist Dan Kirby just used an electroshocker. It stuns the fish and
they float to the top of the water. Now that he can see them, he can
get an idea of how many fish there are and how big they are. The
farmers are watching closely.


(Farmer:) “That’s a real good sign to see them that big, at this
point?”


(Kirby:) “Yeah, especially the southern red belly – they do classify
them a little bit different, they consider them to be a sensitive
species, so it’s a good thing to have them there at that adult size,
for sure.”


That’s better news than they might’ve been expecting. This creek
running along many of the farmers’ fields is in trouble. It’s on
Iowa’s impaired waters list. In this case, that means the fish and
other aquatic life in the creek are not doing as well as they should
be.


“In some of these streams we have had some rough times. Chronic issues
where fish were not even getting to size they could catch them or else
were just plain absent.”


Dan Kirby says farm pollution such as excess fertilizer and soil
erosion from farm fields can harm fish and other stream life. That’s
the kind of thing that put this creek on the government’s watch list
three years ago.


One of the farmers, Jeff Pape, remembers hearing about that. For him it was a big
red flag:


“We knew there was an impaired waterway and it was running through some
of the land I rent and obviously I don’t want that to shine on me… I
didn’t want the DNR – not that they would or have the time to do
it, but I didn’t want them to come in and say hey, you will be doing
this, or you will be doing that.”


Pape says the fear of being dictated to by the government was a strong
motivator for him and a few of his neighbors. In late 2004, Pape
formed a watershed council with nine of his farming neighbors.


Now there are nearly 50 farmers in the group. Pape says there are some ground
rules: No finger pointing. And everyone gets equal say:


“That’s nice with this group – nobody’s telling them they have to do
anything – they do what they want when they want and that’s it. You
know, they don’t do any more than they want to.”


Pape says he’s proud of what he and his neighbors have gotten done.
They’re installing grass strips along ditches and creeks to filter
water rushing off fields. They’re putting in fences to keep cattle
from tearing up stream beds and banks. They’re being more careful
about how much fertilizer they apply.


Maybe most importantly, they’ve gotten a lot of their neighbors to join
them. Jeff Pape says cash incentives help – farmers are paid for the
conservation projects they do. It’s not as much money as some of the
government’s conservation programs, but it keeps the government out of
their hair.


Pape says this program works because there’s an even stronger
motivation:


“That guy’s looking over your fence – he sees you ain’t got a waterway
and you’re thinking about it, so that peer pressure thing does make a
difference too. You know everybody’s watching each other in this
watershed – not pointing fingers at nobody but everybody’s watching
each other and that keeps people on their toes – they want things to
look right, too.”


Other farmers here agree that a farmer-to-farmer project is going to be
much more effective than anything government regulators or researchers
say.


John Rodecap is with Iowa State University Extension Service. He’s
been helping these farmers clean up the creek. He says it’s remarkable
that more than half of the farmers in this 23,000-acre watershed have
signed on.


“The trials that they do, they talk about it at their coffee shop, they
talk about it over the fence… If the trial’s done 50, 60, 100 miles
away, that’s not good enough. They want to know how it’s gonna work on
my farm.”


Rodecap says if you see your neighbor making a change first, you’re
going to feel a little more comfortable giving it a try yourself. And
knowing your neighbor’s watching you over the fence… that’s a powerful
incentive all its own.


For the Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

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Cleaning House for Lewis and Clark

Two-hundred years ago this May, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark started up the Missouri River on a two-year journey into the American West. As America commemorates the bicentennial of the expedition, hundreds of volunteers are cleaning up the Missouri. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Kevin Lavery reports:

Transcript

Two-hundred years ago this May, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark started up the
Missouri River on a two-year journey into the American West. As America
commemorates the bicentennial of the expedition, hundreds of volunteers are cleaning up
the Missouri. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Kevin Lavery reports:


A troupe portraying Lewis and Clark’s Corps of Discovery is retracing the explorers’
path. The real journey starts when they leave Illinois and take their keelboat up the
Missouri River as it meanders through the state of Missouri.


But…the Missouri is not as clean as the day Lewis and Clark first saw it. With the re-
enactors and their flotilla coming, some local volunteers want to do some cleaning up
ahead of time. They’re launching what could be the biggest clean-up ever on the Big
Muddy.


(sound of lapping water)


John Brady and Jeff Barrow are with Missouri River Relief, a grassroots nonprofit that
began cleaning the banks of the Missouri three years ago. Now, they’re embarking on
their most ambitious project yet: eight massive daylong cleanups that will stretch into
June. The idea is to stay two weeks ahead of the flotilla, clearing away any eyesores
along its cruise upriver.


Barrow says they’ve seen their share of garbage clogging the Missouri:


“Everything from cars and truck bodies, you find a lot of freezers and refrigerators, you
find tons of Styrofoam, plastic…we found a piano once.”


(sound of boat motor starting)


Barrow and Brady are scouting the river in search of places where debris piles up. As the
advance team, their job is to place markers in heavy trash areas so the coming clean-up
crews know where to start. Just a few hundred yards out, Brady spots a small pocket of
trash. But he knows that what he sees on the shore is only a fraction of what’s hidden in
the trees:


“So, when you go out scouting you spot the obvious stuff that you can see from the
riverbank, and then you go to the spots where you know that it’s more likely that stuff
accumulates. For example, brushy spots on the outside of bends. And you get out and
look, and if it’s a good heavy spot, you schedule a crew to come in there and work it.”


Barrow guns the motor and heads for the spot where the Missouri flows into the
Mississippi. The two currents blend into a broad waterway. On the far bank of the
Mississippi, green trees give way to rusty machinery and industry on the Illinois bank:


Barrow: “Do we have our passport for Illinois here?” (laughs)


Barrow says this area will get special attention:


“Right here is where they’re going to kick off the Lewis and Clark flotilla. See this gravel
beach? So they’re expecting 2,000 people to be here, and we’re going to be cleaning up
this area, get all this driftwood out of there…you see the trash that’s up there.”


Preparing the site for that many people will take a small army of volunteers. But the
excitement of the Lewis and Clark bicentennial should make that an easier job than usual.


Evan McFarland belongs to the River Kids…a non-profit group made up of some 40 St.
Louis fourth-graders that began cleaning local creeks last fall. He’s enthusiastic about the
environmental benefits of a cleaner river. But Evan also sees a public relations benefit.
With potentially thousands of foreign tourists coming to the U.S. for the bicentennial
events, Evan thinks the time is right to showcase the Missouri:


“Well, I hope that they would be very excited and maybe compare where they came from,
maybe a river or a lake to the Missouri River…and maybe if they’ve already been here
before, see how it’s improved, and say hey…this is a pretty clean river.”


The band of volunteers will start at the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi before
the flotilla sets sail May 14th. They’ll steadily move upstream, capping their efforts with
a grand finale cleanup in Kansas City in June.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Kevin Lavery.

Related Links

Woman Fights Uphill Battle Against Water Diversion

  • Upstream on the Glen Tay River in the Fall of 1999. Residents fought against a Swiss company (OMYA) who wanted to draw water from the river to make slurry for products like toothpaste and paper. (Photo courtesy of Carol Dillon)

In many communities, there are increasing demands for the limited supply of water. But people often feel there’s little they can do to protect that water from outside interests. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly reports on one woman who fought to stop millions of gallons of water from being drained from her local river:

Transcript

In many communities, there are increasing demands for the limited
supply of water. But people often feel there’s little they can do to protect that
water from outside interests. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly reports on one
woman who fought to stop millions of gallons of water from being
drained from her local river:


(sound of crunching leaves)


It’s been a wet spring. But the leaves along the shore of the Tay River in Perth, Ontario
crunch beneath your feet.


Carol Dillon walks a path that was once submerged in water. She stops at a maple tree, and
points to a ring of greenish bark around its trunk.


“This is where the water comes to normally in the spring…
This was sort of the natural shore line, but the water has not
been this high, this would be the fourth year now.”


(sound of wind, crunching of leaves)


Carol Dillon and her husband, Mel, bought this piece of land in
1999. They came here to retire. Then, in the fall of that year, the Tay River dried up.


Four months later, they were shocked when a manufacturer applied
to take 1.2 million gallons of water out of the river every day.


“We simply looked out the window at this very dry river and
said, well how are they going to do that?”


Dillon soon found out they weren’t the only people asking that
question. Six thousand residents depend on the river for drinking water.
Another six thousand draw from wells in the river’s watershed. People worried there wouldn’t be
enough clean water during the dry season. And that wildlife would suffer.


(sound of truck)


An 18-wheeler pulls out of the OMYA plant in Perth, carrying a
load of calcium carbonate sludge. The Swiss company needs water to make the sludge, which
goes into products like paper and toothpaste.


They already draw about 400 thousand gallons out of the area’s
groundwater each day. But OMYA wanted to triple its water consumption so it could step
up production, with a promise of new jobs.


The public had 15 days to comment on the company’s plan.


As a consultant with the federal government, Dillon knew a bit
about bureaucracy. So she started helping out neighbors, who weren’t sure what they
could do.


“At one of the public meetings, a farmer stood up and said,
‘I’ve been a farmer on the Tay River for 40 years, but I don’t know
what to write in a letter to the minister.’ He said, ‘well, we have
to be careful with the water.’ And I said, ‘that’s your letter.'”


Dillon says she wanted to convince people that their voices do
matter. So she dropped off envelopes for them, faxed their letters, and
answered lots of questions. Before she knew it, she had kick-started a grassroots
movement.


“I was not a tree hugger in my life and I never was a
political person, either, but always believed in responsibility…
This is a democracy and when people have an opinion on something,
your government should hear it.”


People were inspired by Dillon. Jackie Seaton is one of the many who got involved.


“She simply spoke to the issue of water. If you’ve ever read
any of her memos or heard her speak at a council meeting, I mean
everybody can understand what’s she saying because it’s in the
plainest and simplest terms. And I must say that was very, very impressive.”


Typically, the ministry of environment receives fewer than 10
letters. But 283 townspeople wrote in to oppose the water taking.


Despite that, the ministry granted OMYA its permit.


The residents could appeal the decision to a quasi-judicial panel. But without money or a lawyer,
they decided it would be impossible.


Dillon, however, disagreed. She forged ahead on her own, and won the right to a hearing. She
relied on scientists who had retired in the community to help her prepare. It would be her word
against lawyers representing the company and the government.


(ambient sound)


Dillon pulls a thick plastic binder off a bookshelf that’s packed
with evidence used in the hearing.


She insists she wasn’t against the water taking per se. She just wanted the government to make a
decision based on good science. The company was granted the initial permit based in part on 75-
year-old data. Dillon argued more research needed to be done.


Over the past eight years, 46 community groups have challenged
decisions by the Ministry of the Environment.


No one had ever won – until now.


The panel granted the company just one third of the amount of
water it requested, with a potential for more in the future. And it directed the province to conduct
more research on the river.


“First, we were…it was unbelievable and then we were
ecstatic that it was all worth it.”


But the citizens’ celebrations were short-lived.


In April of this year, Ontario’s environment minister, Chris
Stockwell, reversed the tribunal decision and reinstated the full
permit. He cited new information that predicted the river would drop only
a few inches when the water was removed. The minister won’t comment on the outcome, other
than to say he stands by his decision.


But OMYA’s plant administrator, Larry Sparks, says the decision
was based on science. And while he recognizes that citizens have a right to question the
government, he says it shouldn’t come at the expense of business.


“And it’s very difficult to make
business decisions when you apply for a permit and have to wait three
years for approval and conclusion of the process. Our concern was not with the people, but rather
with the fact that the process was allowed to go on for three years.”


For Carol Dillon, the minister’s decision was a disappointing end to a
long struggle.


“You can have this two and a half year-long process and the
minister can just overturn it, politically, then what’s the point
of it all? So I’m back to where I started.”


(sounds by the river)


But Dillon hasn’t given up. Now she’s lobbying Ontario to adopt new standards for water use.
She doesn’t care if she has to write letters, battle lawyers or
lobby politicians – she just wants her community, and everyone in
Ontario, to have a say in the future of their water.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Karen Kelly.

Bike Co-Op Pedals Self Sufficiency

  • A volunteer at re-Cycles looks for a replacement. Volunteers teach bike repair to amateurs and novices. Their goal is to get people out of their cars and onto their bikes. Photo by Lisa Routhier.

When it comes to bicycles, many of us are weekend warriors. The thought of riding a bike to work is intimidating – especially given the chance it might break down. Now, some cycling advocates are helping ordinary people become amateur bike mechanics. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly visited a community-run repair shop and has this report:

Transcript

When it comes to bicycles, many of us are weekend warriors. The thought of riding a
bike to work is intimidating – especially given the chance it might break down. Now,
some cycling advocates are helping ordinary people become amateur bike mechanics.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly visited a community-run repair
shop and has this report:


(ambient sound in shop)


It’s the perfect day to work on your bike.
Rainy and cold. But the forecast says warmer weather is ahead.


And that’s why people and bikes are packed into a so-called
bicycle cooperative based in Ottawa, Canada. It’s called Recycles.
And it’s a bike repair shop that’s open to everyone.


Its walls are lined with cookie tins filled with greasy bicycle
parts. Fenders and inner tubes hang from the ceiling.


For just a few bucks an hour, you can get a bike stand, access to
tools and advice from mechanics.


The shop is run by ten volunteers who keep it open two nights a
week and on Sundays.


Mark Rehder is the coop’s director. He’s a firm believer that anyone can fix a bike.


“If they’re a complete novice, we’ll start. We’ll sort of,
‘here.’ We’ll do it or show them and hand them the screwdriver or
the wrench and say ‘you keep doing that and when you get that part
off, let me know.’ And then so the head mechanic will move on to
someone else and the person, ‘okay, I’ve got the thingamajig off’
and we’re ‘okay, now you have to clean that out’ and just step by
step…guide them through the thing.”


The coop was started seven years ago by a group of dedicated
cyclists. Lloyd Deane is one of the coop’s founders. He says their
mission is simple – to get people out of their cars.


“There is an alternative out there and it’s quiet, it’s
healthy, it’s cheap, it’s uncomplicated and you can actually fix
it yourself and we’re a living testament that people with no
mechanical skills whatsoever can come in here and fix their own
transportation.”


(pedals turning)


Volunteer mechanic Rob Galdins focuses intently on the bicycle
wheel spinning in front of him. He works on one side of the bike
as a client tightens nuts on the other.


“We’re putting on some new brake pads and we’re just sort of
centering the brakes so that they hit the rim squarely…
And yeah, tighten that nut. There’s already a nut there. Okay….”


Nearby, volunteer Jennifer Niece is making the wheel true on her
own bike. She says this experience has changed the way she uses
her bicycle.


“I do a lot of touring and I wasn’t really able to do that by
myself until I started volunteering here because if I got a flat
tire or if my brakes busted or something out on the road, I
wouldn’t have been able to fix it. So it’s really valuable for me
to learn that.”


When the volunteers aren’t helping other people, they’re refurbishing
used bikes. They sell them to keep the operation going. But the
group also receives some outside support.


Most of their tools and parts are supplied by the Mountain
Equipment Co-op, a Canadian nonprofit that sells outdoor gear.
Mark Vancoy is the social and environmental coordinator at the
Ottawa store. He says they support Recycles because it fills a void in the
community.


“If you were to go to a bike shop, a lot of times … the
shop rate is, for most people, sort of out of range for them. So this
really empowers people to be able to one, afford to have a bike
and two, to keep them up in working order.”


The bicycle co-op is probably one of the smallest volunteer
organizations in Ottawa. It has a tiny budget, no rules, and virtually no
hierarchy. But the leader of this band of volunteers, Mark Rehder, is
convinced it’s an ideal way to change society.


“It’s great to go up on parliament hill and wave the signs,
‘down with Bush’ or whatever, but at a local level is where change
is most effective. It’s just little groups like us, doing little
things and connecting with the other little groups and maybe every
now and then sort of pulling out a pillar that was propping up
something society didn’t need anyways.”


(sound of bike shop)


Rehder says sometimes they’ll talk about politics. Mostly, they’re focused on
flat tires and broken chains. But many of them share the same dream –
they look forward to a day when cyclists will have the roads to themselves.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Karen Kelly.

Community Keeps Growth in Check

When the Chicago Tribune named Bayfield, Wisconsin as the best small town inthe Midwest last year, there was celebration and some reservation. Thispristine gateway to Lake Superior has seen steady growth since then. But agrassroots effort by residents of that area is trying to keep expansionunder control. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium Mike Simonson has more: