10mar25016 -- CFLRP, Dr. Bill Romme, Berta Cáceres, Double D jazz, Hands on a Hardbody, Steve Rubick, KVNF and a poem by Rio Coyotl

Working collaboratively with the Feds

& the State on behalf of forest health

CFLRP … The Uncompahgre Plateau’s Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Project held its annual stakeholder meeting in Montrose last week. Since San Miguel County has a stake in the USFS-driven initiative, I got to attend -- the only elected official in a roomful of CSU scientists and Forest Service line officers and field workers … The most recent phase of County’s Burn Canyon Monitoring Task Force project was funded through this group three years ago. Another scan of the Burn Canyon longitudinal study -- set up to indicate whether salvage logging negatively, positively or neutrally affects forest regeneration -- is slated for next year. Linda and the late Phil Miller of Telluride worked tirelessly to get the original Burn Canyon citizen science project off the ground … It was encouraging to hear Dr. Tony Cheng of the Colorado Forest Restoration Institute cite the influence of our pioneering Western Slope collaborative -- the Public Lands Partnership, of which San Miguel County is a contributing member – as one of the reasons the Uncompahgre Plateau CFLRP was formed and has been successful nationally in bringing special grant treatment dollars to our local forest … And while impressed by all the presentations -- from Todd Gardiner’s implementation accomplishments to the spruce regeneration study by Dr. Seth Ex’s graduate student, Ryan Davy – it was Dr. Bill Romme’s aspen browse study that knocked my socks off … Contrary to long-accepted forest dogma, browsing cattle, deer and elk don’t appear to have significant impacts on aspen regeneration, except perhaps locally. In fact, according to Romme, it would appear that average annual difference across the forest between unbrowsed and browsed aspen seedlings was just over a foot change in growth. And that was mostly from deer and elk. Cattle had relatively little impact … However, local conditions were a large influence, and Romme tempered his findings by explaining that site specific factors had to be taken into consideration, as completely opposite results were seen in different parts of the forest.

BERTA CÁCERES … The assassination of this indigenous environmental leader in Honduras last week has precipitated international outrage … Josh Nichols and Leila Serafin of Norwood both worked with Cáceres, protesting a disastrous dam project on native lands in that Central American country. They were in shock at the murder of their friend … Since the military coup that ousted the rightist-turned-leftist Manuel Zelaya-Rosales from the presidency, violence in Honduras has escalated precipitously. According to The Guardian (British), “Human rights defenders, journalists, lawyers, trade unionists, gay rights activists and political opponents of subsequent regimes have been singled out for abduction, disappearance, torture and murder in a climate of almost complete impunity” … Women particularly have been targeted. In 2014, 513 women were killed and in 2015 it was estimated that a woman lost her life every 16 hours in Honduras ... Cáceres founded the Council of Indigenous Peoples of Honduras (COPINH) and last year was awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize. In her acceptance speech, she appeared to foreshadow her own death, when she noted that “giving our lives in various ways for the protection of rivers is giving our lives for the well-being of humanity and of this planet” … International Rivers and other international groups have called for foreign investors and engineering companies to withdraw from the Agua Zarca hydropower project that Cáceres had been opposing at the time of her murder.

DOUBLE D JAZZ … Nice to have jazz back on main street for more than just jazz fest season. Arroyo’s hosted the Double D group last Friday and they were cooking.

HARDBODY SHINES … Don’t miss Sasha and Colin Sullivan’s latest comic musical extravaganza in the Palm. You won’t sit in the cushy seats of our lovely, if  cavernous, aerodrome of a hall, but right up on stage. All the singing & dancing. Right in your face … And not just all laughs. Tackling prejudice and tragedy full-on. A Texas car lot promotion gone bad … Funny for sure. Serious sometimes. And in the end, happy. Like a good comedy should be.

LEAP DAY … D.J. Steve Rubick of KVNF explained his problem with February’s Leap Day last Monday. “It’s the wrong month,” he told his listeners. “They ought to set it on the 5^th of July, or sometime when it would be of use to the people. Make it a holiday!” … Must say, I kind of agree. It’s a day out of time in the calendar, and it ought to be placed somewhere other than merely tagged on to our shortest month. In the middle of winter.

THE TALKING GOURD

They brought bulldozers

We brought the Volkswagen bus

A land of machines

-Rio Coyotl

Wright’s Mesa

3mar25016 -- CRISPR, Scalia, FRESH Food Hub, Erika Moss Gordon, Pagosa Springs Sun, and a poem “Leaf Litter.”

Editing the human genome

Erika Moss Gordon (Art Goodtimes photo)

CRISPR … Scientists around the world are wringing their ethical hands, as this new technology breakthrough promises the alleviation of many inherited diseases, but also a dark side where designer babies could become a reality… As Nobel Prize-winning biologist David Baltimore told the The Week last month after an international gathering of scientists calling for a moratorium on inheritable human genome editing, “Everything I’ve learned here says we’re not ready to be doing this yet”  … It didn’t make the Science News top science story of 25015 (2015 CE). Pluto did.  But CRISPR came in a close second … What is it? A new way to edit genes that’s cheap, quick and precise. Imagine splicing new film onto an old reel – cutting, inserting, and rolling things into motion. That’s what this revolutionary technique is capable of with the DNA helix – using an enzyme (Cas9) like a molecular scissors to snip a particular spot, insert a new gene, and stitch everything back together … CRISPR is already being used to create genetically-modified crops, to create a strain of mosquito with malaria-blocking genes that pass on to following generations, and theoretically might be capable of removing genes to cure single-gene defects like Huntington’s disease and other tragic illnesses … Last year a team of scientists under the direction of Harvard geneticist George Church successfully copied Wooly Mammoth genes from frozen tissue and pasted them into the genome of an Asian Elephant. Next they want to inject them into an elephant egg cell. The hope – to create a mammoth-elephant hybrid that could survive outside of Asia and Africa … Genetically, things are moving fast. The future is uncertain. But for sure, you’ll be hearing more of CRISPR in the years to come.

SCALIA … As a member of the radical socialist middle, I feel like Paul Rosenberg in Salon, “Good riddance” … I wrote critically about Nino’s dictum, “Text is king,” when he came to speak up at the Mountain Village a couple years back. His “originalism” -- that hewed, more or less, to a strictly literal, almost royalist interpretation of the Constitution -- I found in direct contradiction to Lincoln’s vision of a nation by, for and of the people. Although Scalia wasn’t always consistent. In Bush v. Gore, The Week “cited his nakedly partisan, circular logic”. To my mind, changing circumstances require changed interpretations to fit the reality of post-modern life, not absolutist adherence to 18^th Century values … As Law Professor Eric Posner wrote in Slate, Scalia’s “originalism” was more pose than philosophy. It let him pretend that he was politically neutral, while scorning his colleagues as activist hacks … But a different picture emerges of the man when you read the personal account of a seminary classmate of Greg Hobbs and I, liberal professor of constitutional law at Valparaiso University in Indiana, Ed Gaffney. It’s quite touching. Send an email to shroompa at gmail dot com and I’ll gladly forward you the account.

FRESH … Norwood’s new storefront Food Hub, sandwiched between Happy Belly Deli and US Bank, opened for snacks & good conversation this past Sunday, thanks to Leila Serafin and friends. Structured as a membership coop, FRESH hopes to sell local food and become a hub for local community food efforts. Come check it out. And become a member, like I did.

ERIKA MOSS GORDON … Under the new management of Norwood émigré Sara Doehrman, the Cimarron Bookstore in Ridgway has starting doing poetry readings. Gordon was the featured reader at a 5 o’clock performance Sunday, and it was outstanding. Erika writes strong, often short, lyrics – stripped down to essentials. But lush with imagery. Her pieces were captivating, and the full-house audience enthusiastic. She was celebrating the publication of her second book, Phases (Middle Creek Publ., 2016) with its daring impressionist cover that looks at first like a landscape of gentle hills, but on closer inspection turns out to be the breasts of a reclining nude … Although wholly her own person, Erika reminded me a lot of Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer – an excellent performer of her work, a poet with great heart and powerful insights, and a beautiful human being … Buy her book. Highly recommended.

PAGOSA SPRINGS SUN … One of the smaller regional newspapers made national press in The Week’s “Wit & Wisdom” column this month, with a quote from the late Robin Williams: “Music is God’s little reminder that there’s something else besides us in the universe, a harmonic connection between all living beings, everywhere, even the stars.”

THE TALKING GOURD

Leaf Litter

Too often cocooned

inside, busy with

the 10,000 things

Took the time today

to watch sunset’s sepia

bronze the San Juans

The clouded sky blazing

molten gold, until

dulled by night’s shadows

Knowing soon enough

the trembling aspen leaves

not yet budded

will curl into litter

on layer like uncut lawn

& what once burned

will turn, McRedeye

sez, & ask us too

to lie down

25feb25016 -- Food Hub, FRESH, Local Food Shift, Dirty Tricks, State Patrol, Josefina Mendéz, Lark & Sparrow, Cottonwood, and a poem “Leaving For Texas”

Local Food: Hub of the Revolution?

Josefina Mendez at the Lark & Sparrow

FRESH … While you have to love the acronym, this new Norwood group’s actual moniker is a little clunky: Food Resources Encompassing a Social Hub. But the group itself is anything but. The locavore food movement’s trendy and FRESH is off to a great start with last weekend’s free Health Day event at the Livery … I missed out on the free back massages, but Catherine Peterson’s salad was delicious. Jen Nelson & Mel Eggars’ Apple Core Project table I found fascinating, and Telluride Mushroom Company’s Scott Koch did a comprehensive presentation on the fungal world – pictures of his Idarado myco-remediation site off Black Bear Road being the most phenomenal ... I also missed Regan Tuttle’s yoga & essential oil workshops, astrology with Cynthia Zehm, and an evening of music with local musicians. Which is to say there were a lot of very fun things happening in Norwood Saturday. I met new people. Exchanged contacts. But I made it back to Cloud Acre in time to walk Simba and admire the rising moon … FRESH’s Food Hub is a buying club and local food store now under development, open to both the public & members, offering the best possible prices on wholesome, healthy foods. It will operate synergistically as a for-profit retail space and a non-profit buying club … Its website (http://freshfoodhub.net/content/about-fresh) links to an article in a Boulder-based publication at the forefront of Colorado’s local food revolution, Local Food Shift magazine (www.localfoodshift.pub). Darien Cabral’s article there is entitled, “Shift Happens: the Role of Food Hubs in Local Food.” As he notes, “The local food movement is taking off nationwide, and Colorado is no exception.” The founding of a Food Hub in Norwood – the county’s traditional agricultural center – seems to be right in line with a significant movement looking to decentralize food the way some have called for us to decentralize our power … “As the local food shift continues to happen,” adds Cabral, “food hubs will play a major role.” Food hubs along with established farmer’s markets, CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture), traditional farms and ranches, and developing farm economies for cannabis and hemp … This is an exciting time to be in agriculture, as the Fossil Fuel Era winds down and self-sufficiency-in-place and sustainability-in-the-face-of-change become central dictums of the 21^st Century.

SHENANIGANS … It’s political season locally. Over the past 30+ years in this county, I’ve seen phony letters to the editor. Economic threats to participants in caucuses and assemblies. Lawsuit saber rattling. Lots of hanky panky … This year is no different. Someone is circulating an email purportedly from “San Miguel County Young Democrats” and signed mysteriously “R.W.” The email endorses Brian Ahern for county commissioner, attacks me and Elaine Fischer and our “high dollar supporters,” and claims there has been all kinds of political harassment against Mr. Ahern from local law enforcement folks resulting in his arrests … During elections it’s sometimes hard to distinguish lies from fact. So be discerning. Those claiming to be shining knights in ethical armor might just be the opposite of what they claim.

LARK & SPARROW … I love this new Montrose jazz club with great music, reasonable prices, café seating, mixed drinks, polished hardwood floors and a stained glass dome in its main performance hall that is visually stunning … Recently I got to catch Aspen-based jazz vocalist and Argentine porteña Josefina Méndez. Her big voice with its syncopated wizardry was backed up by the red-hot saxophone of Mark Johnson, understated piano whiz Tim Fox, and a couple local stand-ins. Méndez belted out some real showstoppers, all the more amazing since she was 8 months pregnant. Check out josefinamendez.com and her new album, Todo Llega  … And go check out the schedule at the Lark&Sparrow. Lots of sassy stuff brewing. Highly recommended.

SPEEDING ETIQUETTE … Now I admit to male privilege. But I have to say, the majority of State Patrol Leos (law enforcement officers) in this state that I’ve run across (so to speak) have been pretty nice people. Polite. Professional. Even the ones that gave me tickets … But a recent story told me by one of my readers left me flabbergasted. This local woman said a cop stopped her for speeding, held her up for 15 minutes and gave her a ticket, while her daughter in the backseat was dilated and waiting to go to the hospital to give birth … Pretty heartless, officer, if you ask me.

BIG TREE … Boulder County made the news a while back with a cottonwood growing along an irrigation ditch that held the distinction of being the largest known of its species for the past 45 years, beginning in 1967. It measured 112 ft. tall and was 36 ft. around (13 people joining hands to surround it) … This specimen stopped growing in 2011, ending its life at 120 years old. However, it’s still standing, just not growing. A county forestry team harvested a dead branch in 2012 and Longmont Museum held a show this past spring of all the amazing art objects created by local artists from one branch of this Grandma Populus.

WEEKLY QUOTA … "The poet can´t change anything, but the poet can demonstrate the power of the solitary conscience." -Stanley Kunitz (1906-2006)

THE TALKING GOURD

Leaving for Texas

-for A.G.

“Jim was a very good teacher

& Mike very supportive

It makes a difference

to have good bosses”

And McRedeye sez, good

employees & bosses are

the rock solid soil on which

 grows good local government

18feb25016 -- Colorado Legislature, Hunger Free Colorado, NACo’s County News and Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer’s poem “Beside the Sunflowers”

Bird-dogging the legislature in Denver

The Colorado Capitol in Denver

NEW BILLS NEW LAWS … I’d given up going to state meetings for Colorado Counties, Inc. (CCI). It’s a useful lobbying group that helps counties prevent really bad bills from making it through the Legislature. And helps even pass a few good ones … But, of late, CCI has been infected with the “partisan paralysis” that Sen. Ted Cruz champions. Last month Republicans knocked almost all Democrats out of CCI leadership positions on its steering committees. Instead of having a chair with the majority party and vice-chair with the minority party, so as to offer a bi-partisan front to legislators on CCI issues, conservatives led by Weld County Commissioner Barbara Kirkmeyer cleaned house … That kind of disastrous internal one-up-woman’s-ship led Boulder County to leave CCI last week. Denver City and County had already pulled out … San Miguel County’s paid its dues for 2016, or we might have considered pulling out as well. But, next year, unless there are changes, it would be hard to recommend staying on board a group that supports fracking, tax breaks for the rich, return of public lands to the states, and opposes universal health care, more money for education, higher minimum wages, etc … But this year, I’ve been directed to attend and offer what liberal input I can to the process … The bills CCI reviews run the gamut from the inane to the seriously wrong, from good ideas to senseless tweaks. There was unanimous support for a SJM16-001, urging Congress to pass Good Samaritan legislation to protect those involved in voluntary reclamation of abandoned hard rock mines from potential liability – a big stumbling block for cleaning up situations like the one over in San Juan County that led to a mine adit blowout and heavy iron release in the Animas River last year … ASIDE: When I was in San Francisco last month, I visited an art installation at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts entitled, “Golden Prospects” by Kevin Cooley. It was all about the Animas River spill, with boxes of on-floor videos of murky water flowing over iron-coated rocks. It wasn’t very impressive. But maybe living so close to the actual river was insulation from the meant-to-shock simulations of tainted agua … CCI steering committees voted to support HB16-1150 to give counties authority to prohibit underage nicotine possession, SB16-080 to require cannabis grow operations in a home to be enclosed, locked and restricted from anyone under 21-years-of-age, HB16-1030 to allow local governments to require insurance and driver’s licenses for OHV riders on local roads (something local counties have been trying to achieve for years), and SB16-060 that shifts fiscal responsibility for providing courtroom space from the counties to the sate … CCI opposed SB16-067 to grant a personal property tax exemption for broadband providers, HB16-1088 giving Fire Protection Districts the authority to impose impact fees on new development, SB16-81 to create a rural economic emergency assistance grant program, HB16-1071 which would have granted county citizens initiative power for county decisions (killed in committee), HB16-1078 granting whistle-blower protections to local government employees, SB16-37 changing the public’s access to digitally-stored data under the Colorado Opens Record Act, and SB16-54 allowing local governments to set minimum wages in its jurisdiction … Those are only a handful of the hundreds of bills considered in the Colorado Legislature each session. Which is why it’s important for local governments to pay attention to what’s happening in Denver. And, with perhaps a new bipartisan county support group, help shape the action.

RAT-A-TAT STATS … Hunger Free Colorado released a report last month for 2015 that ranked Colorado 46^th in the nation for getting food stamps to the needy. Pitkin County had the worst record, enrolling only 10% of those eligible, while El Paso County had the best record, enrolling 71%. San Miguel County enrolled 27% of those eligible, according to the report … The National Association of Counties (NACo) puts out a newsletter, CountyNews, and in the Jan. 11^th edition, it published a graph of the Top 10 Counties with the Highest Growth Rate of 65 Years and Older Population (2004-2014). Colorado had 7 of the 10 spots, with San Miguel County ranked third in the nation with a 203% growth rate. That’s telling me that the Telluride Region is becoming a retirement haven and that doing more for seniors is something the County is going to have to wrestle with in coming years … In the same issue, NACo’s County Explorer program offered a map that showed San Miguel County to be the only county in the state in 2015 to have full economic recovery with all four recovery indicators used from Moody’s Analytics data – one of only 215 counties in the nation to do that, out of over 3000 counties total … Finally, the heaviest one-day snowfall ever recorded in the nation wasn’t in Alaska, Montana, Maine or New Hampshire, but right here in Colorado. On Dec. 4, 1913, 63 inches of snow fell on Georgetown in Clear Creek County

THE TALKING GOURD

beside the sunflowers

naked, except

this strand of what ifs

-Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

Western Slope Poet Laureate