After hitting the ground running last week with a voter registration table on the first day of classes, tabling at the student involvement fair, and posting flyers on campus, tonight was the first UK KFTC meeting of the 2010-2011 academic year.

Nearly all of the active UK KFTC leaders of last year have graduated, are taking a semester abroad, or have had to step back because of heavy school or work obligations, but new UK KFTC leader Callie Thomas has really stepped up to recruit new activists and to revive the organization on campus.  It's paid off with a dozen students coming out to this first meeting.

The group spent some time getting to know each other, learning about KFTC, and brainstorming ideas of things they might be able to accomplish this semester.  Ideas included film showings, voter registration activities, and campaigns to raise awareness of CSAs, locally created goods, and Farmers Markets.

We recruited three new KFTC members at the meeting and scheduled a campus Voter Registration tabling for next week on Thursday, September 9th from 11am to 3pm outside near the Journalism building.

"I hope to live in Kentucky for my whole life.  It's worth it to fight to make it the best possible place for all of us"     - Callie Thomas

UK KFTC meet every Wednesday at 7pm in UK Student Center room 111.  All UK students interested in our work are encouraged to attend!

On Wednesday, University of Kentucky KFTC members were on campus tabling in honor of the first day of classes. We registered a total of 76 voters on their way to and from class! We invited folks out to the first meeting of the semester on September 1st. UK KFTC will meet every Wednesday at 7pm in the Student Center.

On Thursday, UK KFTC President Callie Thomas and volunteers tabled at the Student Involvement Fair. Alongside other campus organizations, we talked to students about what our organization does and handed information about our issue campaigns.

We're expecting a great turnout for the first meeting and a productive year for UK KFTC!

WHAT IS THE DREAM ACT?

The DREAM Act is a piece of practical but fair bipartisan legislation that would help undocumented immigrant youth legalize their status by completing a set of strict criteria. DREAM stands for the Development, Relief and Education of Alien Minors and would apply to immigrant children, regardless of their country of origin, who entered the United States before their 16th birthday, who have lived here 5 consecutive years, who graduate from high school or get their GED, and who have good moral character (no felony charges). Students who fit these criteria would be given a temporary resident status and could move toward permanent residency if and only if they complete two years of college or military service. Students who qualify with the initial criteria would be able to get in-state tuition, get a driver’s license and work legally within the United States. They would also qualify for federal financial aid in the form of loans and work study

The DREAM Act is making great progress! We have 54 of the 60 votes we need in the Senate but we have to keep the pressure up and to do that we need funds! Please come out to El Mariachi Monday May 17th. They will donate a 18% of sales derived from DREAM Act supporters to the DREAM Act campaign. Bring your friends and family, eat, enjoy, write DREAM Act on your check. 

On April 30th, the central Kentucky chapter of KFTC held a chili-cook off friendraiser. What's a friendraiser you ask? Well it's an opportunity to raise money for the organization but with a focus on giving members a chance to hang out with one another, celebrate all of our hard work, and just have a darn good time.

The event was held at the Lexington Friends meeting house on Price street. Six folks entered chili into the contest and nearly forty people came out to partake in the deliciousness.

The chili was fantastic, and incredibly diverse. There were chilis w/ sirloin, turkey and chicken, as well as two vegan options. One chili even had cornbread baked right into it!

I'm not surprised that folks put such effort into their entries considering the prize for first place! The winner of the event took home a copy of the beautiful hard covered book about mountain top removal mining plundering appalachia, a gift certificate for a one-hour massage, and a dinner for two from Stella's Kentucky deli.

Our three wonderful judges that evening are each KFTC members with a keen sense of what makes a good chili. Member Chris Oaks who hails from the Cincinatti area explained to the contestants that what he looks for in a chili is "depth,"while Danielle Boucher who is a newer member and a UK undergraduate explained that she looks for "kick." Our third judge, Marty Mudd who is active on KFTC's land reform committee and also a member of Kentucky mountain justice informed us that he would be looking for a chili w/ "many layers."  

Our winner that evening was long time KFTC member Teresa McReynolds with her sirloin chili. However, in my opinion everyone was a winner considering there wasn't a drop of chili left by the end of the night! In addition to the cook off we also held a raffle. Tickets were $1 and raffle items were donated by several local businesses including Stella's Kentucky Deli, The Morris Book Shop, Woodland Computers, and Charmed Life Tattoo. We also had two professional massages donated by Nishaan Sandhu and Phil Robinson.

It was a rockin' good time and we ended up raising almost $280. Thanks to everyone who came out, to all the businesses and individuals who donated raffle items, to everyone who entered chili, and a special thanks to our intern Jordan Panning for coming up with the idea and organizing the event. We'll be sure to do it again next year!

Students, can you spot Kentucky some cash? One more time?

The Kentucky Legislature didn't want to ask the state's richest to pay their fair share, so students, once again, are footing part of their bill. As the legislature anticipates the Special Session to balance the budget, Kentucky's public universities are calling for 5% and 6% tuition hikes in anticipation of budget cuts.  These increases are on top of a decade of tuition hikes that average out to be 10% a year. 

Over the last five years, in-state tuition for Kentucky's public universities has gone up about 57%.  Think about your family's income over the last five years.  Has it gone up 57%?  No way!  Not even close, right?  Most families are doing well just to have kept up with the 18% cost of living increase since 2005.

Well that's too bad, but what about financial aid?

Nope, not right now. 

Kentucky's College Access Program is supposed to help struggling students afford college through loans.  But CAPS is state funded, and is yet another victim of the legislators' failure to pass revenue reforms.  This year's deadline for students to apply for financial aid was March 15.  More than 16,000 students applied in the week leading up to the deadline.  Because of the legislature's failure to pass revenue reforms, each of those 16,599 students have been told that despite being qualified and meeting the deadline, they can't be helped because the state is out of money.  (You can read more in this Courier-Journal article. It also attracted the attention of the Huffington Post.)  This is a colossal failure on the part of our legislators who aren't standing up for comprehensive and fair revenue reforms.

But this isn't a new problem.  According to a MACED report about Investing in Kentucky's Working Families, almost half of the people who applied and qualified for need-based financial aid in 2008 were turned away, leaving 45,000 would-be students behind.  And in 2009, the funds available were $64 million short of the funds needed.

Folks are expected to pull themselves up by their bootstraps.  The very least that our legislators can do is stop cutting the straps.

Bottom line?

For the last nine years, our legislators have been able to choose between revenue reforms that ask the state's wealthiest to contribute their fair share, or continued cuts to all the state programs and services and systems that keep up healthy, wealthy, and wise, including higher ed.  For the last nine years, they've chosen the latter.  All of us, including our students, are paying the price.

Take Action!

Call your legislators!

It’s time to make your voice heard for meaningful revenue reforms to sustain public services. Please take three minutes to call your state representative and senator, along with Speaker Stumbo, and Senate President Williams.  Tell them that Kentucky shouldn't keep asking students to foot the bill for the state's wealthiest, and that now is the time to pass a just budget and real revenue reforms. You can find out the state representative and senator who serves your county, and their home contact information, here.

 Come rally with us in Frankfort!

When the legislators come back to Frankfort, we want to greet them with a clear message that Kentucky deserves better.  KFTC and allies are planning a 5 pm rally at the Capitol on the first day of the Special Session, whenever it takes place.  We’ll have more details when the Session is called, but please plan to participate!

During our last two chapter meetings we’ve hosted a skill-share, where members had the opportunity to learn from one another a new skill. In February our skill-share focused on blogging , and in March we had a lively discussion about people’s experiences with civil disobedience and direct-action.

We’ve also hit the ground running with KFTC’s New Power Leader Program. New Power Leaders are citizens who are committed to increasing KFTC’s power through working to organize and empower their own communities. So far we have seven folks committed to the New Power Leader Program. We had our first new power potluck on Friday March 6th where we were able to eat drink and be merry, as well as discuss different organizing skills we’d like to learn and how to get started working in our communities.

On April 6th, four CKY members met with Lexington-Fayette urban county council person Linda Gorton to share their concerns about how EKPC's proposed Smith Plant could negatively impact Lexington's air and water.

Finally, we’ve got a ton of stuff in the works. Next Thursday, April 14th we’re co-hosting a candidate forum for the folks running for Lexington city council (specifically the 1st district and the at-large candidates). We’re also working on a friendraiser at the end of the month that will focus on a chili cook off for justice!

If you’re interested in getting involved in any of these activities, please contact the central Kentucky organizer at ondine@kftc.org.

Red State Ramblers: Groundhog from Kentuckians For The Commonwealth on Vimeo.

Performances for the evening were provided by The Wild Boogers, Rich and the Po Folks, Clack Mountain String Band, and the Red State Ramblers. Additionally, Kentucky author Erik Reece and Kentucky poet Eric Sutherland read from the stage. Central Kentucky member Tanya Turner spoke from the stage encouraging folks to attend I Love Mountains Day on February 11.

Long-time KFTC member and establishment owner Josh Miller mentioned how exciting the event is every year and how much he looks forward to opening up the Bar for such a good cause.

Numerous KFTC members volunteered their time and creative skill to make the event such a huge success and one that folks in Lexington look forward to every year. 

Thanks to Jordan Panning, Mason Colby, Erin Cutler, Josh Saxton, and everyone else who helped working the door and the merch table.  Special thanks to Brian and Sara Turner of Cricket Press (www.cricket-press.com) for producing yet another wonderful poster.  Posters are still available for $10 each. Email Tim@KFTC.org if you are interested in purchasing one.

The following is a press release sent to us by an anonymous group of students on UK's campus

LEXINGTON, Ky: Tuesday, an anonymous group of students from the University of Kentucky hung a banner from a parking structure near Rose Street to protest the university’s use of coal power on campus. The banner, reading “COAL: A Tradition of Oppression. STUDENTS: Let’s Change Our Legacy”, included a reproduction of the familiar UK symbol, with a burning smokestack between the letters instead of the usual Memorial Hall steeple.

Deemed the “midnight strike force” by local news sources, the students are fueling a campaign to move the university beyond the “outdated” technology of coal power and in the direction of cleaner energies. One of the students, an economics and environmental studies senior, said, “You can’t argue facts. Coal is a finite resource and the shift to alternative energies has to begin immediately. Kentucky must realize its potential to be progressive and enterprising in the country’s transition toward environmental awareness.”

The students’ use of the word “oppression” alludes to the detrimental effects of coal not only on the environment, but on the miners and communities in coal-mining regions of the state.  An estimated 12,000 coal miners have died from black lung in the past decade, and their families are equally affected.  The real tragedy, though, lies in mountaintop removal (MTR) coal mining, a practice that more and more coal companies have used to extract coal at a lower cost.  MTR employs explosives to decapitate mountains, and the leftover waste is deposited in surrounding valleys.  The chemicals and residue bury and contaminate freshwater streams, thus poisoning the water supply for surrounding communities and devastating local ecosystems.

While the university, directly, does not deal in MTR coal, Kentucky Utilities provides a significant portion of the campus’s power, and is a known distributor of energy derived from the controversial method.

“The University of Kentucky is the flagship university of the state, and as such, sets the example for the rest of Kentucky. Any change we can make toward cleaner energy and the diversification of jobs and economies will affect the entire Appalachian region drastically, and for the better. This change is one that can’t wait,” said an Appalachian Studies junior.

It seems momentum has not died from the announcement last semester that the new Wildcat Coal Lodge would be endorsed by the coal industry.  Tuesday’s banner was one of a series that has hung on campus since October, indicating that the students have not forgotten President Todd’s decision, and that they still worry for the future of their school’s energy and integrity.

Third Annual I Love Mountains Old Time Music Showcase!!!!

February 6, 2010, All Ages
$10 (sliding scale, no one will be turned away) to benefit the work of Kentuckians For The Commonwealth

Al's Bar, Sixth Street and North Limestone in Lexington

Music Starts at 9 p.m.
Clack Mountain String Band
Red State Ramblers
Rich and the Po Folks
The Wild Boogers

Special Guests, Kentucky Authors Erik Reece and Eric Sutherland

*** The beautiful poster designed and printed by Cricket Press will be available at the show for sale***

On Thursday, the Central Kentucky chapter spent its meeting reviewing legislation that KFTC endorses, and also learned from our allies at Lexington Fairness which bills they're lobbying for during the 2010 General Assembly.

Central Kentucky members Katie Meyer, Martin Mudd, Jenn Myatt, and Susan Williams each led a breakout session on one of KFTC's legislative priorities. Members then broke down into small groups and spent ten minutes at each "station."

In Katie's group members celebrated our work on Wednesday during the "Bake Sale for the Budget" big lobby day. They also learned about the progressive tax reform legislation proposed in House Bill 13.

Susan Williams led a group on sustainable energy policies. She shared information about the Kentucky Sustainable Energy Alliance (KySEA), and how the policies proposed by the alliance will

benefit all  Kentuckians by saving ratepayers money in the short and long-term, creating local jobs and businesses, improving our health and environment through cleaner electricity sources and by helping families struggling with rising energy bills.

In the voting rights break-out members had a chance to learn about where we are with the restoration of voting rights legislation (HB 70) and to prepare for our big voting rights lobby day on March 4.

The fourth break-out group, led by Marty Mudd, focused on the history of the Stream Saver Bill. There were several first-timers at the meeting who kept Marty on his toes by asking important questions like, "How do you make an issue like protecting streams in Appalachia important to someone who lives in Lexington or Louisville?"

KFTC also has a history of supporting ally organizations' work in Frankfort as well. The chapter invited Joey Rose from Lexington Fairness to share with them which bills they are working on right now. Lexington Fairness is a local LGBTIQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Intersex and Queer) organization. There are four bills that they are lobbying for during this session;

1. Statewide Fairness Bill (House: HB 117): This bill would prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity throughout Kentucky in employment, housing, public accommodations, insurance coverage, and credit. The House bill also includes sexual orientation and gender identity provisions in the powers of state and local human rights commissions. Right now only residents of Metro Louisville, Lexington/Fayette County, and Covington are protected by city ordinance against discrimination.

2. Hospital Visitation Bill (House: HB 118): This initiative would allow any adult hospital patient to designate another individual to be treated as a member of the patient's family with regard to visitation.

3. Fair Marriage Bill (House: HB 17): This bill would repeal the 2004 anti-marriage amendment by returning the issue to Kentucky voters.

4. Dual Parent Adoption Bill (House: HB 95): Allows non-married couples to adopt.

There will be a fairness lobby day on Wednesday, February 24. Starting at 9 a.m folks can gather in room 131 of the capitol annex for training.

To learn more about these bills and how they're coming along, visit the Kentucky Fairness Alliance's Legislative Action Center at http://kentuckyfairness.org/getinformed/legislation.htm

The Central Kentucky KFTC Chapter meets the third Thursday of every month from 7-9 p.m. at the Episcopal Diocesan Mission House at the corner of 4th Street and Martin Luther King. If you're interested in helping to plan our chapter meetings, please contact the CKY Organizer Ondine Quinn at ondine@kftc.org