Monthly Archives: November 2016

Cancer in Waycross and the upper Suwannee River watershed

At least the Waycross cancer problem is finally getting some news media attention. Brenda Goodman and Andy Miller, Georgia Health News, October 20, 2016, Why are kids in Waycross getting cancer? (Part One of Special Report),

Fourteen-year-old Lexi Crawford was attacked by lower back pain so sharp that she couldn’t even sit up to eat. Her mother had to bring her food while she was lying flat on her back. Doctors in Waycross, GA, the town where she lives, thought it was a kidney infection. But after months of antibiotics didn’t clear it up, a visiting doctor in the local ER suggested an X-ray.

What he saw on the scan was terrifying.

Continue reading →

Gulf and south Atlantic Waterkeeper Retreat

FERC reform as an initiative was one result of this year’s meeting, this time where Georgia Water Coalition usually meets, of the Riverkeepers and other Waterkeeper members and affiliates from Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and beyond as far as Oklahoma and Pennsylvania.

Group Front row by himself: Pete Harrison (Waterkeeper Alliance attorney).
Kneeling: Rick Frey (St Marys), Dan Tonsmeire (Apalachicola), Laura Jackson (Mobile), Rachael Thompson (Satilla), Dale Caldwell (Chattahoochee), Kemp Burdette (Cape Fear), Gordon Rogers (Flint)
Standing: Jason Ulseth (Chattahoochee), Bill Strangler (Congaree), Casi Callaway (Mobile), Susan Wendel (Altamaha) Earl Hatley (Grand), Elena Fodera Richards (Savannah), Emily Markesteyn (Ogeechee), John S. Quarterman (WWALS), Bart Mihailovich (Waterkeeper), Bruce Bodson (Galveston), Krissy Kasserman (Youghiogheny, wearing the blue and gray plaid shirt) Henry Jacobs (Chattachoochee, wearing the beanie cap leaning against the wall), Jacob Oblander (Lower Savannah River Alliance Affiliate, right behind Krissy), Michael Mullen (Choctawhatchee, right next to Jacob), Rebecca Jim (Tar Creek, right next to Krissy), Tonya Bonitatibus (Savannah), Matt Starr (Upper Neuse, right behind Gordon), Cade Kistler (Mobile, against wall), Sam Perkins (Catawba), Lisa Rinaman (St Johns).
Not pictured: Kaitlin Warren, Seth Clark, and Jen Hilburn (Altamaha), Rachel Sliverstein (Miami), Kelly Cox (Miami), Neil Armingeon (Matanzas), Gretchen Quarterman (WWALS), Anna Alsobrook (French Broad), Bill D’Antuono and Harrison Langley (Collier), Misha Mitchell (Atchaflaya), Myra Crawford (Cahaba), John Paul (Caloosahatchee), Kevin Jeselnik (Chattahoochee), Frank Chitwood (Coosa), Hartwell Carson (French Broad), Rob Walters (Three Rivers).

That group picture was taken late after many people had left, and some never arrived, due to hurricane or other reasons. Some of the missing are below in pictures Gretchen took, including one of Altamaha Riverkeeper Jen Hilburn, in whose extensive watersheds we met. And of course FERC reform wasn’t the only initiative: trash, biological contamination, CAFOs, and others are on the agenda.

Bart Mihailovich, Waterkeeper Alliance, 3 November 2016, 2016 Gulf and South Atlantic Regional Retreat Recap, Continue reading →

Waterkeeper Alliance asks Obama to halt DAPL

WWALS has been tying #NoDAPL to #NoSabalTrail for some time, because water protectors here continue to fight Sabal Trail for many of the same reasons as the Standing Rock Sioux fight the Dakota Access Pipeline, plus one of the DAPL pipeline companies, Enbridge, is buying Spectra Energy, the Sabal Trail pipeline company, and many of the same banks finance both.

Plus even FPL admits there’s no need for new electricity for Florida until 2024 at the earliest, which means there’s no need for Sabal Trail.

Waterkeeper Alliance, 3 November 2016, Waterkeeper Alliance Calls on President Obama to Halt the Dakota Access Pipeline and Uphold the Rights of Water Protectors, Continue reading →

Crowdsourcing pictures of Sabal Trail path

Update 2016-11-29: Added to this google map: WWALS aerials of Gilchrist County, and Sabal Trail alignment maps localized by LAKE for Mitchell, Colquitt, Brooks, and Lowndes Counties, Georgia, and Hamilton, Suwannee, and Gilchrist Counties, Florida to just north of Bell, FL.

Update 2016-11-04: Now with Sabal Trail route digitized through Gilchrist, Alachua, and part of Levy Counties, plus part of the Citrus County line.

Signs, silt fences, backhoes in wetlands: you can log pictures on a map of anything going on at a Sabal Trail construction site from your mobile phone, tablet, or laptop. Already posted your pictures on the web? Link them into the map. Here’s how.

You’ve seen many pictures posted by WWALS, taken on the ground and in the air, and linked into a google map (which also has Sabal Trail’s alignment maps linked in).

Here’s another google map, to which more people can add pictures.

If you want to add pictures to this new crowdsourcing google map, you need to: Continue reading →