Bishop got interviewed about his girls and robots up by Current.
Note: I figure if I'm going to keep up regular blogging (my goal is five times a week) that I need to you know... blog about things that don't have to do with me directly. Get excited for ramblings and to find out what I eat for lunch.
I got this email today from Rhiannon. It's worth a read and worth taking notice. She has a few fund-raising/awareness plans brewing as well, so I'll give a heads up once those are up and running.
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Over the past couple of months, I've been coming across this elementary school in multiple readings of the devastation of mountain top removal coal mining. Interestingly enough, all books or articles mention an "elementary school", yet none ever mentioned its actual name. That took some googling and then some guessing.
Anyway, the school, Marsh Fork Elementary, exists a mere 400 yards away from a major coal mining site, which means the children are exposed to a heavily polluted area on a daily basis. The toxins are in their water, their soil, and in the air they breath as they run and play. Not to mention, if the built up coal slurry dams (excess toxic sludge that is leftover after coal is mined) ever give way, which is likened from the mine-seem blasts, these children most likely wouldn't have a chance in a devastating slurry flood. (Which has happened in W. VA, and such dams bursts have claimed 100's of lives.)
To boot, Massey Energy, owner of the coal tower, has requested to build yet a second coal silo at the site. Infuriating enough as that is, it's even more so to find out they were denied, and has further repealed that! (Side note: In my readings, Massey Energy also recently requested the allowance of toxicity levels beyond regulation levels at one of
his coal sites - ridiculous.)
With all of these obvious threats to this school, W. VA government has somehow denied funding to build the children another school out of harms way. It's just mind boggling...
So I'm writing you all to see if you think this is a cause you may be interested in. If so, you can go to the one fundraising website that was difficult to find and donate (it doesn't come up intuitively when you google Marsh Fork Elem, unfortunately, although it's a clever name for the group, it's probably keeping the site from being found.)
http://www.penniesofpromise.org
Oh, they are also on Facebook, just search "Pennies of Promise" (And join!)
I don't see how in this day and age we can move mountaintops, but we can't move a school!
Meanwhile, I'm writing emails, reading up now that I've found a decent path, seeing what I can do... and I'm going to reach out to every teacher and mom I know. Please do the same!
This seems like a no brainer! But, I assume it's difficult for these small groups from nowhere Appalachia to get backing, not to mention in my reading, a lot of local people are afraid to take on the coal companies or complain because so many of their family members are employed by the coal industry in that area. And as you know, you don't bite the hand that feeds you in this country...
So frustrating...
xoxo
Naan
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That Web site again is http://www.penniesofpromise.org.
