Home Tissue Products: What You DON’T Know!
February 26, 2008
Did you know that: If every household in the United States replaced just one box of virgin fiber facial tissues (175 sheets) with 100% recycled ones, we could save 163,000 trees????
Here are some facts about facial tissues we use every day…
Forests are being destroyed to make toilet paper, facial tissues, paper towels and other disposable paper products. You can help stop this destruction by pressing manufacturers to use recycled content and clean manufacturing processes (click here to send a message to paper giant Kimberly-Clark), and by making smart shopping decisions.
Kleenex and Puffs are 0% recyclable and also 0% post-consumer.
Here are some alternatives… Fluff Out, Seventh Generation, Marcal, Hankies.
If you want the full list (as well as the list for toilet paper, paper towels, etc.) then please visit the source here.
Posted in Environment at 1:10am
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Homelessness in San Francisco - Article
February 19, 2008
Here’s a really interesting article that’s in the San Francisco Bay Guardian article. If you have a spare moment, go and read it!
Article
Here are some excerpts I thought were worth mentioning from the article..if you don’t have time to read the article (it is quite long), skim this…
Here’s what I learned: San Francisco has a cumbersome crazy quilt of programs, stitched together with waiting lists and lines. Policies that are written on paper and espoused in City Hall are often missing in shelters. Some rules don’t seem to exist until they’ve been broken. Others apply to some people, but not all…
And once you’re in, it’s sort of like sitting in a McDonald’s for too long. Years ago a friend told me the interiors of fast food restaurants are deliberately designed to make you feel a little uncomfortable. They don’t want you to get too cozy; they want you to eat and leave, making way for the next hungry mouth they can feed.
In other words, shelters are designed to make people not want to use them…Every year the federal government spends almost twice as much on a single attack submarine as the Department of Housing and Urban Development spends on homeless assistance. State and local governments have been left to pick up the hefty price tag.
San Francisco spends more than $200 million on homelessness, through services, financial aid, supportive housing, emergency care, and shelter beds. There are 13 city-funded shelters, four resource centers, and three reservation stations in San Francisco. The Human Services Agency spends $12.5 million per year on shelters through contracts with nonprofit managers. The Department of Public Health also manages two contracts, for a battered women’s shelter and a 24-hour drop-in center.
But it’s not enough: the nonprofits supplement operating expenses with grants and private donations and recently relied on a special allocation of $300,000 to purchase basic supplies like soap, towels, hand sanitizer, sheets, pillows, and blankets…
“Out of all the cities I’ve been in, this is the only city where you have to go and make a reservation for a bed at the rescue mission all the way across the city in order to come back to the place you started,” he says…
But the Guardian found that even if you are willing and waiting for a bed in a place where someone can presumably connect you with one, it often doesn’t happen…
According to the 2007 Homeless Count, there are 6,377 homeless people in San Francisco. The nine year-round single-adult shelters have enough beds to accommodate one-third of that population. Other emergency facilities shelter some of the overflow on a seasonal basis. The remaining homeless sleep in jails and hospitals, respite and sobering centers, parks and sidewalks…
It took Guardian writer Bryan Cohen five nights to find a spot at a shelter. He spent Jan. 20 and 21 at Buster’s waiting to see if a bed would open up. None did. According to the shelter vacancy report for those two nights, there were 108 and 164 beds set aside for men that went unfilled. On an average night this January, a month marked by cold weather and flooding rain, 196 beds were empty…
I notice that unlike at other shelters where I’ve stayed, none of the women here have bothered to change into pajamas. Some haven’t even removed their shoes. I follow suit, tucking my jacket under my head for a pillow and pulling the blanket around me.
When the lights come back on at 5:45 a.m., I understand why no one changed: there’s no time to get dressed. Shelter monitors enter the room, rousting sleepers with catcalls to get up and get moving…Tracy tells me she sent her daughter to private school and considers herself a victim of the dot-bomb era and an illegal eviction that landed them at the Hamilton Family Center. “We were given one blanket. It was filthy. It had poo on it, and, I’m not kidding, there were even pubic hairs,” she says..
While the ability to charge a cell phone seems relatively minor, its ramifications can be huge. The first time James Leonard met with his case manager at Next Door shelter, he knew exactly what he needed to get back on his feet: bus fare to get to and from three job interviews he’d already scheduled, a clothing voucher so he’d have something nice to wear when he got there, and a couple of dollars for the laundry facilities at the shelter. He also needed to charge his cell phone to confirm the interviews. He said he was denied all four things.
POLICY:
The standards of care, if passed, could improve access to those basic provisions, but some in the Mayor’s Office have balked at the estimated $1 million to $2 million price tag. The budget analyst’s final report is scheduled for release Feb. 14, in time for a Feb. 20 hearing at the Budget and Finance Committee.
“You can argue about whether we should or shouldn’t have shelters, but there are no city, state, or federal regulations for them. There are tons of regulations for the army, for public schools and colleges, but we put people in shelters and there’s none,” she said. To her, San Francisco is on the cutting edge of care with this legislation. “I can’t wait until we do this on a state level,” she said.
Kayhan said he and the mayor support the spirit of the legislation and have no problems with most of the no-cost items, but the price tag for staffing, training, and enforcement is a concern. “I think when you’re looking at how much money you’re going to spend on homelessness overall,” he told us, “I would rather allocate additional resources to create another unit of housing for someone as opposed to enhancing the service model of the shelters.”
The city’s 10-Year Plan to End Chronic Homelessness, released in 2004, recommended 3,000 units of supportive housing to get the chronically homeless off the streets. Kayhan confirms the Mayor’s Office of Housing is on track to meet that goal through master-leasing SROs and building or renovating new affordable units, where occupants will get supportive services.
I try to imagine what people like Windspirit would do if there weren’t shelters. But the Ten Year Council also recommended a phasing out of shelters within four to six years, to be replaced by 24-hour crisis clinics and sobering centers.There are 364 fewer shelter beds in San Francisco than when Newsom became mayor. This year more may go. The city is currently requesting proposals to develop 150 Otis, which serves as a temporary shelter and storage space for homeless people, into permanent supportive housing for very-low-income seniors. About 60 shelter beds will be lost.
The HSA confirmed there are currently no plans to open any more shelters in San Francisco. The last plan for a new shelter — St. Boniface — fell through, and the money that was set aside for the project still languishes in an HSA bank account. Midyear budget cuts proposed by the mayor put that money on the chopping block.
Buster’s Place is also on the list of cuts. By April 15, the only place where someone can get out of the elements at any time, day or night, could be closed for good.
Posted in News Articles, Poverty at 1:22pm
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Call on China to Take Action About the Genocide in Darfur
February 17, 2008
All nations share the responsibility to help bring an end to the genocide in Darfur but China has a special obligation to respond. China, more than any other government except Khartoum itself, has the ability to help bring peace to the people of Sudan.
The Save Darfur Coalition, ENOUGH Project, STAND: A Student Anti-Genocide Coalition, Genocide Intervention Network, and Dream for Darfur released a joint position paper outlining the essential steps China needs to take to help end genocide in Darfur.
Click here to read the joint statement and fill out the petition to join activists around the world in calling on China to live up to the ideals of the Olympic Games and help end genocide in Darfur.
From SaveDarfur.org
Join others and call on China to take action!!
Posted in Darfur, Petition, Politics at 9:50am
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Fight Climate Change Every Monday
February 12, 2008
Below are some examples of what people across the U.S. — and maybe even the world — will be doing each Monday:
- You could join USCEC director Mike Tidwell and myself in an every-Monday fast.
- You could skip one meal each Monday.
- You could bicycle to work.
- If you eat meat, you could forego it on this day.
- You could spend some time each Monday volunteering for your local climate group.
- You could call your local, state and federal elected officials to prod them to take action.
- You could call five of your friends to talk with them about this campaign and encourage them to join it.
- You could pledge to make a donation each week to a group working on climate issues.
- You could join with others in your area and organize a “Clean Energy Now” vigil at a busy intersection in your town or city.
From ClimateEmergency.org
Posted in Environment at 4:33pm
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Defy Bush, Fund Public Broadcasting
February 10, 2008
This week brought the news that once again, President Bush has proposed deep budget cuts for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which supports public stations across the country. In previous years, Congress has heard overwhelmingly from their constituents and restored this funding.
From CREDO Action
Take action and tell Congress — reject Bush’s cuts to public broadcasting.
Posted in Petition, Politics at 9:25pm
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Discrimination in the Workplace!
February 8, 2008
Many people with diabetes and other chronic diseases are no longer protected against discrimination from their employers.
Employers have been saying a person with diabetes is “too disabled” to do the job, but not “disabled enough” to be protected by the laws. The stakes are huge: If a person with diabetes isn’t covered by anti-disability discrimination law then it’s perfectly legal to fire or refuse to hire that person explicitly because of his or her diabetes.
From Care2.com
Posted in Petition, Worker Rights at 11:29am
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Voting Information
February 4, 2008
Tomorrow (Tuesday) is the primaries for 20+ states! So, if you live in one of them, I again urge you to VOTE. If you don’t know where or how, here are some links with information:
Where to vote: You can find your polling location by online lookup (works for most counties):http://www.smartvoter.org
Phone info for all counties: http://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/elections_ppl.htm
Posted in Politics at 4:58pm
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VOTE!
January 30, 2008
“Super Duper Tuesday” is coming up for more than 20 states in the United States. It is vital that we all vote!! Young people have shown that the youth voting bloc is becoming more and more important, and it’s time that politicians and presidential candidates start listening to what we have to say. So, if your primary has not passed and is coming up — REMIND all of your friends to VOTE!
There is no reason why we should not vote.
Posted in Politics at 10:29pm
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Global Warming #s
January 24, 2008
Global warming is the most serious environmental threat of our time.
As these facts show, affordable options are available. And America cannot afford to fall behind any more in the race to invent clean, renewable energy sources.
45%
Increase in world’s solar generating capacity in 2005.
2
Rank of China as global producer of solar cells, behind Japan (U.S. ranks 4th).
$1.5 billion
Amount US government spends a year on renewable energy research.
$1 billion
Amount ExxonMobil earns in a day.
$2 billion
Amount GE Energy Financial Services invested in wind, solar, biomass and geothermal energy in 2007.
$200 billion
Amount China has committed to invest in renewable energy sources over the next 15 years.
0.74%
Projected cost of smart cap-and-trade climate policy on US economic output in 2030.
100%
Projected growth of the US economy by 2030.
53
Number of senators supporting cap and trade legislation.
0
Number of bills passed by Congress to cap and reduce America’s global warming pollution.
Posted in Environment at 11:44pm
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The Senators Must Defend the Constitution!
January 22, 2008
This week the Senate is set to resume debate on wiretapping legislation and whether or not the Bush administration and big telecom companies will be retroactively excused for previous violations of the FISA law. Three key senators (Clinton, McCain, and Obama) who have a unique voice in this debate due to their presidential candidacies are out campaigning; will they return to Washington and stand up for our civil liberties and the rule of law?Unfortunately the Senate is considering legislation that violates the Fourth Amendment to our Constitution and includes retroactive immunity for telecom companies. Senators Dodd and Feingold, among others, have been fighting alongside us Credo Action members. Dodd has repeatedly voiced his commitment to stop retroactive immunity by any means necessary, including a filibuster.But where are the Senators who want to be President?
Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have both stated that they will support a filibuster of retroactive immunity. But last December both remained on the campaign trail while Senator Dodd forced a delay. John McCain, widely regarded as a political “maverick,” has been silent on this critical issue.
From CREDO Action
Make them stand up for the Constitution today!
Posted in Petition, Politics at 5:17pm
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