Texas

Hunger Strike Exposes Biden’s Drive To Increase US Oil Exports

May 11, 2021 Margaret Flowers, Clearing the FOG. Podcast Environment, Joe Biden, Oil exports, Texas

The Biden administration claims to care about the climate crisis but it is currently allowing a dredging project to proceed in the Matagorda shipping channel to open the way for crude oil exports in Texas. Not only will this drive a surge in oil extraction, but it will also increase mercury pollution by digging in a Superfund site left by the aluminum company, Alcoa. The project will decimate the struggling local fishing industry. To stop this project, veteran activist and shrimper, Diane Wilson has been on a hunger strike since April 7. Clearing the FOG speaks with Diane about her current hunger strike and her long fight to protect the waters in her area.

Diane Wilson In Hunger Strike To Protect Matagorda Bay

May 6, 2021 Stephanie Thomas, Public Citizen. Resist! Oil and Gas, Oil exports, pollution, Texas

Legendary environmenal activist Diane Wilson has been called “an unreasonable woman.” As a shrimper, Diane learned firsthand about tremendous pollution damaging the waters near her hometown of Port Lavaca and fought to defend the Bay from Formosa and Alcoa, major chemical companies. In 2019, Diane was plaintiff to a court case brought against Formosa on account of the shocking amount of plastic pollution – called nurdles – that Diane found littered around the Bay. That case resulted in a $50 million settlement against the company that is being used for environmental projects. Now, as of May 5th, Diane is on Day 29 of a hunger strike protesting the dredging of the Matagorda Ship Channel, a channel first dredged in the 1960s to provide a means for ships to travel between the Gulf of Mexico and the industry along Lavaca Bay.

US Army Corps Of Engineers Permit Big Oil To Dredge Mercury-Contaminated Matagorda Bay

April 30, 2021 Ann Wright, Popular Resistance. Resist! Fossil Fuels, Hunger Strike, pollution, Texas

Texas shrimper, fisherwoman and internationally known environmentalist Diane Wilson is on Day 22 of her hunger strike to gain national solidarity and publicity for pressure on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to rescind its permit for big oil to dredge a channel in mercury laden Matagorda Bay, Texas. The dredged channel would allow massive oil tankers into the bay to take on crude oil that will be exported from the U.S. “I am risking my life to stop the reckless destruction of my community. Oil and gas export terminals like the project I am fighting pollute our air, water, and climate — only to pad the pockets of fossil fuel CEOs,” said Diane Wilson. “The Biden Administration needs to stop the dredging and stop oil and gas exports.”

72-Year-Old Fisher Hunger Strikes For Crude Oil Export Ban

April 24, 2021 Candice Bernd, Truthout. Resist! Hunger Strike, Oil Export, pollution, Texas

Texas - Seventy-two-year-old, fourth-generation retired shrimper Diane Wilson has been without food for 16 days. Her 1995 red Chevy, nicknamed “Rosie,” has become a mobile campsite, and each morning she posts up on a causeway at the waterfront of Texas’ Lavaca Bay, expending just enough energy to switch out a sign displaying the number of days she’s been on hunger strike and drape a banner off the side of the truck blaring the message: “STOP THE DREDGING. STOP OIL EXPORT.” She hopes her hunger strike will draw enough attention to pressure the Biden administration stop Houston-based oil and gas firm Max Midstream’s plans to invest $360 million to deepen and widen the Matagorda Ship Channel by 2023.

Portraits Of Houston’s Black Urban Farmers

April 18, 2021 Leonard Smith, Jr., Scalawag Magazine. Educate! Black Farmers, Food and Agriculture, Food Security, Texas

Texas is home to more Black farmers than any state. The USDA's Census of Agriculture estimated in 2017 that of the 3.4 million farmers in the United States, roughly 48,000 are Black, and nearly a quarter of them are located in the Lone Star State. The number of Black folks sinking their hands into Texas soil, however, used to be much larger. The early 1900s witnessed the terrors of Jim Crow, which ran Black families in Texas off of their own land. The societal and business practices of the 1950s didn't allow Black farmers access to the fields and credit necessary to keep their farms afloat, and by the 1980s, an estimated 170 farms a week were being forced into foreclosure, most of them Black-owned.

Saving Ourselves: Autonomous Disaster Relief In Texas

March 13, 2021 It's Going Down. Create! Extreme weather, Failed State, Mutual Aid, Texas

On this episode of the It’s Going Down podcast, we speak with participants in autonomous groups across Texas, including Cooperation Denton, Stop the Sweeps in Austin, Mutual Aid Houston, Houston Tenants Union, and North Texas Rural Resilience. The first in a two part series, this episode discusses the devastating storms which rocked Texas and the Southwest and the context that the “big freeze” happened within: from anti-Black police violence and attacks on the homeless community, to widespread neoliberal policies that left infrastructure and housing stock dilapidated and on the verge of collapse.

Texas County Got Rid Of Cash Bail For Minor Crimes

March 13, 2021 Jolie McCullough, Texas Tribune. Create! Bail, Mass Incarceration, Police, Texas

Eager to resolve a federal civil rights lawsuit, Texas' most populous county over the past two years has stopped requiring most people accused of low-level crimes from putting up cash to get out of jail on bond. Tens of thousands of people accused of misdemeanors not involving some specific circumstances, like domestic abuse or previous bond violations, have been freed without cost while awaiting trial. Letting them out does not appear to increase the chances they will be arrested for new crimes, according to researchers who have been tracking changes made to the Harris County misdemeanor bail system. In fact, the percentage of defendants arrested for new crimes within a year of their original arrest went down after the county changed its bail practices.

No Human Rights In Texas

February 25, 2021 Margaret Kimberley, Black Agenda Report. Educate! China, climate crisis, Human Rights, Texas

Texas, the Lone Star state, was once a part of Mexico but broke away after that nation outlawed slavery. Such reactionary beginnings have carried over into its governance in the 21st century and millions of people now pay a high price as a result. That state’s government perpetuates its history by committing itself to being regulated as little as possible. Texas is disconnected from the two electric grids which provide power to the rest of the country. Its system failed under the strain of a freak snowstorm and people went without power and heat and even without water. Consumers pay unregulated utilities who are allowed to charge a fluctuating wholesale price which soars when demand is high. Those lucky few whose power stayed on now have bills in the thousands of dollars .

Half Of Texas Without Clean Water

February 22, 2021 Chase Lawrence, WSWS. Educate! Energy, Extreme weather, Texas, Water

More than 14.6 million Texans, about half of the population of the state, remained under a boil-water advisory Friday, according to Texas Commission on Environmental Quality spokeswoman Tiffany Young. This encompasses more than 1,225 water supply systems and 63 percent of Texas counties following the record winter storm which hit the state last weekend. In a press conference Austin Water Director Greg Meszaros stated that “we know that there are tens of thousands of leaks,” and that the Austin Fire Department responded to “thousands upon thousands of burst pipes.” In Houston, the fire department received almost 5,000 reports of burst pipes. Texas Republican officials are currently in the process of trying to pin the blame on each other for the disaster. Governor Greg Abbott blamed the state’s grid operator, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), claiming that it told state officials five days before the blackouts that everything would be under control.

Texas’s Independent Electric Grid Leaves Millions Without Power

February 18, 2021 Sharon Zhang, Truthout. Educate! Electric Grid, Energy, Extreme weather, Texas

On Tuesday, millions of Texans woke up to find themselves without power as unusually cold conditions for the state knocked out the state’s power grid. The blackouts began on Monday when the state grappled with a winter storm and record low temperatures. Over 4.3 million people in Texas remain without power as the state’s power grid struggles to keep up with high demand. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which operates the state’s grid, had originally announced 45-minute rolling blackouts starting around 1:25 a.m. in order to conserve energy. But the blackouts instead extended throughout the day and into Tuesday, and there is still uncertainty about when they will end.

A Fossil Fuel Fail In Texas

February 17, 2021 Jamie Henn, Fossil Free Media. Educate! climate crisis, Energy, Texas

As you may have seen on social media, a group of climate deniers, right wing politicians, and fossil fuel industry mouthpieces are spreading a bunch of disinformation about how wind and solar energy is to blame for the current blackouts in Texas. This is a lie. In reality, the blackouts in Texas are a fossil fail: the result of our over dependence on a fossil fuel energy system in the era of climate disruption. Fossil Free Media has pulled together a set of talking points that you can use to share the truth about what’s going on in Texas and pushback on the fossil fuel industry’s disinformation campaign.

Hospital Closes Without Warning Because It’s Behind On Rent

January 20, 2021 Mycah Hatfield, ABC13. Educate! Health Care, Hospitals, Landlord, Texas

Houston, TX - Doctors and patients at the Heights Hospital were left stuck in the parking lot after being told they were not allowed in the building Monday afternoon. A note posted on the door said that the locks for the spaces rented by 1917 Ashland Ventures LLC, the owners on record of the hospital, have been changed and they will only be given keys when $461,302.24 in rent and fees are paid. Staff members said they were given no warning or opportunity to alert their patients or collect their personal items from inside. "I tried to contact the owners," said Dr. Felicity Mack, who is listed as a physician at the hospital. "They aren't responding. The title company is not responding.

Free Grocery Store Opens In District With High Number Of Poor Students

January 6, 2021 Janelle Griffiths, NBC News. Create! Education, Food Insecurity, Poverty, Texas

This month, the principal of Linda Tutt High School in the small town of Sanger, Texas, said he was approached by an eighth grader eager to share that he had bought a three-in-one men's shampoo, conditioner and body wash. "The first thing he did was he said: 'Hey. Look in my hair,'" the principal, Anthony Love, recalled in an interview Tuesday. "And so I looked at it, and it looked clean," Love said. "But he was excited about it because it was the first time he's ever had his own shampoo." The student, who lives with his mother and sister, said he had avoided using their shampoo because of the smell, Love said. But he was finally able to get his own shampoo, as well as food, at a new student-run grocery store on the school's campus where students can buy food and other essentials, without money.

Doctors Decry ‘Less Lethal’ Police Munitions

August 26, 2020 Alexandra Kelley, The Hill. Educate! Police violence, Rebellion2020, Texas, weapons

A group of doctors from the Dell Seton Medical Center at The University of Texas, Austin penned a letter published in the New England Journal of Medicine to warn of the dangers of police’s less-lethal munitions used to subdue Black Lives Matter protesters after treating several patients with severe injuries. The Associated Press (AP) reports that 12 doctors from Dell Seton said Austin police used bean bag rounds in place of actual bullets to control the protests, but the bean bags still resulted in injuries like bleeding in the brain and a skull fracture.

ICE Guards ‘Systematically’ Sexually Assault Detainees

August 15, 2020 Lomi Kriel, Pro Publica. Educate! Detention Centers, ICE, Immigrants, Sexual Assault, Texas

Guards in an immigrant detention center in El Paso sexually assaulted and harassed inmates in a “pattern and practice” of abuse, according to a complaint filed by a Texas advocacy group urging the local district attorney and federal prosecutors to conduct a criminal investigation. The allegations, detailed in a filing first obtained by ProPublica and The Texas Tribune, maintain that guards systematically assaulted at least three people in a facility overseen by Immigration and Customs Enforcement — often in areas of the detention center not visible to security cameras.

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