Page 32 - Sonoma County Gazette Sept 2017

support a loved one as they make this choice? If so, you’ll want to know about the innovative Village movement for people ages 50 and better.
Nevertheless, he’s still trying.
Village Network of Petaluma invites the public to the 15th anniversary of the Village movement during a live nationwide webcast from Boston on Monday, September 25 at 1:30 pm at Petaluma Library’s Forum Room, 100 Fairgrounds Dr. in Petaluma.
“If we’re going to address the effects of climate change during the next ten or 15
years – which is all the time we have left -- the first thing we have to do to come up with any reasonable plan is to point out the realities of where we are.” he said. “I clearly recommend is to not do more of it. At the very least, put some sort of moratorium on new vineyards so you don’t exacerbate the problem.”
Learn about the innovative Village movement, community and choice during this webcast with Dr. Atul Gawande, surgeon and author of “Being Mortal”. Dr. Gawande’s profound understanding of the importance of community and choice o ers valuable insights and solutions for our rapidly growing aging population. The event will be moderated by Robin Young, host of NPR’s
Using accurate figures that reflect the real climate costs of economic activity, we can begin to reduce activities that produce the most GHGs, and get on with the task of creating a more sustainable way of life.
Here & Now. Join a post-webcast discussion on aging, honoring choice and transforming habits, cultural expectations & one-size- ts-all corporate o erings as we age, led by Joanne Martin Braun, the new of Membership and Volunteer Manager for Village Network of Petaluma.
Bernhaut is working with energy consultant Tom Conlon to produce such an evaluation, one that includes international travel to and from wine country of tourists and wines far beyond the borders of the Bay Area utilized in the CAP. Local policies, including the collection of substantial hotel taxes, actively promote wine country all over the world.
The free event is hosted by Village Network of Petaluma. Refreshments will be served. For details, contact 776-6055 or info@VillageNetworkofPetaluma.org
We know that airline travel creates literally tons of carbon dioxide.
Visit www.villagenetworkofpetaluma.org to learn more.
“The New York Times has reported that one round-trip flight from New York to Europe or to San Francisco creates warming effect equivalent to 2 or 3 tons of carbon dioxide per person.” That’s a significant chunk of the 19 tons generated by each American per year – which is considerably higher than the 10 tons produced by the average European. If we don’t count emissions from long-distance air travel, we’re leaving out a big piece of the puzzle. Jerry has given up flying altogether. It’s worth noting that rejecting this CAP does not stop cities from taking steps. The city of Sonoma has already put into effect its plan to use electric vehicles and LED lights within its jurisdiction.
Beacon Hill in Boston was the rst nonpro t Village in the United States. Learn about this grassroots social movement where older adults engage in a supportive community to live in our own homes for as long as we can. Adults aged 50+ and volunteers of all ages are involved in more than 200 non-pro t membership Villages nationwide. INFO: www.vtvnetwork.org/
What is the Village? As part of this innovative national movement,
the Village Network of Petaluma is a nonpro t membership organization created to empower adults ages 50+ to continue living active, vibrant and connected lives in our own homes as we age. Our Village serves Petaluma and Penngrove, and has 87 members and about the same number of volunteers (of all ages). Through interest groups and educational programs, we are creating a committed group of “friends helping friends”. Members can request support when they wish, such as rides, note takers at medical appointments, light handyperson services, computer tutors and more.
Want a Village in your area? The 707 Village is working to start up, and you can learn more at http://707villages.org/ or see their Facebook page @707Villages.org . Village Network of Petaluma is a non-pro t 501 (c)(3), serving Petaluma and Penngrove since 2014.
32 - www.sonomacountygazette.com - 9/17
What comes next? We need to design a different kind of economy, says Bernhaut, something along the line of steady-state economics, where we
go forward without exceeding the carrying capacity of the earth. “Market forces alone won’t get us there. My sense is that there has to be an expanded role for government to regulate consumption and development.”
The Superior Court ruled in favor of the lawsuit brought by RiverWatch charging that the Climate Action Plan (CAP) is inadequate in evaluating the true environmental impacts of the county’s plan to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG’s) emissions by 2020.
The CAP is a planning document that begins with an inventory of current GHG emissions within the county and proceeds to identify reduction measure intended to reduce emissions to 25 percent below 1990 levels.
Among its failures, the CAP underestimates the GHGs generated by the county’s two economically sustaining industries, wine and tourism. It also fails to evaluate a reasonable range of alternatives including a moratorium or significant reduction in new vineyard and tourist development.
Living in Your Own Home or Apartment?
Many people are angry about the court ruling having invested time and energy into what Supervisor David Rabbit, chair of the RCPA, has described as most “progressive” and the first of its kind in the country.
By Lyndi Brown
Do you expect to live in your own home as long as you can? Do you want to
What makes Bernhaut angry is the way people defer to the wine and tourism industries regardless of their real costs to the environment. “I’m working against a great deal of resistance towards getting this info to the public,” he said testily.
The ruling means the county will have to amend its plan or
start on a new one. The court also approved the lawsuit’s charge of “lack of clarity in the language describing the reduction measures in the programmatic EIR which would allow project proposals to ‘streamline’ the GHG analysis from the PEIR.”
That’s the legal language. What it means in practice, attorney Jerry Bernhaut said in an interview, is that “Not having to do those EIRs for each project was part of the incentive for different cities to adopt reduction methods as a way of being able to approve more projects.” In other words, it’s a bow to the demands of industry.
How much does all this travel contribute to climate change?
Sadly, that is not the direction of our present governments.
The CAP calamity demonstrates the complexity of making systemic changes to our economic, governmental and energy systems by trying to accommodate the preferences of all sectors, especially business.
Somewhere we are going to have to take “the leap” to create new systems, as Naomi Klein advocates in her new book, No Is Not Enough.
Stay tuned.