I Love Mountains Week Starts Tonight

The I Love Mountains Day rally at the Capitol next Tuesday, Feb. 14, has mushroomed into a full week of events you do not want to miss.

Via the indispensable Barefoot and Progressive, Lexington offers six full days of I Love Mountains events, starting tonight:

Thursday, Feb. 9th: Film Screening — Dirty Business: “Clean Coal” And The Battle For Our Energy Future // @ Homegrown Press 7 pm, FREE, 574 N Limestone

At 7:15 p.m. on Monday, the Kentucky Coffeetree Cafe on Broadway in downtown Frankfort will host a special pre-rally party.

Celebrate the marchers coming from Prestonsburg, KY, and participate in an interactive film screening of #whilewewatch.

#whilewewatch is the gripping portrait of the #OccupyWallSt media revolution. Citizens came together at Zuccotti Park with energy, intelligence and guts to impassion their message, "We are the 99%." #whilewewatch discovers the #OWS media team who had no fear of a critical city government, big corporations, hostile police, or a lagging main stream media to tell their story. Through rain, snow, grueling days, sleeping on concrete; they pumped out exhilarating ideas to the world. Fueled with little money, they relied on the power of Twitter, texting, Wi-Fi, posters, Tumblr, live streams, YouTube, Facebook, dramatic marches, drumbeats and chants.

And on Tuesday, as Kentuckians for the Commonwealth says:

Please join us on Tuesday, February 14th for I Love Mountains day to continue calling for an end to mountaintop removal and asking our leaders to share a vision for the solutions that Kentucky so desperately needs. Help us call on Governor Beshear, our state legislative leaders, and even our leaders in Washington D.C. to serve the public interest by ending mountaintop removal and looking towards a clean energy future that provide good, safe jobs and health communities.

12:00 p.m.: Gather on the front steps of the State Capitol (please eat lunch before you arrive).

12:30 p.m. to 1:45 p.m.: Rally and march. Our rally will feature special guest speaker, Tar Sands Activist Melina Laboucan-Massimo

Coal mining harms Kentucky and Kentuckians in many more ways than mountaintop removal, as horrific as that is.

John Cheves at the Herald:

Kentucky's leaders should consider the health hazards of mining, moving and burning coal as they craft the state's energy policy, an environmental group said (in January).

The Kentucky Environmental Foundation, based in Berea, released a 44-page "health-impact assessment" on coal and sent copies to Gov. Steve Beshear and the General Assembly.
The statement cites published, peer-reviewed scientific studies from recent years that document health risks associated with coal. They include air and water pollution from mountaintop-removal mining, mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants, and toxic metals, including arsenic and cadmium, that are found in coal-waste storage ponds. Burning coal also releases heat-trapping gases that contribute to climate change, the statement says.

Just as state government can require an environmental-impact statement before it undertakes a public construction project, it should require a health-impact statement before it passes laws or regulations concerning coal, said Elizabeth Crowe, executive director of the Kentucky Environmental Foundation.

"Unfortunately, many of Kentucky's elected officials seem concerned about protecting the image and profits of the coal industry with little if any time donated to consideration about the impact on public health," Crowe said. "After all, this is the state in which legislators last year proposed a bill that would make Kentucky a 'sanctuary state' for the coal industry."