Check out this update and short video from high school teacher Russell Evans and his motivated group of students in Montrose, Colorado, where they are preparing for 9/24 and creating a long-term 350 movement in their community:

There are environmentalists in small, rural, and conservative towns all over America wondering what they can do to get more active. When we started our 350 Club in Montrose, Colorado, our biggest challenge was to figure out how to help the environment, engage the conservative population, and stay true to ourselves. In the past two years we’ve learned a lot and had fun—enjoy the video that we made about our efforts!

350 Documentary from Drew Herder on Vimeo.

 

In the next year, our biggest goal is to set up an Urban Gardening Course at our high school to teach kids the basics of Permaculture, provide nutritious food to the cafeteria, and to develop a healthy relationship with the Planet.

On September 24, 2011 the Montrose 350 chapter is planning on taking part in the global movement by staging a community event. During this event we plan on holding a bike ride, trash pickup, organic/local pot luck lunch, and rallying on the corner of Townsend and Main. We want this event to be similar to the 10/10/10 event we staged last year. One thing we would like to improve is the turn out. We want to focus on promoting this event thoroughly throughout or community as to yield more environmentally aware citizens. Keep it healthy!

Here's an update from Micah Parkin, our on-the-ground Colorado Regional Coordinator, talking about the recent organizing happening statewide in Colorado and about the plans underway for the Moving Planet anchor event in Denver/Boulder.

350 and partners in Colorado have been kickin’ it this spring despite an uncharacteristically wet, cool month, and we’re beginning to gear up for an awesome Moving Planet event this September in Denver!

In February, we held “Protect the Clean Air Act” rallies in Boulder and Denver with a total of about 250 people and more than 30 groups participating. We honored elected officials like Senators Michael Bennet and Mark Udall, and Representatives Diana DeGette, Ed Perlmutter, and Jared Polis for standing up for the people vs. the polluters who want to strip the EPA of authority to regulate carbon emissions through the Clean Air Act.

In April, volunteers began outreaching to local businesses by phone, email, and canvassing to encourage business owners to sign onto our “US Chamber Doesn’t Speak for Me” declaration. By the end of the month we already had over 100 businesses, including the Aspen Skiing Company, which employees thousands. We’re thrilled to report that the Boulder Chamber of Commerce has also recently signed on!

On May 6th, supporters of 350.org and other local groups met outside the Fort Collins and Greeley offices of Rep. Cory Gardner to express our frustration with his continued attempts to gut the Clean Air Act and undermine climate change science. We held press conferences with speakers from several local groups and then delivered a coalition letter, signed by almost 100 local groups, business owners and individuals, expressing our alarm.

Last month Rep. Gardner voted in favor of H.R. 910 by Sen. Fred Upton, which seeks to block the EPA from acting to limit emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, and he voted against Congressman Waxman’s Amendment acknowledging basic climate science. We told Rep. Gardner that his positions on climate science and his attacks on the Clean Air Act are currently out of touch with mainstream science and out of touch with two-thirds of his constituents according to a February poll of voters in this district. (One can only assume that Representative Gardner’s choice to put polluters’ profits above his constituents’ health has something to do with the $444,324 that dirty energy companies and their corporate front groups pumped into his campaign last year.*)

This weekend, a Montrose 350 group is presenting their awesome student-created film on their climate work and fun at the Mountainfilm Festival in Telluride (more on that below). And other organizers in Telluride are starting to plan their own Moving Planet activities, which they’re recruiting for this weekend by tabling at the festival.

And speaking of Moving Planet, other folks around the state are getting excited about events in their communities and a big Moving Planet event being planned for Denver on Sept. 24th! We’re planning a Power Past Fossil Fuels Bike Ride from Boulder to Denver, rallying at 2 coal plants that we want retired NOW along the way. We’re also calling for a safe, direct bike path for the numerous avid bicyclers in our area to travel fossil-free between our towns. We’ll join up with folks (who want a shorter bike ride) in Denver for a final procession on wheels around the State Capitol and into Civic Center Park. If you’re in our neck of the mountains, please sign up to join us!

*Direct Dirty Money = $189,324.00, AFP = $5,000.00 Independant Expenditures, and US Chamber = $250,000.00
Independant Expenditures

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