HBG and Local Issues & Business
Reach Out: Chair the HBG Outreach Committee!
Harvey Broome Group table at Earthfest 2017. Photo by Todd Waterman.
Shout it OUT from the mountaintop! Or from a tabling event, or from a community fish fry! Sierra Club OUTREACH, that is. HBG is looking for an excited and engaged chairperson for our Outreach Committee. There is a loosely-formed committee to support the chair. The Outreach Committee reaches out to communities in the HBG region to inform and educate about the history of the Sierra Club, our past achievements, and our current initiatives. In 2019, before COVID shuttered many in-person activities, the Outreach Committee participated in 9 events scattered throughout the year, mainly around Earth Day. There is funding in the current HBG budget to expand Outreach events and to support other HBG committees, like the Political and Membership committees. The Outreach chair will decide the level and type of activities. If you understand the importance of the Sierra Club’s mission to explore, enjoy, and protect our planet and can put some time and energy into chairing this important committee, please contact Joan Tomlinson at joanptomlinson@gmail.com for more information. HBG needs you! Please get involved!
Welcoming New ExCom Members
New year, new members! HBG is pleased to welcome two new additions to the Executive Committee: Julie Elfin and Melanie Mayes, both of Knoxville.
Julie has been editor-in-chief of the HBG newsletter since February of last year. She will continue in this role, while also serving as chair of the Nominations Committee. Julie has worked as an environmental educator in Knox County and in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. As an ExCom member, Julie plans to prioritize seeking out diverse perspectives and building coalitions to improve the East Tennessee environment for all residents.
Julie has been a Sierra Club member since 2013 and has organized for fossil fuel divestment, renewable energy, and environmental justice ever since. As a young adult herself, Julie understands the importance of adapting traditional activism to collaborate with new partners and appeal to younger generations. To this end, she recently created an Instagram account for HBG.
Dr. Melanie Mayes is a geologist and Senior Scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and a Joint Faculty with the University of Tennessee. Melanie’s two-decade research career involves radionuclide and heavy metal migration in soils; remedial solutions for mercury; and greenhouse gasses, soil carbon, and climate change. She is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and a Lead Editor of the U.S. Global Change Research Program’s Second State of the Carbon Cycle Report. She presented the report’s findings to the Tennessee Sierra Club Annual Meeting and the Harvey Broome Group.
Melanie is an avid hiker, having logged over 10,000 miles in the Appalachian Mountains. She serves as the Chair of WaysSouth, a non-profit promoting environmentally and fiscally responsible transportation projects in Appalachia. She is a past Board member of the Tennessee Citizens for Wilderness Planning and served as a science advisor to the Lundquist Environmental Appalachian Fellowship.
Melanie can contribute to the mission of the Harvey Broome Group with her expertise in subsurface hydrology and metal contamination, can speak to the public about climate change and its effects, and would love to contribute to the Third Edition of the Cherokee National Forest Hiking Guide to the fabulous mountains of eastern Tennessee.
Job Opportunity: Organizer with Appalachian Voices
 Graphic by Appalachian Voices
Our allies at Appalachian Voices are looking to hire a Tennessee Field Coordinator to work with rural communities around:
1. Stopping the Kingston Coal Plant's conversion to natural gas (because Roane county has dealt with ENOUGH pollution and land grabs from TVA), and helping to develop a local community group to drive long term outcomes at the plant.
2. Organizing for democratic decision making and new programs for clean energy/lower utility bills at member-owned Rural Electric Cooperatives in this part of the state.
Required activities include but are not limited to: gorgeous scenic day drives, porch sits & shooting the shit with local community members, and meeting/ bringing rural folks together at venues that could range from potlucks to ice cream socials, drive-ins to county fairs or cattle auctions. Success in this work looks like developing new local leaders, powerful organizing infrastructure, and winning campaigns that tangibly improve people's lives & environment in East TN.
Some days this kind of work is very hard but when it's good, it's VERY good. Looking for someone with community organizing experience but open to folks with relevant skills around strategy and power analysis, leadership development and who know how to connect with rural folk.
Find more information and apply here.
Appalachian Voices is a nonprofit advocacy organization that works to achieve an Appalachia with healthy, intact ecosystems and advance a just transition to a generative and equitable clean energy economy. They have 30 staff members located in offices in Boone, N.C., Charlottesville, Va., Norton, Va., Knoxville, Tenn., and Durham, N.C.
KUB posts intentions with respect to disconnections for non-payment.
They also include their suggestions for “assistance” for those in need, and how those of us in better circumstances can assist those in need via “Project Help."
For utility companies in other counties and municipalities in Tennessee, e.g., Alcoa, LaFollete, Lenoir City, Maryville, Clinton, and more, links to pandemic response policies can be found here.
Federally Funded Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP)
This federal program provides federally funded assistance in managing costs associated with: home energy bills, energy crises, weatherization and energy-related minor home repairs.
Read about other local events in Tennessee in our Chapter e-newsletters.
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Events and Actions
Maryville Huddle Meeting: Update on Kingston Coal Ash Spill
Thursday, Jan 27, 7:00-9:00 PM ET
Online via Zoom
Graphic by Maryville Huddle
The speaker is Ms. Jamie Satterfield, the former Knoxville New Sentinel reporter, who followed the story of the spill and its effects on clean-up workers for years. Jamie Satterfield is an investigative journalist with more than 33 years of experience, specializing in legal affairs, policing, public corruption, environmental crime and civil rights violations. Her journalism has been awarded as some of the best in the nation, earning recognition from the Scripps Howard Foundation, the Society of Professional Journalists’ Sigma Delta Chi Awards, the Green Eyeshade Awards, the Tennessee Press Association, the Tennessee Managing Editors Association, the First Amendment Center and many other industry organizations. Her work has led to criminal charges against wrongdoers, changes in state law and citations in legal opinions and journals. The veracity of her work led authorities to allow her to personally present her investigative findings in the cover-up of the mass poisoning of an American workforce to federal agents and a county grand jury in the fall of 2021. She was married to the love of her life for 28 years and is now a widow and proud mother of two successful children of good character and work ethic.
Join the Zoom Meeting here:
Meeting ID: 895 4588 8666, Passcode: 061690
Tennessee Valley People’s Power Trainings
Monday, January 31 & Tuesday, February 1
Online via Zoom
 Sierra Club graphic
Do you want to start a grassroots campaign for lower electric bills, renewable energy or another energy goal in your area? Are you interested in rallying your community for change but don't know where to start?
Register for the second part of the Tennessee Valley People's Power Training series on Tuesday, February 1st from 6:30-8:30pm ET to get the tools you need to win a campaign at your local electric utility. Register here
This is the second training in a free, three part series to help you and your neighbors build the knowledge, skills and connections you need to be successful. If you missed the first part of the training series on December 7th, you can attend the makeup session on Monday, Jan 31st from 7-9pm ET (6-8pm CT). Here's a registration form.
SEEED’s Green Gala
Friday, April 8, 7:00-10:00 PM ET
Jubilee Banquet Center, 6700 Jubilee Center Way, Knoxville, 37912
Poster by Socially Equal Energy Efficient Development
The annual Green Gala by Socially Equal Energy Efficient Development (SEEED) raises funds to provide pathways out of poverty for young adults through career readiness training.
Hallerin Hilton Hill will host the gala, which will include live music by Lynnez & The Good Fellas and DJ Von, a silent auction, dinner and a photo shoot. The young adults also will be honored.
Tickets are $65, early bird in the month of January, $49.99. Buy tickets here.
Attire: Dressy, black tie optional, cocktail.
Great Smokies Eco-Adventure
Sunday, April 10 - Tuesday, April 12, 2022
Great Smoky Mountains National Park
 Great Smokies Eco-Adventure 2021 participants. Image by Will Kuhn.
Experience the Smokies like never before! Spend your days exploring the wilds of Great Smoky Mountains National Park and your nights glamorously camping off the grid. Discover Life in America is partnering with A Walk in the Woods to bring you this exclusive 3-day, 2-night adventure that will include guided hikes and nature walks, camping in a luxurious off-grid setting, great local food and drink, and much more. All proceeds from this fundraising event will help DLiA discover and conserve the rich biodiversity of the Smokies.
Tickets are $950 per guest. For more information and to purchase tickets, visit www.dlia.org/event/eco-adventure-2022
Discover Life in America is a nonprofit organization based in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Our flagship project is the All Taxa Biodiversity Inventory, a joint effort with the park to identify and catalog each of the 60,000+ species living here! We work with park staff, researchers, and volunteers to study biodiversity in the Smokies, to educate others about its importance in our lives, and ultimately to conserve the richness of life on Earth.
Tell KUB: We Need to Know About Utility Shutoffs
 Graphic by Knoxville Water and Energy for All
Earlier this year, the Knoxville Water and Energy for All (KWEA) research team found that Black and brown census tracts were 200% more likely to be disconnected from their utilities. Since then, KUB has stopped sharing key data that allowed us to do this research by census tract. As customers of KUB, we need to know how these disconnections are impacting different neighborhoods and demographics in our community so that we can find solutions that are equitable and just.
Sign this petition to tell KUB to make utility disconnection data by census tract PUBLIC!
KWEA has been able to obtain some of the data we need in order to know how utility disconnections are impacting our community through public records requests. But in these open records exchanges KUB has claimed that they do not have the capability to share data by census tract, even though they were sharing this same data with KWEA previously.
From January to September of 2021, KUB disconnected 9,150 households (some more than once) from their utility services. This means that tens of thousands of people in our community lost access to their power and water because they were not able to pay their bills. This is a critical time for KUB customers, nonprofit organizations and elected leaders in our community to have access to detailed disconnection data!
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Environmental Newsflash
*** Note to readers about accessing these articles
Biden administration zeroes in on protecting groundwater from coal ash contamination. Anila Yoganathan, Knoxville News Sentinel, January 14.
Yoganathan quotes Beyond Coal’s Jonathan Levenshus, Southern Environmental Law Center’s Amanda Garcia, and TVA’s Scott Brooks.
E&C Leaders Request Information from Tennessee Valley Authority on Ratepayer Bills and Climate Action: Members Express Concern over High Electric Bills, Underinvestment in Energy Efficiency and Renewable Power, and Inadequate Decarbonization Goals. Press Release, House Committee on Energy & Commerce, January 13.
 Take Back TVA Rally, August 8, 2021. Photo by Todd Waterman.
“The TVA was created by federal statute through the Tennessee Valley Authority Act and is required to ‘give preference to States, counties, municipalities, and cooperative organizations of citizens or farmers, not organized or doing business for profit’ and to maintain national leadership in technology innovation, low-cost power, and environmental stewardship. Congress has safeguarded TVA ratepayers from predatory practices by requiring the federal electric utility to engage in ‘least cost planning’ that accounts for the ‘full range of existing and incremental resources’ including energy conservation and efficiency and renewable energy resources.
“‘The Committee is concerned that TVA’s business practices are inconsistent with these statutory requirements to the disadvantage of TVA’s ratepayers and the environment. Specifically, we are concerned that Tennessee Valley residents pay too much for electricity, which particularly impacts low-income households in Tennessee,’ the four Committee leaders wrote to TVA CEO Jeffrey Lyash. ‘The Committee is also concerned that TVA is interfering with the adoption of renewable energy by its commercial and residential customers and, while it is making progress on decarbonization, it must do more this decade.’”
Congressman Cohen Applauds Energy and Commerce Committee Leaders’ Request for Information from the Tennessee Valley Authority on Ratepayer Costs and Commitment to Addressing Climate Change: Members Express Concern over High Electric Bills, Underinvestment in Energy Efficiency and Renewable Power, and Inadequate Decarbonization Goals. Press Release, Office of Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN, 9th District, Memphis/Shelby County), January 13.
House Committee on Energy and Commerce Calls for Long-Overdue TVA Oversight. Maggie Shober, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, January 13.
Six in 10 Americans ‘alarmed’ or ‘concerned’ about climate change – study: New report finds ‘alarmed’ group doubled in size over five years, while only two in 10 Americans are ‘doubtful’ or ‘dismissive’. Maya Yang, The Guardian, January 13.
“The study revealed that the largest group, Alarmed (33%) greatly outnumber the dismissive (9%) by more than three to one. Approximately six in 10 Americans (59%) are either Alarmed or Concerned while only approximately two in 10 (19%) are Doubtful or Dismissive.”
Source study: Global Warming’s Six Americas. September 2021. Anthony Leiserowitz, et al., Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, January 12.
“There has been substantial change in the distribution of the Six Americas over the past five years. The Alarmed segment has nearly doubled in size, increasing 15 percentage points (from 18% to 33% of the U.S. adult population), including an increase of 9 percentage points from March 2021 to September 2021. In contrast, over the past 5 years only about 1 in 10 Americans have been Dismissive (decreasing from 11% to 9%). Overall, Americans are becoming more worried about global warming, more engaged with the issue, and more supportive of climate solutions.”
What to expect from the world's sixth mass extinction: Humans alive today are witnessing the beginning of the first mass extinction in 65 million years. What does biodiversity loss mean for us and the environment? Alistair Walsh, Deutsche Welle, January 11.
“About 65 million years after the last mass extinction, which marked the end of dinosaurs roaming the planet, scientists are warning that we are in the early throes of another such annihilation event. Unlike any other, this sixth mass die-off — or Anthropocene extinction — is the only one caused by humans, and climate change, habitat destruction, pollution and industrial agriculture all play a hand.
“In mass extinctions, at least three-quarters of all species cease to exist within about 3 million years. Some scientists believe that at our current rate, we could be on track to lose that number within a few centuries.
“Over the next few decades alone, at least 1 million species are at risk of being wiped out. That's according to an estimate in a landmark report published in 2019 — but many scientists say it could well be an undercount.
“Trying to predict the results of a complete collapse in biodiversity is almost a black art — ecosystems are incredibly complex.
“Scientists agree, however, that there are several clear predictions should extinctions continue at this rate. And all the effects are inextricably linked, like a game of Jenga. . . .
"Despite these catastrophic predictions, there is some cause for optimism. If humans do something. …
"A recent study found that had it not been for conservation interventions, losses would have been three to four times worse since 1993."
Neal Stephenson Thinks Greed Might Be The Thing That Saves Us. David Marchese, New York Times, January 9.
The interview touches on topics from the purpose of art to the philosophy of the post-fact era.
“Neal Stephenson, the best-selling author of “Snow Crash,” often imagines apocalyptic events, but he also looks beyond the edge of the cliff.
“His new novel, ‘Termination Shock,’ contemplates possible solutions to a climate-driven disaster. And he has hope that self-interest might save us yet.”
‘The Fuse Has Been Blown,’ and the Doomsday Glacier Is Coming for Us All: New data suggests a massive collapse of the ice shelf in as little as five years. “We are dealing with an event that no human has ever witnessed,” says one scientist. “We have no analog for this.” Jeff Goodell, Rolling Stone, January 7.
 Thwaites Glacier. Image by sjrankin CC BY-NC 2.0
Jeff Goodell, who coined the name "Doomsday Glacier," extensively quotes Richard Alley, the scientist quoted in the article’s title. Alley presented a PowerPoint at UTK's Alumni Hall in 2020.
"Ten feet of sea level rise would be a world-bending catastrophe. It’s not only goodbye Miami, but goodbye to virtually every low-lying coastal city in the world. …
“‘We may have a small safety margin in Antarctica, but not a large one,’ says Alley. Even if the fuse is blown, cutting emissions fast could slow it all down to a millennium-long crack-up that will give us more time to adapt. One way or another, our future is written in ice.”
Knox County deputies stun participants by arresting Black activist at meeting about policing. Angela Dennis, Tyler Whetstone, and Rebecca Wright, Knoxville News Sentinel, January 7.
David Hayes was endorsed for Knoxville City Council by the Harvey Broome Group of the Sierra Club in 2019.
“Activist and former Knoxville City Council candidate David Hayes told Knox News he was punched in the face by a Knox County deputy while he was in custody Friday following his arrest outside a public meeting about policing in the city.
“When Hayes asked why he was being arrested and declined to walk with deputies after he was handcuffed while lying on the floor, they lifted and carried him by his arms and legs to a holding room in the City-Council Building.
“While he was in a holding room at the City-County Building, Hayes said, a deputy applied continuous physical pressure, "pushing me around" and "hit my head or my throat" to the point he couldn't stifle a cough. When he coughed, deputies said he spit on the officer.
“He went on to punch me two or three times in the face, point-blank,” Hayes said, showing his injuries.”
Fire at Knoxville Planned Parenthood was arson, investigators say. Tyler Whetstone, Knoxville News Sentinel, January 6.
“The fire that tore through Knoxville’s Planned Parenthood clinic on New Year's Eve was arson, fire department officials said Thursday, confirming the fears of health care workers and activists alike who thought the blaze was an act of hate.
“No suspects are in custody, and the Knoxville Fire Department urged community members to share information that could help investigators by calling 800-762-3017 or emailing KFDArson@knoxvilletn.gov. People who provide tips can remain anonymous and may be eligible for a reward up to $10,000 for information that leads to the prosecution of anyone responsible.
“Planned Parenthood officials pledged to rebuild the facility, which is the organization's only branch in East Tennessee.”
Donate here to support rebuilding.
This tree has stood here for 500 years. Will it be sold for $17,500? Juliet Eilperin with photos and video by Salwan Georges, The Washington Post, Dec 30, 2021.
6000 board feet. 13.5 metric tons of carbon. "This mammoth tree plays an outsize role in the Tongass National Forest, which holds the equivalent of 9.9 billion tons of CO2 — nearly twice what the United States emits from burning fossil fuels each year."
Read about other events in Tennessee in our Chapter e-newsletters.
*** A democracy with informed citizens requires the professionalism that we have historically expected of credible news sources. Most “local" newspapers today are asking folks who access their online news stories to purchase a subscription to their paper. This is understandable generally, and reminds us that we should do our part to pay for the resources that result in publication of local news. Those of us who use summaries of published print news, as we do, are no exception, and we ask the same of our readers. However, we also believe that a person who only wants to see an occasional article published in a newspaper should not be required to subscribe. So if you believe that you are in the latter category - only an occasional reader - you may be able to read an article without a subscription if you "browse anonymously" or clear your browser cache before activating a link to an article. This may help you avoid many "pay walls" at these news sources (some sources restrict access even with anonymous settings). Another approach is to search for alternate source on the particular news item. But we recommend that our readers who find themselves accessing an online news source on a regular basis subscribe to an online version of the paper, which is generally much cheaper than a print version.
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HELP THE HARVEY BROOME GROUP
PROTECT OUR ENVIRONMENT
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Can't donate now? Sign up for Kroger Community Rewards. Kroger donates a portion of what you spend to the Harvey Broome Group as long as you designate HBG as your preferred charity.
Here's how:
1. Go to the Kroger Community Rewards web page
2. Register (or Sign In if you already have an account.)
3. Enroll in Community Rewards (or Edit if you're already enrolled.)
4. Enter HBG's Community Rewards Number 27874.
That's it. Swipe your Kroger Card when you shop and know that you're helping protect your environment.
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