January 2012

The BP Oil Disaster is Not Over

oily footprints in Barataria Bay. Photo: GRNOriginally published on Care2.com. Over a year and a half ago, BP’s Macondo well erupted, spewing over 200 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. We continue to experience impacts from the disaster today. [...Read more]

Aaron Viles's picture
Aaron Viles

Alabama faces civil rights complaint over landfill taking waste from TVA coal ash disaster

Crossposted from Facing South.arrowhead map The Alabama Department of Environmental Management faces a civil rights complaint for [...Read more]

Sue Sturgis's picture
Sue Sturgis

Community Profile: Eugene Dean

eugene deanCrossposted from Justice Roars.  This profile comes from VOTE (Voice Of The Ex-offender) in New Orleans. Eugene Dean has been with VOTE from the very beginning, when the organization sprang from an effort of incarcerated men within Ango [...Read more]

Bridge The Gulf's picture
Bridge The Gulf

Did Closing the Large Housing Projects in New Orleans Create a Spike in Crime and Violence?

vigilBy Dr. Lance Hill, crossposted from Justice Roars. One of the post-Katrina policies touted as a way of reducing poverty and crime was to demolish most of the large housing projects and disperse the poor throughout the city (and the nation). [...Read more]

Bridge The Gulf's picture
Bridge The Gulf

Exonerated death row inmate John Thompson digs for the roots of New Orleans crime epidemic

john thompsonA Talk with John Thompson, by Jed Horne, Crossposted from The Lens.  John Thompson knows the streets of New Orleans. He also knows the state’s prisons. He was one of several defendants railroaded to death row during Harry Connick’s 28-year tenure as Orleans Parish district attorney. [...Read more]

Bridge The Gulf's picture
Bridge The Gulf

Angola Warden Burl Cain on "Black Pantherism"

Crossposted from Justice Roars.burl cain Last week, the newsletter of the International Coalition to Free the Angola Three published recently transcribed testimony of the October 2008 deposition of Burl Cain, Warden of Angola Prison, questioned by Nick Trenticosta, an at [...Read more]

Bridge The Gulf's picture
Bridge The Gulf

A Call for Sunshine on the Gulf's Restoration

sunshine press confBy Scott Eustis, Gulf Restoration NetworkOver a year and a half into the BP oil drilling disaster, restoration seems to come too slow. [...Read more]

Bridge The Gulf's picture
Bridge The Gulf

BP protesters thank oil giant for unintended publicity  

deformed shrimpBy Michele Walker-Harmon. BP protesters are thanking oil giant BP and their highly paid public relations firm, Purple Strategies, for helping to shine the spotlight on the continuing effects of BP's Oil Drilling Disaster, effects which include ongoing health issues, questions about seafood safety and lack of adequate clean-up in many coastal areas.   
  [...Read more]

Bridge The Gulf's picture
Bridge The Gulf

Connecting youth to their environment in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana

[...Read more]

Bridge The Gulf's picture
Bridge The Gulf

Listen: Alabama fishermen featured on radio show

siriporn hallAlabama fisherfolk and community organizers were recently featured on the Apex Express, a radio show by and about Asian and Pacific Islander communities. Hear from Siriporn Hall, Minh Van Le, and Zack Carter about the state of the fishing industry in Coden and Bayou La Batre, "the seafood capital of Alabama." [...Read more]

Bridge The Gulf's picture
Bridge The Gulf

Shameka Banks honored by fair housing center for speaking out about sexual harassment

shameka banksEvery year the Greater New Orleans Fair Housing Action Center (GNOFHAC) honors the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. by hosting the "Fit for King" conference on housing.  James Perry, Director of GNOFHAC, kicked off the event on Friday, January 13th, by explaining why this year's theme was "Women and Fair Housing": [...Read more]

Ada McMahon's picture
Ada McMahon

Advocates urge NOLA City Council to reject citywide curfew for youth

Yesterday, a group of advocates sent the following open letter to the New Orleans City Council, regarding a proposed citywide curfew that would make it illegal for youth under the age of 16 to be outdoors after 8pm.

OPEN LETTER REGARDING CURFEW EXTENSION

January 18, 2012

Dear Councilmembers: [...Read more]

Rosana Cruz's picture
Rosana Cruz

Video: Gulf Coast children experiencing health challenges

A handful of mothers and grandmothers on the Gulf Coast describe the illnesses their children are facing after the BP oil disaster. [...Read more]

Bridge The Gulf's picture
Bridge The Gulf

What you missed last week at the BOEM...

Ada McMahon's picture
Ada McMahon

Speak up for Restoration (this Week!)

coastal restoration projectsCrossposted from the Gulf Restoration Network. The coastal crisis in Southern Louisiana is at a tipping point.  We continue to lose a football field of wetlands every hour, or 16 square miles a year.  If we fail to adequately address the problem, that rate could skyrocket to 51 square miles every year, jeopardizing our very way of life.  [...Read more]

Aaron Viles's picture
Aaron Viles

For The Love of My Home

dead dolphin and childBy Kathleen M Walker-Gordon. On June 25, 2010, when oil had been flowing from BP's well in the Gulf of Mexico for 66 days, Kathleen Walker-Gordon sat down in her Orange Beach home and wrote.  She wrote of her anger that one corporation could do so much destruction, and she wrote of her family's history in charter fishing, a way of life she feared was gone.  Here's that original essay, and [...Read more]

Bridge The Gulf's picture
Bridge The Gulf

Inside Orleans Parish Prison

opp cellIn a letter to the editors of the Times-Picayune this month, New Orleans resident Mona Castillo wrote that the key to decreasing crime is to make prison "less comfortable."  She wrote, "At the present time, jails are more like hotels.  Many prisoners live better there than they did on the outside." [...Read more]

Rosana Cruz's picture
Rosana Cruz

A short up-to-date guide for citizen activists and other heroes who love the Gulf of Mexico

tarball expressI wish to commend you on your continuing work on behalf of the people still being affected by the 2010 BP Oil Catastrophe. As you know, on a daily basis the lifeless corpses of birds, fish, turtles and dolphins wash up at some 10 times the usual mortality rate. Thick, black, sticky, toxic oil continues to come in, often accompanied by a bubbly, peanut butter colored dispersant/oil cocktail.
  [...Read more]

Cherri Foytlin's picture
Cherri Foytlin

Mid Continent Oil and Gas Association Scared of Kazoos, Song Sheets and Huey Long

huey longPress release from Sons and Daughters of the Kingfish, January 25th, 2012. NEW ORLEANS - The Huey Long flash mob assembled today to celebrate Huey Long’s defense of Louisiana is currently being denied access by police and hotel personnel at the Roosevelt. [...Read more]

Bridge The Gulf's picture
Bridge The Gulf

Failure of climate talks imperils nowhere more than Louisiana coast

plaquemines sedimentationBy Bia Assevero, crossposted from The Lens.  December’s climate change conference in Durban, South Africa, was, as these conferences usually are, more style than substance. [...Read more]

Bridge The Gulf's picture
Bridge The Gulf