jerbil@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu (Stainless Steel Gerbil [Joe Beckenbach]) (04/02/89)
sci.space purists might want to hit 'n'.... Flames to me welcomed as long as it's e-mail. NO FLAMES TO THE NEWSGROUPS PLEASE! Rationale behind posting to: sci.space-- wide audience, possible space anti-funding hooks pointed out misc.misc-- most appropriate group comp.society.futures-- philosophy behind the posting In Saturday's LA Times, Section I, page 26, I read an article entitled "Long Crippled by Financial, Social Woes, / East St. Louis is Now Fearing the Worst". It seems that the housing project of Villa Griffin acquired a two-to-five acre sewage 'lake' last December when a sewer collapsed. Nor is this reportedly an isolated case in this town. Illinois Governor Jim Thompson (in the words of the article, not direct quote) "said that the state will not help bail the city out as long as Mayor Carl E. Officer remains in power." The article goes on to chronicle some of the other woes threatening the stability of the town, including health menace due to the overflowing and broken sewers. An Associate Circuit Judge has ordered that the sewage problem be solved by the first of June. And a state task force questions whether the city can provide '"the basic municipal services required to to ensure public safety and the welfare of its citizenry."' the federal government". Ocean Arks International, founded by two of the New Alchemy Institute's original founders, designed and helped install the Harwich, Massachusetts, septage purification setup. This twenty-five-tank, one-trough layout runs the septage through half the tanks, then the trough, and the rest of the tanks, with floating plants in the tanks and marsh plants in the trough. The results? I quote from New Alchemy Quarterly, [Winter 1988, #34] page 15: "... the Harwich plant has proven an unqualified success. It is removing 99% of the ammonia and 99% of the phosphorus from the septage wastes. The nitrate levels being discharged are one-tenth of those considered safe for well water and the effluent has officially been pronounced as very high-quality water. In just a few months, the Harwich experiment has made a significant breakthrough in cost-effective, environmentally safe, waste water treatment." The New Alchemy Institute has a long history of incorporating the cycles and mechanisms of nature into solutions to many and varied problems. Some of the NAI people supposedly joke about being 'in the world-saving business'. Wink wink nudge nudge say no more. Any Washington University students, or anyone else in the St. Louis metropolitan area, please help me get word of this successful solution to the people who can use the help. In particular, several names were mentioned in the newspaper article: 1- St. Clair County State's Attorney John Baricevic, who has launched a grand jury investigation into the city's finances, and also was one of the lawyers involved in the effort to force a 1 June solution deadline. 2- [State?] Associate Circuit Judge Sheila O'Brien, the judge who ordered the 1 June solution deadline. 3- Sister Julia Huiskamp. a nun who runs a Catholic Urban Charities program at Villa Griffin, who was quoted as saying the conditions were Third-World. 4- Joseph T. Kurre, "director of an East Side Health District clinic, who is fearful that the sewage problems throughout the city could cause outbreaks of serious diseases, such as diphtheria, tetanus, and cholera." 5- Katherine Ashford, a resident of Villa Griffin, who was mentioned in passing in the article. The connection to space efforts? One, that solutions to most of the life-sciences problems in closed-ecosystem efforts seem partially addressed and even implemented under the guise of 'ecologically sound practices' such as the above, which are economically viable even without the underlying philosophical basis which motivated the 'radical' solution. Two, that when the environmental push was less intense, and the infrastructure of cities were less loaded by people and the ravages of time, the anti-space lobbies were justifying removal of money to spend on earth-bound social projects. If the space efforts do not provide spin-offs to solve immediate and pressing problems, such as for East St. Louis' sewage crisis, then it will be easier for politicians to draw money from "unproductive" space efforts in order to help keep ground-dwellers alive. Ecological insights could be one such spin-off. AGAIN, flame me if you wish, but by e-mail. Flaming in a newsgroup when e-mail is available tends to make me lose respect for the flamer. Material taken from LA Times, Saturday 1 April 1989, and New Alchemy Quarterly, Winter 1988 [#34]. LA Times copy quoted without explicit permission; New Alchemy copy quoted with explicit permission for "nonprofit educational purposes provided that credit is given to the _New_Alchemy_Quarterly_". -- Joe Beckenbach | How can we dream of the stars jerbil@csvax.caltech.edu | if the table is bare Caltech 256-80, Pasadena CA 91125 | and the water is opaque and brown?
jerbil@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu (Stainless Steel Gerbil [Joe Beckenbach]) (04/04/89)
In my article <10232@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu> I tried for contacts with East St. Louis residents, attempting to get some information through to them about Ocean Arks International, specifically to solve a problem reported by the _LA_Times_ (1 April 1989, section I, page 26). The address is (in case someone has gotten close to sending the information previously posted): Ocean Arks International, 10 Shanks Pond Road, Falmouth MA 02540 I have gotten two responses so far; the first was a pat on the back and a wishing of luck. The second, from Columbia, MO, pointed out a few things which I should have been clearer on: 1- This is not a call to pour money into East St. Louis. It is very clear that the most appropriate funding source, the State of Illinois, has refused to supply such money; federal grants might still be available, but I have absolutely no experience, nor right to go off and help them in that way. 2- The author of the second e-mail message paints a very bleak picture for East St. Louis. I do not deny that with the City in arrears, unable to provide basic services and protection, that things are seriously wrong. However, I am not one to sit idly by without offering a possible solution which can probably be implemented with a modicum of funding, on site, and with relatively little fuss-- assuming that a grassroots organization is allowed to provide itself with services that the City is unable and/or unwilling to provide. [Regarding police forces, this can border on vigilantism- or citizen patrol and arrest. The area is gray, but deaths are black and white.] 3- He also said something to the effect of 'try pushing your idea elsewhere, where it could catch on and benefit more people'. I question that assumption that nothing can be done once the decay has hit the core, except to let it die and watch what comes of it. My attitude is more one of 'see if the process can be reversed, else ease the pain of transition on those involved, and help cultivate a better foundation for what comes next'. In my private reply to him, I also mentioned that ideas can be planted while expecting that they will die-- no idea, or plant, or anything else, spread and flourished by picking only perfect conditions and staying there. By the way, my view is more idealistic and probably slightly wronger than his. I admit that. But there's still a chance to help, so I'm offering what I can. -- Joe Beckenbach | How can we dream jerbil@csvax.caltech.edu | if the table is bare Caltech 256-80, Pasadena CA 91125 | and the water opaque and brown?