It’s getting harder and harder to deny the implications of climate change. As the weather around the planet continues to quickly evolve, delivering with it droughts, flooding, and other natural disasters, there are those who refuse to sit by the sidelines and watch the planet spin out of control.
In Buffalo, attempting to reverse the situation starts today, with a Flash Mob that is scheduled to take place at 6:30pm (corner of West Ferry and Elmwood Avenue).
From there local advocates are preparing to join in on the People’s Climate March scheduled to take place in NYC on September 21, 2014. Already, buses have been reserved to transport activists and supporters to the march.
One of those activists, Lynda Schneekloth, Chair of the Sierra Club Niagara Group, was willing to formulate some of her thoughts regarding the NYC rally, and the importance of people to support the cause.
Can you give us the schedule that you have set, along with the logistics of getting activists to NYC?
We have three buses and the cost is $50 and $25 for students and people needing extra support. The buses leave at 11:30 pm on Saturday night, arrive in NYC the next morning where we disembark, eat, then line up for the march. We’ll finish up around 4 or 5 pm on Sunday and will head back home, arriving in Buffalo between 11 and 12 pm Sunday night. Here is a website that has the route and some other ‘logistic’ issues.
Can you tell us what Buffalo activists can expect upon arrival?
They are expecting close to 100,000 people. So why is this important? We’ve been trying everything to get the government of the US and NYS Governor Cuomo to pay attention to the issues of climate change. The latest climate report of the Intergovernmental Plan on Climate Change tells us there will be irreversible climate impacts – so severe that it has already set off the 6th Great Extinction. And if people think they will be exempted, they are mistaken.
Obviously this is a timely march. But there are still those who deny that climate change is real. There are others who feel that maybe we should just give up, it’s too late to reverse the mistakes that have been made.
So give up? Hell no. We’re going to hit the streets because it is obvious that our governments are bought and sold by the fossil fuels industry (8 of the 12 largest corporations in the world). The occasion for the March is the UN Climate Change Summit bringing world leaders to NYC to renegotiate a treaty – the Kyoto protocol is 17 years old, and we never signed it anyway. We have to do this now, really, and we have to keep at it until we restore some ecological balance to the planet in spite of dirty energy’s deadly stranglehold on US politics.
How does living in Buffalo sway people’s outlook on effects of climate change?
Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, we live is a place that is naturally resilient with the Great Lakes and northern latitude – other parts of the world are not so lucky. But it makes it hard for people to take the consequences seriously in WNY.
To learn more about the march, and how to reserve a seat on one of the buses, visit the Sierra Club Niagara Group.
Mobilize. March. Make history. Join more than 550 local, national and international organizations as they march in NYC in coming weeks.