...Anne Cockrell and Karen Maute
....Organizers and Planners of Danville's First Uranium Seminar!
Southside Concerned Citizens, The ALLIANCE, and all concerned citizens and groups would like to thank Anne and Karen for a very successful seminar! The event proved to be very informative and worthwhile! Attendance was great and the question and answer exchange was rewarding in terms of educational opportunites for all involved!
And a special thanks goes to all the volunteers who helped man the show, as well as the presenters:
- Todd Benson, Piedmont Environmental Council
- Jeffrey Johnston, Dan River Basin Association
- Jack Dunavant, SCC Chairman
- Katherine Mull, Executive Dir., Dan River Basin Association
We feel sure that we are accidentally leaving out the names of other valuable participants, but please know that you are indeed appreciated!!!!!
3 comments:
I fully understand how much time and energy go into planning such an event and moreover that it is all being done by volunteers. Everyone responsible should be commended.
Appropriately, the meeting was billed as an educational seminar because we do need to educate. But I assume as well that our purpose is to persuade and to rally people to the cause. This life-threatening issue, therefore, must be presented in a much more powerful way. New people hearing about it for the first time must come away feeling threatened, alarmed and endangered! Only then will this movement grow and succeed in making the moratorium permanent. Therefore, I was very disappointed in the energy level of the moderator—who lost control toward the end—and of the panel. One panel member, in fact, declined to speak and then during the Q&A said nothing at all.
We also need to emphasize over and over and over again what this is really about: (1) corporate greed at the expense of human welfare, evidenced by the pro-uranium folks being unable to offer anything new, and (2) who decides what happens where.
Facts and figures are great but by themselves they will not grab people’s attention. Perhaps a slide saying “COMING SOON TO A RIVER NEAR YOU: TOXIC WASTE!” superimposed on a Southside pastoral landscape or some such attention-getter might get some blood coursing through our old veins.
Speaking of old veins, I also wonder where all the young people are, whose future is much more at stake than ours. High school students, college students and young adults need to see this as their issue also, although I have no immediate suggestions as to how to reach them. But they certainly would help to get people fired up about this. Any ideas out there?
(The Rev.) Christopher Ross
South Boston
The seminar planners were faced with the difficult decision to either cancel the seminar or move forward with the scheduled program, following unforeseen changes in the lineup of speakers.
The seminar's major presenter faced a serious ailment and is now, thankfully, recovering nicely post a brief hospitalization. Another presenter succumbed to the flu bug and was going to attempt traveling with it. The planners were unsure if this speaker would be well enough to attend until the day of the seminar, and for that reason, a program list of speakers was not provided for seminar attendees.
Very knowledgeable persons presented at the seminar, and SCC is indebted to them for their excellent efforts and their support of SCC. It was not the planned seminar that had been scheduled for weeks, but it was the very best we could do under the circumstances.
It was an informative seminar and, hopefully, the first of many more for Danville and surrounding areas. Our deepest apologies to any disappointed seminar attendees.
As any seminar attendee will tell you, acoustics were not always the absolute best in the North Theater. Therefore, this is a repeat of the names of those persons assisting with the seminar:
Seminar Hostess and Presenters/Panel Members:
Karen Maute, Southside Concerned Citizen Member and Organizer, Danville, VA
Jack Dunavant, Chairman, Southside Concerned Citizens, Halifax County Chapter, Halifax, VA
Todd Benson, Fauquier Field Officer and attorney for Piedmont Environmental Council, Warrenton, VA
Jeffrey Johnston, Dan River Basin Association geologist and board member, Eden, N.C.
Katherine Mull, Executive Director, Dan River Basin Association, Eden, N.C.
As for Katherine Mull, she had never been a planned speaker for the seminar but was present, on the panel of speakers, in case there were posed questions regarding mining rules and regulations. She would have based her answers on coal mining rules and regulations because of her extensive background in the area and for the fact that there are no existing rules and regulations for uranium mining and milling in Virginia--the state continues to uphold its existing moratorium on the industry--at least, for now!
No particular questions regarding this issue were raised, so Ms. Mull acquiesced to the other panel members for the answering of questions, during the Q & A segment. We are indebted to her and DRBA's support of SCC.
For those that attended, thank you for your time, support and interest in learning more about this issue facing Southside Virginia (and beyond).
Anne Cockrell, SCC Member and Organizer
Was there a sale at the punctuation store?
!!!!!!......!!!!!!......
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