August 2005 | Dock of the Bay
Dig Pigs?
Anyone who palpitates over porkers would absolutely pig-out over Byron Rourkacha’s Oakland apartment. The walls are covered with snapshots of Rourkacha cuddling pigs at animal rescue farms, pig paintings by artists from around the world, and storyboards with roughed-out character models. Rourkacha heads the Green Beings Global Animation Studio (gbglobal.org ), and the artwork represents stage-one of GBG’s debut animated feature, “Operation Piggy Rescue.”
Looking for ways to address “green issues and social injustices,” Rourkacha has forsaken a writing career to pursue “visually spectacular 3D animation.” Despite warnings about entering a highly competitive industry that has already produced several animal-friendly hits — including “Babe,” “Chicken Run” and “Finding Nemo” — Rourkacha takes heart from the exploits of Julia Butterfly Hill. “If Julia Hill can sit in a tree for two years and endure cold, hunger, lightening, rain, wind, and thunder,” he grins, “this ought to be a walk in the park.” Rourkacha even has a role set aside for Hill — as the voice of the redoubtable Wanda Warthog.
An established Dutch animator currently oversees a crew of international artists who have only met in cyberspace. They swap sketches electronically. GBG plans to split any profits with animal rights organizations and is steering clear of casting “traditional Hollywood icon” voices in favor of eco-activists. Rourkacha hopes to corral reformed cattle-rancher Howard “Mad Cowboy” Lyman to voice a farmer in the movie, and he’s courting another of his heroes, Noam Chomsky, in hopes he’ll be the voice of a wise old boar. Indian activist Vandana Shiva may voice a tough-mama pig and Woody Harrelson is on the short list to play an owl named Hoot.
High on the Hog at Central Casting? If there’s room for an offbeat Hollywood icon like Harrelson, why not make room for cameos by a few other La-la-land Greens like Pamela Anderson, Darryl Hannah, Ed Begley, Jr. and Leonardo di Caprio? Think pig; think big! — Gar Smith
Watchword Eight
Since its 2000 launch, Watchword Press has published a bi-annual literary magazine that features the fiction, prose, and poetry of emerging American writers and modern translations. And these folks tend not to be your Cosmo- and-NEA-grant-types. They are a motley crew of tattoo artists, punk rockers, taxi drivers, car mechanics, and one retired police officer. There’s grit in their rhymes and prose.
Publisher/editor Liz Lisle and art director Helene Poulshock have created a Bay Area journal, at once elegant and innovative, that has quickly become a beacon for literary work of new writers. One past issue came with a CD of One-Act Plays by singer-songwriter Sonny Smith; another Watchword featured a chapbook collaboration between local poet Sam Tsitrin and visual artist Sonny Smith.
Watchword also throws some of the best literary-schmooze-fests in town — to date, some 40 events for local writers and readers. (Lisle is also Managing Director of Berkeley’s Shotgun Players and Poulshock is a multi-talented artist whose prints were recently exhibited at Oakland’s Lobot Gallery). Their journal has drawn national attention as well. Last month’s Harper’s reprinted a Jay Orff story. Other Watchword -smiths have seen their work win Honorable Mention in Dave Eggers’ collection, Best American Nonrequired Reading 2003 (Calla Devlin’s “Borderlines”) and receive nominations for The Pushcart Prize (Melvin Sterne’s “Warriors”). Watchword has featured work by local poet Nina Schuyler whose first novel The Painting (Algonquin) was selected by the SF Chronicle as one of the Best Books for 2004. Schuyler’s latest poem, “A Biography of Grief” appears in Watchword Issue Eight, just out and available at most Bay Area Independent bookstores. It features work by 19 writers and the childhood artwork of California Rueger, who turns 100 this year. You can also subscribe: www.watchwordpress.org — Carl Nagin
The Answer, My Friend…
Two Stanford University researchers have assembled some breezy stats that we hope could blow out the candles on the Fossil Fuel Era for good. Christina Archer and Mark Jacobson surveyed more than 8,000 global weather records and concluded that the world’s winds blow up a 72-terrawatt storm of untapped energy — about 40 times more electricity than was used worldwide in 2000. According to their report in the Journal of Geophysical Research, tapping just 20 percent of this wind power would provide enough juice to run every city, home and factory on Earth.
The study was based on the current crop of turbines that tower 300 feet in the air. With turbine construction soaring 34 percent a year, wind-power is the planet’s fastest-growing energy source. There’s still plenty room in this mini-boom. Wind-electricity only accounts less than one percent of humanity’s total energy budget. Some spots are especially wind-rich. The new Saudi Arabias of the Post-Carbon future will be located in Europe’s North Sea, off the tip of Southern America, on the island of Tasmania, along the Great Lakes and both northern coasts of the US. Archer is optimistic: “We tend to believe our results are kind of conservative,” she says. — GS
Nonprofit News
How about giving children in Bayview Hunters Point free backpacks full of school supplies? If you think there’s MAGIC behind the idea, you’re right — that’s the acronym for the Bayview Mobilization for Adolescent Growth In Our Communities, and they’re holding the second annual Back-to-School Backpack Celebration on August 27.
MAGIC is the brainchild of SF Public Defender Jeff Adachi and a coalition of 42 youth and family agencies, dedicated to giving poor youth and youth of color full access to educational, mentoring and motivational opportunities. Other MAGIC programs include a computer and technology center, book and technology expos, and an extensive mentoring program hosted by Bayview-based professionals.
“The idea is to recreate the advantages that most other communities give kids,” explained Adachi. “Our office represents about 1,400 kids a year. We saw that about a third of that total comes from Bayview Hunters Point.” Instead of hooking up kids to programs after they have run afoul of the juvenile justice system, MAGIC gives them opportunities to avoid that system in the first place. “You get a roomful of adults together they will talk forever — rarely with a youth in the room,” he says. And, generally, there is no follow-through. The solution is to make the program neighborhood-based and fully accountable. Everyone needs to know when a person or an agency has succeeded or failed to follow through on a project. That can involve anything from volunteering at an event or selling the promised number of fundraising tickets.
With backing from the United Way, UCSF and SBC, MAGIC has been a remarkable success both for lowering the level of community violence and reducing the ranks of kids in the juvenile justice system. This approach has engaged nonprofits that normally compete for funding to work together for the common good. MAGIC’s impact on individual kids is impressive. “We had a kid from the Log Cabin Ranch [part of the city’s juvenile program],” Adachi recalls. “He took a website course there, and then we paid him to create a website for our agency. It is really amazing the work [these kids] can do when they are given a chance!”
The August 27 Back-to-School Backpack Celebration runs from 11-3 in Bayview Park at Third and Carroll St. For more information or to get involved, call (415) 905-9100 or visit www.bayviewmagic.com. — Tim Kingston
Stem Cell
In California, Proposition 71 provides taxpayer money to fund stem cell research. That research may lead to cell replacement therapies that can treat diseases such as Alzheimer’s and cancer, or spinal cord injury. So far, so good. But if taxpayers fund the basic research, will resulting therapies be made available to everyone? Probably not. Although a clause in the Proposition gives patent rights for publicly funded research to the state, it will be the healthcare industry that turns this basic research into saleable products.
Health care companies demand huge profit margins here in the US. Any charges companies like Pfizer or Eli Lilly will have to pay for the state-owned patents will certainly be passed on to the consumer. Since the money generated by patents on the research is not earmarked for any purpose, it will be hard to pry this windfall from government’s greedy hands.
Moreover, there is no guarantee the healthcare industry will create therapies for all diseases that would benefit from the stem cell research. If the profit margin is low for curing Lou Gehrig’s disease, for instance, will a treatment for it be developed? Will it be affordable to all?
We need to monitor how our stem cell dollars are used or we could find our money going to better facelifts and cell-therapies for breast augmentation. — Tre Trefethen
This Book Rocks
Journalist/musician John Malkin has put his twin talents together to produce Sounds of Freedom, a new book that profiles 15 of the country’s most outspoken and influential recording artists (hip-hop, pop, rock, folk and classical), and then invites them to improvise on themes of social change and spirituality. Vietnamese Zen monk Thich Nhat Hanh (see this month’s Journeys ) chimes in with a ringing endorsement of action and spirit. Then it’s time to sit back and tune in with Ani DiFranco, Philip Glass, Holly Near, Utah Phillips, Rickie Lee Jones, John Trudell, Goapele Mohlabane, Laurie Anderson, Michael Franti, Michelle Shocked, Darryl Cherney, Boots Riley, Steve Reich, Tom Morello and the Indigo Girls.
Berkeley’s Parallax Press, a division of the Unified Buddhist Church, specializes in publications on “engaged Buddhism and the practice of mindfulness.” But with Sounds of Freedom, they’ve released a book that’s not just thought provoking — it’s also a toe-tapping, finger-snapping multimedia treat, thanks to the bonus 15-track CD encased inside the cover. The book is so inspiring you can dance to it. (www.parallax.org ) — GS
Charting the Green Scene
The Bay Area is alive with environmental groups, projects, events, and activities but how do you keep track of all this Greenitude? Fortunately, there are some good calendars out there. One of the newest is the Planet Drum Foundation’s Green City Calendar (www.planetdrum.org), which lists classes, internships, and job listings along with the regular calendar fare. The Berkeley Ecology Center has been offering cutting-edge eco-solutions since 1969 (has it really been 36 years?) and its website (www.ecologycenter.org) not only lists a comprehensive Eco-Calendar but also offers links to jobs, Action Alerts , Curbside Recycling, Farmers’ Markets, Terrain magazine, and a host of in-house orgs including the Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters, the Bay Area Seed Interchange Library (BASIL), the Biodiesel Cooperative, the Community Gardening Collaborative, Motor Oil Recycling Program, Community Water Rights Project, Indigenous Permaculture Project and the Plastics Task Force. No excuse now, plant that garden and go to a hoe-down with Clan Dyken! — GS
Fossil Fools
Are you turning a tad lethargic? Maybe our national zeitgeist is more than a little… Bushed. Maybe you need Gerit-Oil! Unfortunately, the GOP’s latest energy plan is just another fossilized rehash of the same-oil-snake-oil.
George W. has only recently—and reluctantly—conceded that Global Warming does exist but still professes a faith-based belief that world salvation comes by taking more lumps (of coal), sparing no rods (of uranium) and holding our future over barrels (of oil). Indeed, his new energy plan has slashed funding for industrial energy efficiency by 25%.
Other cuts have hit solar energy, geothermal technology, biomass, and hydropower (torpedoed with a 90% funding cut). The budget sets aside $8 billion in tax incentives, but only six percent would go to renewable energy — $7.5 billion would go to enrich the Big Energy Oily-garchs, coal and uranium cartels. Had enough? Then…
DON’T JUST GET MAD….
Take Action
Check out the Campaign for America’s Future. They have a better plan. It’s called the Apollo Alliance, and its action agenda could make the country energy independent within a decade. As a bonus, the plan would clean our air and water and create thousands on brand-new jobs in a sustainable economy. To learn more and get involved, visit www.apolloalliance.org or call (202) 955-5665.
What would the Founding Fathers do? Probably more than pitch in for a tea party. They and you might consider signing Rainforest Action Network’s “Declaration of Independence from Oil.” You know something’s wrong with a Model T Ford gets 24 mpg and a new Ford Expedition only racks up 12 mpg. RAN’s online Flash Animation drives this point home, mixing facts and footnotes with music and humor. As the RAN Declaration reads: “When government and corporations endanger our freedom, it is the right, the duty, and the obligation of the people to seek justice, and hold them accountable for their abuse of power.” www.ran.org — GS
Shine a Light on Me
Thomas Dinwoodie started PowerLight Corp. 14 years ago in a garage. But then he could only dream that his vision of a socially responsible solar-power company would become one of the fastest growing private corporations in the US. (See “Solar Flair,” August 2004, CG ). Now a $55 million-a-year enterprise, Fortune magazine has declared PowerLight “the Next Big Thing” and the accolades keep rolling in. On June 30, Dinwoodie and PowerLight President Dan Shugar were named winners of the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award for Northern California. Powerlight (www.powerlight.com ) was recognized for building and operating “many of the largest solar-electric systems in North America and Europe.” The Berkeley-based duo won out over 25 other companies in the Socially Responsible category. They’re now in the running for Ernst & Young’s national award, created to honor innovative business leaders in more than 100 cities in 35 countries. Winners will be announced on November 19. — GS
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