BETTER PATH PRESENTS
EVERY TUESDAY AT 8 P.M.
Don't miss the Better Path Coalition's new webinar series, Better Path Presents. The Coalition turned 2 on April 13th under circumstances we could not have imagined at our kickoff rally in 2018. We decided to organize weekly webinars to help us stay connected, stay informed, figure out together how to be activists, advocates, and organizers who must work at a safe distance from each other and our targets, and make plans for how we can help shape the new normal. Each webinar will include information about current actions and events and how you can participate.
JUNE 2 - Direct Action
Patrick Young of Rising Tide North America and Drew Hudson of 198 Methods will discuss Direct Action on the next Better Path Presents webinar. More details to come.
MAY 26 - Enabling a Just Transition: Public Ownership of Fossil Fuels
On the next Better Path Presents, hear from Johanna Bozuwa of the Democracy Collaborative and Collin Rees from Oil Change International on their new report, The Case for Public Ownership of the Fossil Fuel Industry they collaborated on for The Next System Project.
"We need public ownership for the people, not a bailout for fossil fuel executives. By assuming ownership and control of the coal, oil, and gas industries, the U.S. government can position itself to provide near- and long-term economic security for struggling workers and communities, and to proactively wind down fossil fuel production to meet climate goals. This approach would help manage further social, financial, and environmental stress from a sector already in decline before COVID-19."
MAY 19 - Laurie Barr on Orphaned & Abandoned Wells
Hundreds of thousands of orphaned and abandoned oil and gas wells dot Pennsylvania. Only a small fraction of the wells have been plugged. The vast majority are in varying states of disrepair, many considered to be super-emitters of methane.
Laurie Barr and her associates at Save Our Streams PA started a project they called Scavenger Hunt PA to locate and photograph wells and test them for leaks. Laurie's efforts have been nationally recognized by the press and the research community alike. Last May, she began working on a documentary, Releasing Methane, that looks at the issue in oil and gas producing states across the country to provide "a comprehensive picture of the environmental and regulatory issues surrounding abandoned oil and gas wells and emerging solutions."
Watch a recording of our webinar
MAY 12 - Community Watchdoggin', featuring Chris "PK" DiGiulio
Chris "PK" DiGiulio has been watchdogging her community on the frontlines of the Mariner East pipeline for years and has developed a training. "The definition of a watchdog is: one that guards against loss, waste, theft, or undesirable practices.
Who can be a watchdog? Anybody.
What is better than a watchdog? A team of watchdogs.
When it comes to the fossil fuel industry, watchdogs become a community necessity.
With regulations fixed to aid the industry and regulators understaffed and budgets being slashed, especially in the environmental realm, community watchdogging becomes a way for a community to gather the evidence they need to fight the injustices placed upon them by both our government and the industry. Developing a well orchestrated community watchdog team, I have found, helps to keep our regulators, elected officials, and industry accountable for their damaging behavior to individuals, the community, and the environment. This presentation is what I have learned through my experience fighting the Mariner East pipeline project and the fracking industry. I will share what we have created and show why anybody can be a watchdog. We I’ll talk about what is needed, safety and legal precautions, and what to look for while in the field."
Watch a recording of our webinar
MAY 5 - Justin Nobel on Radioactivity in Shale Gas Development
Justin Nobel's groundbreaking piece, America's Radioactive Secret published in Rolling Stone in January reviewed his three years of research into radioactivity in oil and gas development. He writes on issues of science and the environment for Rolling Stone and has a book on oil and gas radioactivity forthcoming with Simon & Schuster entitled PETROLEUM-238: Big Oil’s Dangerous Secret and the Grassroots Fight to Stop It.
Watch a recording of our webinar
APRIL 28 - Disrespect: Rogue Creek Garbage, COVID-19, and the Missing Rights of Nature, featuring Dr. Michael Schroeder
What’s the connection between the abundance of plastic garbage in our local waterways and the global COVID-19 pandemic? Both phenomena, along with the fracking & pipeline revolutions, global climate disruption, and systemic animal cruelty, are rooted in the same fundamental disrespect for the non-human natural world that defines our contemporary consumer-based capitalist society and political economy. In this presentation and invitation to dialogue, Michael Schroeder, Executive Director of the Quittapahilla Creek Garbage Museum in Annville, PA, and Associate Professor of History at Lebanon Valley College, will explore these not-so-hidden connections to argue the critical need to expand our conception and practice of “rights” beyond the inalienable rights of individual citizens to also embrace and codify into law the inalienable rights of non-human Nature.
Watch a recording of our webinar
Mentioned by Michael Schroeder
Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom by David W. Blight
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari
APRIL 21 - COVID-19: Pandemics, Pollution, and Public Health, featuring Dr. Ned Ketyer
Our first webinar looks at the intersections of COVID-19 and pollution and climate change. Dr. Ketyer is a Pittsburgh-area pediatrician with special interests in developmental pediatrics, preventative medicine, and environmental health. After completing his pediatric residency at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, Dr. Ketyer practiced general pediatrics for 26 years before retiring from patient care in 2017. He writes and edits his practice’s popular blog, The PediaBlog, and remains a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics Council on Environmental Health. Dr. Ketyer is a consultant for the Southwest Pennsylvania Environmental Health Project bringing attention to the health impacts of shale gas development in the Marcellus Shale gas patch, a board member of Physicians for Social Responsibility - Pennsylvania, and a Climate Reality Project Leader.
In all these roles, Dr. Ketyer connects the vast petrochemical “clusterfrack” underway in SW Pennsylvania with local and regional health impacts, and the global ecological and public health catastrophes resulting from plastic pollution and climate change that threaten the health and well-being of all passengers on this shining ball of blue.
Watch a recording of our webinar
REGISTER FOR OUR
UPCOMING WEBINARS
Please register before 7:30 the evening of the webinar.
June 2
Direct Action
Register Here before 7:30 on 6/2
May 26
Enabling a Just Transition: Public Ownership of Fossil Fuels
Register Here before 7:30 on 5/26
ANNOUNCEMENTS
MAY 26
Better Path Presents - Save the Dates
6/16 Blowout
6/19 Legislator Virtual Tour
6/20 Lynne Cherry Webinar for Young People
6/21 Josh Fox on Gasland at 10
MAY 19
Virtual Tour of SWPA Fracking Impacts, Thursday, 5/21 at noon
Email Lois Bjornson to RSVP
Hosted by EHP and PSR
Speakers:
Lois Bjornson
Matt Mehalik
Ned Ketyer
Leann Leiter
Watch at:
facebook.com/EnvironmentalHealthProject
www.environmentalhealthproject.org
youtube.com/user/BreatheProject
Diane Sipe on Marcellus Outreach Butler's panel discussion on Planet of the Humans
Saturday, May 23 at 7:00 pm
Register Here
Participants are urged to view the film beforehand. It can be viewed free through May 21 at here.
Tammy Murphy on upcoming PSR events
May 27th Pennsylvania Physicians for Social Responsibility is partnering with ProtectPT and Halt the Harm Network
for a talk with author Eliza Griswold where she will discuss the impact of her locally sourced book: Amity and Prosperity: One Family and the Fracturing of America.
Register Here
On May 28th at 7:30 p.m., Pennsylvania Physicians for Social Responsibility will host a film-screening of Triple Divide {Redacted} with directors Melissa Troutman and Josh Pribanic. We are in the process of establishing a registration form and deciding which platform we will use to share the film-screening.
Better Path Presents - Save the Dates
6/16 Blowout
6/19 Legislator Virtual Tour
6/20 Lynne Cherry Webinar for Young People
6/21 Josh Fox on Gasland at 10
MAY 12
Gillian Graber of Protect PT on Amity and Prosperity Now: A Virtual Discussion with Pulitzer-Prize Winning Author Eliza Griswold, May 27 at 6:30. Register here.
MAY 5
Karen Feridun on behalf of Food & Water Europe on an upcoming online conference. The Heinrich Böll Foundation, Deutsche Umwelthilfe and Food & Water Action Europe are organizing the online debate series “Fueling the Fire: Fracking, Plastics, Methane Emissions and the Gas Lobby”. Guest speaker will be, among others, Prof. Robert Howarth from Cornell University, USA.
Fracking, plastics and the climate - the still widely unknown nexus and its implications for the European Green Deal
Thursday, 7 May 2020 at 4-6 pm CEST (10 a.m. - noon ET)
The underestimated impact of fossil gas on global warming: The important role of Germany as the EU’s largest gas market
Wednesday, 13 May 2020 at 4-6 pm CEST (10 a.m. to noon ET)
Simultaneous interpretation (German/English) will be provided throughout both events.
You can register for each event here: www.duh.de/projekte/veranstaltungsreihe-zuendstoff-fuer-die-klimakrise/
APRIL 28
Karen Feridun on Call state senators to tell them to vote NO on SB327. Read details of bad bill here
Michael Bagdes-Canning on The Story of Plastics virtual screening by MOB on 5/2 and Medicare for All PA discussion from The Patio Series on 4/30
APRIL 21
Michael Bagdes-Canning on The Patio Series
Megan McDonough, Pennsylvania Organizing Manager, Food & Water Watch and Food & Water Action on
Have an action or event you'd like to announce on an upcoming webinar? Email betterpathpa@gmail.com with the details by Friday of the week before the webinar.