activism

The Mountainfilm Commitment Grant was created to help ensure that important stories are not only told, but also heard. What follows is an update from Ben Knight, one of the recipients of a 2011 grant.

Ninety-nine years after Olympic National Park’s Elwha River was illegally dammed, wild Chinook salmon still instinctively gather at the foot of the lower dam as if they sense a change in the current. Upstream, the usual low rumble of antique turbines generating electricity has faded, and the piercing sound of an excavator-mounted jackhammer reverberates off the 210-foot-tall Glines Canyon Dam. De-construction crews have begun the painstaking process of chipping away at its mossy, con-caved facade. This moment marks the beginning of the largest dam removal in U.S. history, unveiling the best opportunity for wild salmon recovery in the country.

Tim DeChristopher is serving a two year term in Federal prison near Ferlong, California. In a recent letter to Mountainfilm Festival Director David Holbrooke, he wrote:

"Overall, I'm doing really well. The moving around before I got here was stressful but it's been nice to settle in here the last couple of weeks. In a way, I have been waiting to get here for over two and a half years, so I actually have a relieving sense of moving on with my life."

If you want to write him, you can get all the details here. Also, check out a recent interview Mountainfilm 2007 guest Jeff Goodell did with DeChristopher for Rolling Stone.

Ben Knight and Travis Rummel of Felt Soul Media brought the story of Pebble Mine in Bristol Bay to Mountainfilm audiences in 2008 with their film, Red Gold. The issue of whether a copper and gold mine will wreck this pristine salmon run is still up in the air with many groups trying to prevent it, including a major push by the NRDC. Even though they have enlisted Robert Redford in this battle, it's an issue that could still use help.

Revenge of the Electric Car, which opened Mountainfilm 2011, comes to theaters across the country this weekend. Director Chris Paine shared his thoughts about the challenges of making this film in an interview with the design site, Inhabitat.

"The new film Revenge of the Electric Car debuts in just a few days and we were recently lucky enough to catch up with director Chris Paine to get the inside scoop on this sequel to his popular film Who Killed the Electric Car? The film brings awareness to how electric vehicles were able to break through an incredible number of obstacles to get to where they are today. We sat down with Chris Paine to ask him all about the new film, how he felt when he suddenly found himself to be a part of his own movie, and what he sees in the future of green transportation."

Jeff Goodell was a guest at the Energy Symposium in 2007 and is a regular contributor to Rolling Stone. In his latest piece, Jeff makes a list called: Environment - Ten Things Obama Must Do. Number 9 is Pardon Tim DeChristopher.

"When Barack Obama won the Democratic nomination for president in 2008, he declared that future generations would remember it as "the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal." More than three years later, the oceans are still rising and our planet has done more howling – in the form of extreme weather – than healing."

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Activists are making all kinds of statements these days. Some artists and athletes made this one on the Matilija Dam near Ojai, California. The dam is scheduled to come down at some point, but the demolition plan is unclear, and this action will surely prompt closer attention.

Tim DeChristopher, two-time Mountainfilm in Telluride festival special guest and well-known climate activist, was sentenced on July 26 in Federal Court in Salt Lake City to two years in prison for his activism in disrupting a corrupted oil-gas lease sale by BLM in Utah.  Immediately after sentencing Tim was taken by Federal Marshalls directly to jail to begin serving his sentence.  Over 200 people were at the Federal Court House in support of Tim and his climate awareness actions.  Upon hearing the sentence and learning that Tim was taken directly to jail to prevent him from speaking, against the norm in these types of cases, many of Tim's supporters decided to speak for Tim in the form of a spontaneous protest to proclaim that citizen voices cannot easily be silenced.  Twenty-six were arrested in this peaceful protest and taken to jail.  Two of those arrested were from Telluride; locals Chris Meyers and Skip Edwards.  Local Tellurider's have set up a defense fund to help with Chris's and Skip's fines with the remainder going to help Tim DeChristopher's appeal expenses, said by his pro-bono attorney's to be in excess of $50,000.
 

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is listed as the 10th richest person in America is putting his money up against Big Coal. Over the next four years, his philanthropic organization is giving $50 million to help the Sierra Club expand it's "Beyond Coal" campaign.

"If we are going to get serious about reducing our carbon footprint in the United States, we have to get serious about coal, " Bloomberg said. "Ending coal power production is the right thing to do, because while it may seem to be an inexpensive energy source the impact on our environment and the impact on public health is significant. Coal is a self-inflicted public health risk, polluting the air we breathe, adding mercury to the water we drink and the leading cause of climate disruption. ”

From Rolling Stone:

Judge Dee Benson was right in determining that Tim DeChristopher is dangerous. He was right in delivering a stiff sentence in a federal prison to try and silence him if what the judge fears is an evolving democracy. And we can all thank him for showing us how terrifying civil resistance is to the power structures of the United States of America, when a citizen, especially a student, steps forward in an act of courage when justice is being denied.

But Judge Benson was dead wrong when he reprimanded DeChristopher for speaking out after his conviction in March. He stated during the sentencing hearing that DeChristopher might not have faced prosecution, let alone prison, if it were not for that “continuing trail of statements.”