One Civic Act

Today, I helped to run the Climate Reality Project Boston chapter’s November meeting. We had quick media training, which was really helpful, and then turned to some strategic planning for 2020.

Today, I dialed into another legislative briefing from the Massachusetts Climate Action Network . I heard from two state legislators, about one bill for carbon pricing and another to require the state to create a more comprehensive long-term implementation plan for state climate action, putting people at the center. And there was an additional discussion of municipal light plants and pending legislation that might affect them.

Today, I joined a conference call convened by the Climate Reality Project. Specifically, the call covered the organization’s Pricing Pollution working group, which is its campaign to put a price on carbon.

Back in June, I attended the Environmental League of Massachusetts’s Earth Night.  ELM been around since 1898. They’re a small organization with an influence far beyond their means. Today, I made a donation to ELM.

Do you know how your bank is investing the dollars you’ve parked with them? Hint: It’s not all good. CNote has a different model. They invest your deposits with non-profit CDFIs, which lend to minority- and female-owned businesses in local communities. And CNote pays a higher return than a typical savings model, though to be sure, it is not FDIC insured. Today, I opened an account with CNote, and I plan to move a small amount of savings into the account to see how it works. I’m excited to put my savings to work helping minority and female entrepreneurs.

Today, I went to the December meeting of the Somerville Commission on Energy Use and Climate Change. A big agenda item was the debrief of the Somerville Climate Forward launch a few weeks ago. Here’s a video of the speakers, if you’re interested.

Today, I made my annual contribution to the MIT Annual Fund. My gift isn’t even a rounding error for the $16 billion endowment. But I’m appreciative of what MIT is doing in the world so it’s worth it.

A humanitarian aid social network? Yup. Today, I supported ConnectAID on Kickstarter . The idea is to connect people to concrete humanitarian and development actions on one platform, to support nonprofit development projects and respond to humanitarian crises.

Today, I joined an advocacy group for Somerville pedestrians and transit users. Bicycle riders have a strong advocacy base, but few people speak up for pedestrians. Hopefully, we’ll be able to give peds more of a voice in development activities.

There were some breathless news stories last year about how 2018 was going to be the year of the climate voter. With the mid-terms now about five weeks away, I’m not so sure. But it’s a litmus test issue for me. Today, I took a pledge for the YEARS Project that I will be a climate voter .

Monthly voting for the Shared Nation crowdsourcing platform closes today, with the finals for democracy related projects. Today, I voted for Faith in Florida . Here’s what they do: The program will activate and align 175 churches in a high commitment level of voter engagement participation practices (church in-reach + community outreach), and engage another 150 churches in a low commitment level of voter engagement participation practices (church in-reach). Through the participation of these churches a minimum of150,000 conversations with (mostly) Black voters will be conducted about the importance of voting and the possibility to restore voting rights for 1.5 million Floridians.

Today, I attended the monthly meeting of the Climate Coalition of Somerville. We had a great meeting this month, with a special guest, Carol Oldham from the Massachusetts Climate Action Network , of which we’re a member. We got excellent validation of our efforts from Carol, and learned a ton about how other organizations operate as well as about zoning and net-zero buildings, which is a particular focus of ours right now.

I was in touch with the Baby Trump tour back in July. They’ve been slow to respond, but a US tour is in the works. So I’ve filled out their tour request form to see if it might be possible to bring Baby Trump to HonkFest in October.    

Today, I extended some planning work I’ve been doing for climate actions in Somerville. For one thing, the September 8 People’s Climate rally is coming up. I’m trying to rally a group of Climate Coalition of Somerville and Indivisible Somerville folks to attend. Early accounts of the Boston event, however, are describing “teach-ins, skill-shares, and art-builds,” activities that don’t seem to be inspiring a lot of folks to want to get involved. I have some other ideas, too, to raise public awareness. I’ve contacted the creators of this Kickstarter sticker campaign to see if we could do something bespoke.

Did you see the Trump Baby balloon in London two weeks ago? Well, the organizers want to go on tour with the giant balloon. Today, I made a donation to the project. I also asked the organizers how much we would need to raise to bring Trump Baby to Boston. We’ll see if I get a response.  

Today, I wrote a letter to the Boston Globe , in response to their coverage of the Massachusetts legislature’s actions on energy and the environment. Or lack thereof, in the case of the House. It probably won’t get published, but here’s what I wrote: To the editor: It is hardly true that “Mass. lawmakers [have wrapped] up work on energy legislation,” as the Globe’s headline states on July 13. In fact, the baby steps taken by the Massachusetts House of Representatives amount to kicking the can down the road, ensuring that they will have to take up energy legislation session after session until they can credibly fulfill the state’s obligations under the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2008. The irony is that the House could have had it easy. That’s because the Massachusetts Senate had already thoroughly vetted and passed an omnibus energy bill, a giant leap forward that would have moved the state toward a more resilient energy infrastructure and created an engine of eco...

Environmental Defense Fund has an ambitious new project: launching a new satellite. What? Here’s the back story. In 1978, NASA’s Nimbus-7 satellite verified the hole in the ozone layer, and led to a great environmental success story. The same needs to be done for methane pollution, which is responsible for a quarter of climate change emissions, by some estimates. But those are estimates; we need more data to help ensure that companies and countries make bigger reductions faster. That’s where the MethaneSAT satellite fits in: to provide global high-resolution coverage of methane emissions. Today, I donated to EDF to help launch that satellite .

The Red Sox are a big part of life in Massachusetts. The Red Sox have already taken some good steps on sustainability, like installing solar panels to heat water at Fenway. But those lights at Fenway use a lot of energy, so it would make a meaningful difference if the organization moved to renewable energy. It would  will help protect public health and ensure a safe future for our children. In 2015, Boston experienced 92 days with unhealthy levels of air pollution, which can force kids with asthma to stay indoors, off the baseball field. Today, I added my name to a petition started by Environment Massachusetts to ask the Red Sox to lead the way with 100 percent renewable energy commitment. We wouldn’t want the Yankees to get there first.    

Today, I helped to make happen the next edition of our Conscious Conversation, one of our Conscious Capitalism Boston chapter event series. This time our focus was on employees, more specifically on how companies can be intentional about their employee engagement and how employees can be “conscious” even in companies that might not seem to be. Fantastic panel, once again, and great breakout groups. We had a testimonial from a member who attested to how many connections he’s made through our event series that have directly impacted his new venture. I think we’re on to something here.

Carbon pricing is thought by many environmentalists and business savvy to be the single most effective tool to effect radical change input economic systems and be able to reduce emissions dramatically. It is also a very wonky topic which is hard to get across to people. Today, I went to an event hosted by MIT Climate Action, a comedy show on carbon pricing. Comedian Yoram Bauman is a PhD economist, who calls himself the “ Stand-up Economist. ” Here’s a preview from his act. Right up my alley.