KFTC's Statewide Annual Meeting in Jabez at the Kentucky Leadership Center is in progress now.  We have 175 KFTC leaders from all over the state, East, West, North, South, urban, and rural.

Here are some initial pictures by member Jenny Hungerbuhler.

We'll have much more information soon, with more pictures, and video up on the blog, letting you know how it all went.

Thanks to everyone here this weekend!

   

Today (Monday, October 6th) is the voter registration deadline.

If you're not registered, get down to your local County Clerk's office by the time they close today and register or download a mail-in voter registration card and get it post-marked today.

83 Hour, Non-Stop Voter Registration Marathon! - Join the fun

 
As part of a year-long push to register voters in under-represented areas (low-income, people of color, and youth communities), Kentuckians For The has again put together Operation Voter MADNESS – an all-out 83-hour marathon of non-stop voter registration ranging all over Lexington and Louisville, and including substantial efforts in Rowan, Warren, Madison, Knott, Perry, Pike, Harlan, Floyd, and Letcher Counties.

This last push caps off an effort including hundreds of events by KFTC to register voters throughout the year.

The deadline to register to vote is Monday, October 6th.  Cards must be postmarked or turned in to your local county clerk on this day or earlier to register for the November 4th General Election.

In all, we plan to contact 15,000 voters three times each this election cycle, making sure they're registered to vote, that they have non-partisan information about candidates, and that they have every opportunity to get out and vote!

New volunteers are welcome at these events!

Lexington Operation Voter Madness Schedule

Thursday 10/2
10am-2pm - BCTC - Voting is Patriotic Concert
2pm-5pm - Lexington Public Library Northside Branch
5pm-10pm - Save-a-lot (and other grocery stores)
10pm-2am - Bars (bar complex - free/mias/mccarthys, als, A1A).  The central location will be a table at the corner of Limestone and Short street.

Friday 10/3
2am-6am - Tolly Ho, plus other late-night restaurants
6am-10am – Lexington transit center
10am-2pm - UK Campus outside near the Journalism Building
2pm-6pm - Woodland Park 2pm-6pm
6pm-10pm- Southland Bowling Alley
10pm-2am Outside of the Kentucky Theatre

Saturday 10/4
2am-6am - Tolly Ho, plus other late-night restaurants
6am-9am - Lexington Transit Center
9am-2pm - Lexington Farmers Market
2pm-6pm - Funky Farm at Douglas Park
6pm-10pm - Concert For The Commonwealth at the UK Student Center Patio

Louisville Operation Voter Madness Schedule

Friday 10/3

7am-9am - KFTC office, Butchertown, and the Marathon gas station
9am-11am - Phoenix Hill, St. John's
11am-3pm - Presbyterian Community Center, grocery store, fast food,businesses, sidewalks, Shepherd's Square
3pm-7pm - Jackson and St. Catherine: St. Vincent dePaul Homeless Shelter,St. Jude's, Jackson
Woods Housing
7pm-8pm - Gas stations
8pm-11pm - Midcity mall and Bardstown Road
11-12am - White Castle at Preston and Eastern

Saturday 10/4

12am-3am - White Castle
3am-7am - Denny's decompression and some registration
7am-3pm - Shelby Park tabling event, Meyzeek Farmer's Market
3pm-5pm - Old Louisville around Hill (Old Louisville Coffee, etc)
5pm-7pm - Park Hill and Parkland
*3pm-7pm CONCURRENTLY Table in 4th Street Borders
7pm-9pm - Break
9pm-11pm - Expressions of You coffeehouse open mic
11pm-12am - Downtown bars and clubs

Sunday 10/5

12am-3am - Downtown bars and clubs
3am-7am - Waffle House decompression and some registration
7am-11am - Portland: churches, fast food, gas stations (28th st)
11am-3pm - Shawnee: Market, Broadway
3pm-7pm - Park Duvalle and coming back along Algonquin
7pm-9pm - Rounding it out in the Highlands on Bardstown Road, etc.

Lexington primary contact - Ondine Quinn - Ondine@kftc.org - (614) 370-3009

Louisville primary contact - Colette Henderson - Colette@kftc.org - (502) 767-5735

2nd Annual Jefferson County Open House

Saturday greeted us Louisvillians with ominous gray skies looming with the threat of some very NEEDED hard rain. However, Jefferson County KFTC members were not discouraged and from 2 pm to 5 pm members worked tirelessly to prepare for our big event.  By 5 pm the block looked lovely, despite the continuous gloomy weather. The Mountain Top Removal Banner project wrapped around the whole perimeter of the block party, Christmas lights twinkled around the stage area, and delicious looking food was being brought out by member Retha Justice. The street block barely accommodate the variety of organizations recruited to table by members Peggy Kidwell and Becki Winchel. Members Retha Justice and Mary Love gave compelling testimonials and electoral organizer Amar Shah and member Margaret Stewart shared some poetry and played a CD of two of her poems that were converted to music. The evening closed music from member Carol Kraemer who was surrounded by a group of fans, singing and clapping along.  

Despite MANY competing events, approximately 60 people showed up for the event.  Many who showed up stayed for quite some time, eating, making connections and enjoying company.  Food  and drink was prepared and donated by Salvation Army, Rainbow Blossom, Retha Justice, Miss C's Kitchen, and Jackson's Organic Coffee. Many people from the neighborhood stopped by and took membership envelopes with them. One neighbor was from Eastern Kentucky and very interested in putting an end to MTR. Another woman said she lived across the street and definitely plans to be at our Chapter Meeting. Three copies of the charming MTR print used for the event invitation were sold. The print was created by member Julie Yoder.

One week from today (Monday, October 6th) is the last day to register to vote for the big General Election in Kentucky.  If you're not registered, you can visit your local county clerk today before they close that day, or print out a registration card from Here -  and get it postmarked on that day or earlier.

Also, please make sure your friends are registered this week - and that they're voting address is updated.  You can find out whether or not you're registered and where on from a link from KFTC's www.KentuckyElection.org website.

Finally, please join in the local massive voter registration drives organized by KFTC this week.  We'll have Operation Voter Madness registration marathons in several areas, as well as lots of community tabling events and door-to-door canvasses.  Please contact your local organizer to learn about events in your area. 

Monday is just one week from the Voter Registration Deadline, which still gives Governor Beshear a slim window to issue a blanket restoration of voting rights order to all former felons who have served their time, so that all of them will have time to register and vote in this critical election.

KFTC is organizing a call-in day and small action in Frankfort Monday, September 29th, to show the Governor that there is support for restoration of voting rights to former felons, to thank him for streamlining the process, and to show support for greater steps to provide access to our democracy.

Take Action

We encourage everyone to take time Monday to call Governor Beshear to let him know you support his move to streamline the restoration process and that you also call on him to give a blanket restoration of voting rights order to former felons in time for them to be able to vote this year.

Governor's Office Main Line: (502) 564-2611
Fax: (502) 564-2517
Online Contact form

Also, if you are able, please join us in Frankfort Monday at 2pm in the Capitol Rotunda.  We'll meet, carrying 186 strands of paper dolls, each representing 1,000 people who can't vote in Kentucky because of our extreme felony disenfranchisement laws. We're not aiming to make this a large rally, but the more the merrier.

Thank you for taking action!

Longtime Kentucky activist John Cleveland passed away yesterday while working on his farm.  John has a long history of working with KFTC and other social justice organizations and hosted  two weekly radio programs on WMMT in Whitesburg.  He had recently begun working with the Sierra Club as an organizer on coal issues in Eastern Kentucky.  His untimely death is a blow to cause of environmental justice in Kentucky.  He will be missed.

From the Lexington Herald-Leader:

Environmentalist John Cleveland, 55, dies

John Cleveland, an environmental activist who worked on coal, gas, logging and solid waste issues in Eastern Kentucky, was killed Monday when a tree fell on him at his farm near Blackey in Letcher County.

He apparently had been cutting a tree and was trapped between it and another, said Sgt. Brian Damron of the Letcher County sheriff's office.

Mr. Cleveland, 55, was recently hired by the Sierra Club. He also had been associated with Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, the Democracy Resource Center, the Kentucky Resources Council and other groups. He was known as a local government watchdog.

"I think he probably attended more school board meetings and more fiscal court meetings that anyone else, probably including the elected officials," former Letcher County Judge-Executive Carroll Smith said.

Read more...

The visitation for John begins tonight at 6pm at the Letcher Funeral Home (102 Main Street Whiteburg, KY).  The funeral will be held Thursday morning at 11:30 at the Letcher Funeral Home.

In lieu of flowers, the family has asked that people make donations in John's honor to WMMT, the Appalshop, KFTC, or the Sierra Club.

For all donations, please put "Memorial Donation for John Cleveland" in the "For" part of your check or on a note accompanying your donation.

We encourage people to use the comments section below to share their remembrances of John and to celebrate his life.   To get us started, here is a piece written by local Sierra Club member and friend of John, Rick Clewett.

John Cleveland, our recently-hired Sierra Club activist working on mountain top removal and coal-fired power plant issues, died on September 22nd, while he was working on his 200 acre property near Blackey in Letcher County. He was killed by a falling tree.

John grew up on a farm near Frankfort and graduated from UK. He married and settled down in Letcher County over two decades ago. Ever since he has been working passionate for the people, creatures and land of eastern Kentucky. Some years ago, he conducted almost single-handedly a fact gathering effort that resulted in several county officials being sent to jail. He worked for a time as an organizer for Kentuckians for the Commonwealth struggling against the unreasonable and unlawful actions of gas, oil, and coal companies.

Teresa McHugh, his supervisor in the Sierra Club, remembers John in a way any of you who met him will appreciate:

John was warm and gentle, and at the same time tough, passionate and committed to the core. He was a natural story teller, whose humor, insight and gift for description could bridge gaps of culture and experience. When we interviewed John for the position of Coal Organizer in Eastern Kentucky he said that he was really excited to see our job opening. He explained that two decades of fighting coal and gas companies in Kentucky had made him unemployable by any entity but an organization like the Sierra Club.

I first met John on April 1st of this year at the community center in Grapevine, near Fishtrap Lake. A handful of Sierra Club people had gathered there, including Club lawyers from San Francisco and Vermont, to talk with local people about the problems local mining operations were creating. It was John’s first day of work and the first chance any of us would have to meet him. But John didn’t introduce himself. Instead, he let Aaron, our lawyer from San Fancisco, start the meeting. When Aaron got to the point of mentioning that our new organizer John Cleveland, was supposed to be there, John sort of pulled his sleeve and grinned a mischievous little grin.

I had the wonderful opportunity of spending ten or twelve days this summer with John scouting mountain top removal and contour mining sites for which Corps of Engineers 404 water permits had been sought. In the September issue of this newsletter, I mentioned all the fun I had had on these outings and the pleasure I experienced being introduced to various plants and animals. It was John who named the Luna moth for me. It was John who identified the Indigo Bunting’s call and followed it to a tiny little bird in a distant tree. It was John who pointed out two wild turkeys and a large flock of “doodles,” as he called the baby turkeys.

I spent enough time with John to really feel both his noble dedication to the task of opposing wrong and his very keep kindness. We scaled a steep and hugged mountain face to try to get a sense of where one mining project was going to be. We hiked for five hours, part of it semi-lost in a huge potential area slated, if the mining company has its way, to include ten valley fills. This was shortly before my hip replacement. John helped me up the mountain and found an easier way down. When we were lost, he was sure that all we had to do was manage to get down the face of the mountain and we would come out where we wanted to be. But we took an extra hour to backtrack so that I wouldn’t risk hurting my hip. It was with remarkable gentleness and naturalness that he leaned over to retie my boot once because I could not bend over far enough to do it.

John’s love for “criters” reminded of St Francis. The reason John knew the call of the Indigo Bunting so well was because he had once spent some weeks trying to nurse one back to health. He told me about how people in his neck of the woods often try to run over black snakes when they see one on the road. As a response, John used to carry a bag in his car. Whenever he saw a black snake on the road, he would stop, capture the snake in his bag, take it home, and let it loose on his land, where it would be safe.

It seemed as if John knew at least a quarter of the people in Appalachian Kentucky. When I went to Louisa, south of Ashland, to spend two days scouting a mining site with him, he connected with a legendary KFTC activist he had known for years. When we drove through a strip mining operation near Fishtrap Lake, a fellow driving a water truck for the mining company recognized him. They had coached little league baseball teams against each other when John son was small.

John was 55 when he died. Besides all of his activist work, he did a weekly pop music show every Wednesday night for a local radio station. And he was a devoted soccer referee for high school and college games through a large swath of southeast Kentucky. He asked me to loan him some Yoga DVDs, so that he could work through the tendinitis problem he had had recently in one knee. He needed to use little “granny” magnifying glasses to read maps; when he lost the cheap pair he was using on one mine scouting expedition, I had to read the map for him—a watered-down version of the halt leading the blind.

John had dyslexia. He told me that when he went to U.K., he really had trouble reading the books. He described himself as much more of an intuitive than an analytic. But he was a smart man and he compensated. He could be analytic when he needed to be. And he had absolutely amazing skills of perception that seemed to be somehow attached to disinclination for linear thinking. It seemed as if he could see and hear everything—all the smallest details. That made a wonderful tutor in the woods.

John spoke often of his wife, Artie Ann Bates, one of the few psychiatrists in their part of Kentucky. His devotion to her shown through whenever he mentioned her. We all share in her and his John’s son David’s grief.

I don’t think it an exaggeration to say that the example set by John Cleveland will be a resource for the area he loved. The rest of us are going to work harder to pick up the slack, but we will be strengthened by having known that someone like John existed.

Goodbye, John.

Nearly 30 concerned community and statewide residents, sportsmen, and KFTC members participated in a public permit conference hearing held the by State Department for Natural Resources, Thursday September 11th at the Oven Fork Senior Citizens center in Letcher County.

Under the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act (SMCRA) of 1977 residents have the right to submit public comments as the state is reviewing a coal company's mining permit application for official state approval.

Cumberland River Coal Company of Appalachia, VA has applied for a surface coal mining and reclamation operation permit affecting 1,299.25 acres of surface, constructing three hollow fills and five sediment ponds approximately 1.4 miles from the community of Eolia. The proposed operation would use the surface contour, area and highwall mining methods of surface mining along the Poor Fork of the Cumberland River near the Bad Branch Nature Preserve.

The Poor Fork is one of the headwater streams for the Cumberland River and is one of only six Kentucky designated class 1 streams for its pristine water quality and natural brook trout population.

Residents protesting the proposed mining permit are concerned about the impacts to the headwater streams of the Cumberland River, their communities and the future of Bad Branch.

KFTC members gave testimony in favor of protecting the streams and requested that the state deny the mine permit.

Local resident KFTC member, Jim Webb, quoted the late Harry M. Caudill, "reclamation is like putting lipstick on a corpse, I don't want to see Black Mountain become a corpse."

Local artist and KFTC member, Jeff Chapman-Crane presented the state with an analysis of Cumberland River Coal company's profit gains according to information combined from the Associated Press and Mountain Eagle reports published on July 30, 2008.

Cumberland River's parent company, Arch Coal Inc., reported that its second quarter profit tripled from $37.6 million in 2007 to $113 million in 2008.

But while Arch Coal officials and stockholders may be celebrating their profit margins the Appalachian region and its people are the one's who are paying the true cost of coal. We pay every time our homes are shaken off their foundations with each illegal blast the company sets off, the mountains pay one by one as they are blown up and made barren, and the streams pay into Arch's profits with each mile that is buried and contaminated."

Over the past 30 years jobs in the coal industry have decline significantly. Mean while the production of coal has increase and the price of coal has skyrocketed. This economic practice funnels more and more money to fewer and fewer people further jeopardizing our future.

--Jeff Chapman-Crane

Concerned citizens are awaiting for the state's decision to grant or deny Cumberland River Coal's proposed mine permit.

There was general consensus that the next step for community action is to monitor the permitting process closely. Residents need to make sure that the company does not begin to mine without a permit or decide to clear the land without permission.

Coalfield residents and all Kentuckians who like clean water got a partial victory Wednesday when the U.S. Court of Appeals agreed that the state’s practice of granting water quality exemptions is "arbitrary and capricious." The three-judge panel rejected 5 of 6 state exemptions, including a blanket exemption of coal mining discharges from “anti-degradation review.”

“We’ve long believed that the numerous exemptions in Kentucky’s regulations could seriously degrade water quality. The court opinion makes it clear that the Clean Water Act requires anti-degradation rules work to maintain water quality and EPA must look seriously at the individual and cumulative impact of  … exemptions prior to approving them,” said Judith Petersen, executive director of Kentucky Waterways Alliance and the lead plaintiff in the case.

The 24-page opinion found that U.S. EPA's approval of five exceptions was "arbitrary and capricious" because EPA never required Kentucky to prove that the multiple exceptions would cause only insignificant degradation of the state's rivers, lakes and streams. The exemptions involve the use of public waters for storm water permits, sewage from single-family residents, waste disposal from industries and discharges from concentrated animal feeding operations.

The Court also rejected EPA's approval of Kentucky's blanket exemption of coal mining discharges from anti-degradation review. EPA approved this practice based on a letter from the state rather than a regulatory or statutory change that would have provided the public the right to comment on the rules.

We work diligently to protect our most important natural resource – water. And we’re delighted that the court stepped up to insist that mining be activities be held to the same standard as other permitted discharges,

KFTC Canary Project Fellow Teri Blanton

The legal action was filed under the “anti-degradation” provisions of the federal Clean Water Act. States are required to develop and implement rules to prohibit degradation of good water quality unless it is necessary to allow such degradation to accommodate important social or economic development.  Kentucky developed plans that were rejected by EPA in 1997 and 2000. In 2005, given the absence of any approved state plan, KWA, KFTC and other plaintiffs sued the U.S. EPA asking that it be required to implement a plan for Kentucky. Shortly thereafter, EPA approved the state’s current draft of an anti-degradation plan. The plaintiffs then challenged specific parts of that plan.

 While rejecting the exemptions, the Court upheld provisions on how Kentucky classifies streams (we wanted the state to have to consider more closely the impacts of individual pollutants).

The Court's opinion sends Kentucky's rules back to U.S. EPA for further review. Kentucky will likely have to significantly revise and improve its rules in order to comply with the Court's opinion.

Joining KWA and KFTC in the legal action were the Sierra Club Cumberland Chapter and the Floyds Fork Environmental Association. We were represented by the Environmental Law and Policy Center and the Kentucky Resources Council.

   This week, 14 KFTC Electoral Organizers start work across the state. For the next 11 weeks,  they'll help members to identify, register, educate, and mobilize 15,000 voters between now and Election Day to build grassroots voting power that will have an impact this year that we can build upon next year and every year after.

   We have a fantastic team with a strong mix of skills, experiences, and backgrounds including lots of active KFTC members, people with experience in ally organizations, advanced degrees, three former felons, and people with tremendous excitement, dedication, and life experiences

Jefferson County

- Whit Forrester – A KFTC member and returning Electoral Organizer from last year. 

- Carl Matthews – A former felon KFTC met a year ago who just got his right to vote back a couple of weeks ago.  Came to the Voter Empowerment training in Louisville.

- Amar Shah – A student activist at UofL who has worked with KFTC throughout the year.  Came to the Voter Empowerment training in Louisville.

- Doante Davis – Active with Women in Transition.  Came to the Voter Empowerment training in Louisville. 

Central Kentucky Chapter

- Danny Cotton – Former Central KY KFTC Intern and active member with a focus on connections on UK’s campus. 

- Jerry Moody – An active KFTC member from Central Kentucky and long-time involved community activist.

- George Moorman – Long-time North Lexington activist in African American communities.  Former felon spokesman.

Madison County Chapter

- Jeff From – Berea Restorative Justice Practitioner with a Masters in Conflict Transformation and Peacebuilding. 

Northern Kentucky

- Tayna Fogle – Active KFTC member and relentless former felon spokesperson.

Bowling Green

– George Eklund – Student and active KFTC member.  Came to the Voter Empowerment training in Louisville recently. 

Rowan County Chapter

– Paul Lovelace – College instructor, KFTC member and Former Kentucky Heartwood Organizer.

Harlan County Chapter

- Ashley Long – Berea College Appalachian Studies graduate from a ccoal mining family in Appalachia.  Former Lead-Supervisor for Youth Conservation Corps. 

Floyd County Chapter

- Lisa Perry – Oral Historian, teacher, and Doctoral Candidate in Heritage Studies.

Letcher County Chapter

- Willa Johnson – KFTC member and former Appalachian Media Institute Intern and Vista worker.  Worked with KFTC to create 'True Cost of Coal.'

The Electoral Organizers are spread over the state in a mix of urban and rural areas where KFTC is strong or actively growing chapters.  They're all across the state with a tremendous potential to have an impact on voter education and turnout in traditionally under-represented communities.