JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2020 NEW MEXICO 2020: ISSUES TO WATCH The NM Environmental Law Community Voices: Center’s Top-10 Issues Activism and Resilience Dreaming Beyond Youth United for Extraction Climate Crisis Action (YUCCA) VOLUME 12 NUMBER 1 GREENFIRETIMES.COM PLEASE SUPPORT GREEN FIRE TIMES PUBLISHER GREEN EARTH PUBLISHING, LLC EDITOR-IN-CHIEF SETH ROFFMAN / [email protected] As we enter a new decade, Green Fire Times wishes to thank those who ASSOCIATE EDITOR ALEJANDRO LÓPEZ have supported our efforts over the past decade. We look forward to GUEST ASSOCIATE EDITOR BIANCA SOPOCI-BELKNAP working with you. We will continue to create an inspiring publication DESIGN WITCREATIVE that contributes uniquely to New Mexico’s media landscape. GFT COPY EDITOR STEPHEN KLINGER provides a platform for regional, community-based voices—useful in- formation for residents, businesspeople, students and visitors—anyone CONTRIBUTING WRITERS JONI ARENDS, VEROAYLIN CAMPOS, ARTEMISIO interested in the green movement—and the history and spirit of New ROMERO Y CARVER, ELAINE CIMINO, CHARLOTTE GRUBB, SUSAN GUYETTE, ELIZA HILLENKAMP, MICHAEL JENSEN, JAPA K. KHALSA, SENECA JOHNSON, MAKAI LEWIS, Mexico and the Southwest. RUBY LÓPEZ, JOSUE MARTÍNEZ, DOUGLAS MEIKLEJOHN, FAITH PENNELL-SUTTON, SETH ROFFMAN, KIMBERLY SMITH, REBECCA SOBEL, NAYELI SOLIS, BIANCA SOPOCI- Storytelling is at the heart of community health. GFT shares stories BELKNAP, YANG TOLEDO, RALPH VIGIL, CHILI YAZZIE of hope and is an archive for community action. In each issue, a small, CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS ROBERT ESPOSITO, MICHAEL JENSEN, dedicated staff and a multitude of contributors offer articles docu- JAPA K. KHALSA, MARIEL NANASI, SETH ROFFMAN, RALPH VIGIL menting projects supporting sustainability—culture, history, traditional ADVERTISING SALES [email protected] economy and ecological traditions respectful of Mother Earth. OR: [email protected], 505-226-3382 GFT, now operated by an LLC owned by a nonprofit educational orga- PRINTED LOCALLY WITH 100% SOY INK ON nization (est. 1972, swlearningcenters.org), is seeking financial support 100% RECYCLED, CHLORINE-FREE PAPER to help us institute a new business model. We also hope to formalize GREEN FIRE TIMES © 2020 GREEN EARTH PUBLISHING, LLC our mentorship program for writers, aspiring journalists and documen- C/O SOUTHWEST LEARNING CENTERS, INC. tarians. Please consider a tax-deductible donation. Checks may be made A NON-PROFIT EDUCATIONAL ORGANIZATION (EST.1972) out to Southwest Learning Centers, Inc. (with a notation ‘for GFT’) 505-989-8898, P.O. BOX 8627, SANTA FE, NM 87504-8627 GREENFIRETIMES.COM and sent to: P.O. Box 8627, Santa Fe, NM 87504-8627, or via Fundly: https://fundly.com/sustain-green-fire-times# COVER We also hope you will consider advertising. The print edition—now YUCCA STUDENT LEADERS DESTINA WARNER AND ANGELICA BOHANAN published every other month, while our website is updated more fre- (L-R), FROM THE INSTITUTE OF AMERICAN INDIAN ARTS, SPEAKING AT quently—is widely distributed from Albuquerque to Taos and beyond. THE CLIMATE STRIKE AT THE NEW MEXICO CAPITOL ON SEPT. 20, 2019. THEY CALLED FOR URGENT ACTION ON THE CLIMATE CRISIS AND AN For a rate sheet, visit GreenFireTimes.com. END TO EXTRACTION ON INDIGENOUS LANDS. PHOTO © SETH ROFFMAN VOLUME 12 NO. 1 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2020 CONTENTS OUR HOUSE IS ON FIRE, OUR CHILDREN ARE INSIDE – YUCCA (YOUTH UNITED FOR CLIMATE CRISIS ACTION) / 4 THE NM ENVIRONMENTAL LAW CENTER’S TOP 10 ISSUES TO WATCH – DOUGLAS MEIKLEJOHN / 6 FOOL ME ONCE… – RALPH VIGIL / 10 NEW MEXICO WATER DIALOGUE / RIO CHAMA CONGRESO / 11 THE LIVE EARTH AND EXTRACTIVE ENERGY – CHILI YAZZIE / 12 GROUNDING OUR CLIMATE JUSTICE WORK – YANG TOLEDO / 13 DEMANDS FOR A JUST TRANSITION – KIMBERLY SMITH AND MAKAI LEWIS / 15 PUBLIC CONDEMNS SALE OF ANCESTRAL TRIBAL AND PUBLIC LANDS – REBECCA SOBEL / 16 THE PERMIAN BASIN: FROM PREHISTORIC REEF TO CLIMATE INFERNO – CHARLOTTE GRUBB / 18 FRACKED WATER – FRACKED HEALTH – ELAINE CIMINO / 19 LANL – A WORLD WITHOUT NUCLEAR WEAPONS – JONI ARENDS / 21 YUCCA’S NUCLEAR PERSPECTIVE / 23 RENEWING HEALTH-PROMOTING HABITS IN THE NEW YEAR – JAPA K. KHALSA / 24 SHIFTING FROM SUGAR: DIABETES IN NEW MEXICO – SUSAN GUYETTE / 26 IT TAKES A VILLAGE – A BENEFIT FOR HONOR THE EARTH AND TNAFA / 27 NEWSBITES / 11, 12, 16, 21, 23, 28 WHAT’S GOING ON / 29 – INTRODUCTION – YUCCA: DREAMING BEYOND EXTRACTION We are honored to partner with Green Fire Times to bring you the 124th issue of this critical publication. For three years, Earth Care has co-curated the January “Community Resilience” issue to mark another year in the trenches in the face of these troubling times. This year, Earth Care’s Youth United for Climate Crisis Action (YUCCA) invited articles related to the theme, “Dreaming Beyond Extraction.” State- ments from YUCCA’s steering commmittee were co-written by the group. Members include Veroaylin Campos, Artemisio Romero y Carver, Eliza Hillenkamp, Seneca Johnson, Ruby Lopez, Josue Martínez, Faith Pennell-Sutton, Nayeli Solis and Yang Toledo. We have 10 years to transform our economy in order to address the climate crisis. In New Mexico, that presents both the challenge and the opportunity to transition away from extraction and to build a dignified, renewable and life-gener- ating economy. This edition of Green Fire Times outlines some of the issues we need to tackle in 2020, as well as opportuni- ties for action and movement building. Thanks for reading! Student Climate Strike at the New Mexico capitol, Santa Fe, Sept. 20, 2019. © Seth Roffman GREENFIRETIMES.COM 3 OUR HOUSE IS ON FIRE, exploit every drop. It’s a tragic irony that the only mention of the Permian in the recently published Climate Change Report signed OUR CHILDREN ARE INSIDE by New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham states, “The Perm- ian Basin has enriched New Mexico, and the oil and gas industry A Declaration of the Climate Emergency and a Call for Intergenerational Justice is expected to grow and continue supporting our economy in the future.” FROM YUCCA (YOUTH UNITED FOR CLIMATE CRISIS ACTION) We are headed toward a cliff, racing at 200 miles an hour. We At one-degree warming, we are already seeing the devastating impacts of severe weather events, young people are strapped in the backseat—screaming and beg- longer and deeper droughts, California and Australia aflame, food and water shortages, forced dis- ging for those driving to hit the breaks and change course. Instead, placement, costly damage to infrastructure and communities and the beginning of the sixth mass those in power are hitting the accelerator—promising that the extinction. bridge they’ve been building incrementally for decades will be ready to save us someday. Someday…. Will you be alive in 2030 to witness whether The first issue we need to address is that we are operating from the world achieves its two fundamentally different premises. One is based in science commitments under the (and our lived experience of the climate crisis). The other is based Paris Climate Agree- on what proponents call “pragmatism” but could also be called ment? Will we finally convenience, delusion and, quite frankly, cowardice. We need the begin changing course in adults and “leaders” in the room to acknowledge the existential order to hit the 1.5-de- threat that climate change poses. If science is not the premise, gree cap that scientists we’re not having the right conversation. Greta Thunberg, in her advise, or if we will con- address at COP25 in Spain, demanded world leaders focus on the tinue down our current science. She said, “For about a year I have been constantly talking emissions path toward about our rapidly declining carbon budgets over and over again. 3.5 degree warming? (1) But since that is still being ignored, I will just keep repeating it.... [In the] IPCC report that came out last year, it says that if we How about in 2050, ought to have a 6-to-7 percent chance of limiting the global tem- when scientists predict perature rise to below 1.5C degrees, we had on January 1, 2018, that global fisheries will collapse and the tens of millions of people worldwide who depend on the 420 gigatons of CO2 left to emit in that budget. And of course, oceans for sustenance no longer have food? (2) that number is much lower today, as we emit about 42 gigatons of CO2 every year, including aviation. With today’s emissions levels, Will you be alive in 2100 when scientists predict New Mexico’s conifer forests will be gone that remaining budget will be gone within about eight years. These forever? When those same scientists warn that our current trajectory toward 3.5-to-4 degrees of numbers aren’t anyone’s opinions or political views. This is the warming will mean “vast changes to the environment, including: current best available science.” • Ice vanishing from both poles We need every one of our leaders to acknowledge the cliff we are on. We need leaders to rise to the challenge of tackling the climate • Many rainforests turning to desert crisis head-on by working in service to the people as communities • Rising sea levels flooding into the interior of continents come together to transform our society at every level. Or we need them to have the courage to step aside. We need every candidate • Irreversible loss of diversity among plants and animals and every elected official to say openly and honestly that we are facing a Climate Emergency and act accordingly. That means No We will be alive. We will be alive, and we will be faced with the consequences of your genera- Fossil Fuel campaign contributions. That means the climate crisis tion’s mass consumption, waste and fossil-fueled “prosperity.” We will be faced with the conse- and just transition as a premise for every campaign and every pol- quences of your generation’s inaction and complacency.