What does Olympia’s Community Planning and Development staff do with the comments they solicit from the public? For sure they don’t summarize them and link the results to their eventual proposal.
Posts published in “Issue: February 2020”
If we look around we can see a difference between values that are professed -- and those we express in how we behave. But this is a moving target.
I’ve been working closely with the 4th Ave bridge camp as a member of Just Housing Olympia. The City recently decided to halt progress toward moving the encampment to another piece of City property, and instead to proceed with sweeping the encampment.
April 12, 1953 – January 4, 2020 Tom was a beloved member of the Olympia community, helping start the Olympia Food Coop, the Crisis Clinic, Heartsparkle Players, and the Community Sustaining Fund, among many other projects and activities. Tom was a tireless activist for many other political movements, including mental…
When we look ahead to 2020 and beyond we see struggle, promise, hope, and victory for self determination, from Gaza to Santiago to Hong Kong to Kafranbel to Baghdad. Resisting authoritarianism When you zoom out over the past decade, you notice how more people in more places around the world…
They say that “one cannot live by bread alone”—and so it is, that along with food, there are some other material necessities. For the past 34 years, people in our community were able to find a whole range of necessities —personal hygiene and household cleaning products—that weren’t available at the…
The Community Farm Land Trust (CFLT) is a local nonprofit formed in 1997 currently owning two farms and holding a protective agricultural easement on another. As an organization, the Trust has developed a distinct set of values that guide its work. The staff and volunteers keep a focus on our…
In his latest effort to implant a housing project in Green Cove Basin, developer Jerry Mahan is refusing to provide information that the City needs to review his application. In a letter from his attorney Heather Burgess to the City, Mahan said he would not do any more environmental testing and demanded that the City complete its review without further information.
Many toxic sites are the legacy from heavy industry of the past including mining, milling, boat building and manufacturing. Much of this toxic pollution was left in our midst years ago, before we knew the impact and before laws were passed that prohibited dumping chemicals on our land, water, or in unlined landfills.
In the late 1980s, D’Amico leased a site near Discovery Bay where he was permitted to train SSNW employees. After 2001, neighbors become alarmed at increasing noise from automatic weapons fire, explosions, and helicopter landings...
The Pacific Northwest Inlander publishes a story reporting that Fort Discovery’s attorney, Greg Overstreet, wrote a series of 10 dystopian novels called 299 Days using the pen name Glenn Tate. The novels depict the degeneration of the democratically elected government, its violent overthrow by “Patriots,” and its replacement with a libertarian state.
“Every possible asset trimmed to the bone” The railroad industry is largely “self-regulated” which means that there is no outside agency that monitors safety or anything else, including collecting accident data. Recently the Railroad Workers United (RWU) made a list of “major” derailments on Class One railroads—not including passenger trains—and…
How much poison are you willing to eat for the success of the free market and global trade?
Beginning with this issue, Dave Jette will share his view of possibilities for urgent collective action to confront the threat of fascism and the collapse of human habitat.
Our Revolution Thurston has a new volunteer headquarters at Lamplighters, 211 4th Avenue East in downtown Olympia (the White Building). The Democratic Primary starts February 21, when ballots will be mailed, and ORT is hosting phone banking events there Tuesday through Sunday in support of Bernie Sanders, whom they have…
On August 26, 1920, Congress ratified the 19th Amendment to the US Constitution.: “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state on account of sex.”
An Iliad is an up-to the-minute retelling of Homer’s Iliad. With poetry and poignancy, the ancient tale of the Trojan War and the modern world collide. Brilliantly adapted by Lisa Peterson and Denis O’Hare from Robert Fagles’s acclaimed translation of Homer’s Trojan War epic, An Iliad telescopes the story into…
The national housing shortage affects millions in the US who can’t afford to rent, let alone buy, a home. The epidemic has rightly sparked a national conversation over racial and economic inequality...
The Sustainable Farms and Fields Program, SB 5947, is a grant-based program that would allow farmers to invest in efficient and effective practices designed to address climate change...
Dear WIP, The bankruptcy rate today is 3 times what it was in 1991 for people 65 and over.
Irritated conservative legislator to intense young activist: “Every college socialist should be encouraged to live under a Marxist regime for six months.” Intense young activist to legislator: “Okay, then every elected capitalist should be required to live on the $7.25 federal minimum wage for six months.”
Celebrate Tom Nogler • Orca Recovery • Strengthening Sanctuary • Clean Energy Thurston • Thurston Public Power • Workplace Organizing • Jacobin Reading Group • The Iliad—A retelling • Susan B Anthony • Planned Parenthood • Native American Art Exhibition • Nuclear Weapons Nowadays • The Vote
5G Apocalypse Film • Parallax Perspectives • Civil Survival Events and Game Changer Workshops • Solidarity in Tough Times • 2020 Labor Notes Conference