Solicitation form, TN Charitable Organizations, helping UMD intern set up two community meetings, and helped UMD intern make music contacts

Today I did further research about the solicitation form that UMD would need to apply for in order to become part of Community Shares. I learned that in order to fill out a solicitation form UMD would need to be registered as a charitable organization with the Tennessee Secretary of State Office of Charitable Organizations. I have begun to fill out the required forms and hope to send them in soon. I also helped a UMD intern, Sam Chillaron, set up two community meetings/ workshops in Eagan, TN at the Clearfork Community Institute and in the Davis Creek Community at the Parent Resource Center in White Oak, TN, two coal impacted communities that UMD has been working with for a few years now. These two community meetings will be trainings in the citizen's rights that are granted under the Surface Control and Reclamation Act of 1977. I also provided a more complete list of musicical contacts for UMD intern, Sara Henry, who is working on the creation of a new Mountain Justice songbook.

Visited TDEC and OSM for the past two days teaching volunteer how to review permits

Yesterday and today I went with Mary Gibson, the law intern and instructed her how to review surface coal mine and NPDES water pollution permits at both the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation and the Office of Surface Mining and Reclamation offices. We reviewed two permits for Davis Creek Energy Mine Area #4 and Kopper Glo Straight Creek Surface Mine.

Community Shares organization member application, Mountain Justice promotional video

Today I began working on the lengthy application that is required for UMD to become a member of Community Shares here in Knoxville, TN. Community Shares is a workplace giving program where they solicit payroll deductions from various businesses around Knoxville to give to local non profits. UMD would be required to pay a membership fee and give a portion of funds raised back to Community Shares but UMD stands to raise at least a couple thousand dollars by joining Community Shares. UMD volunteers will have to put in at least 80 hours of direct volunteer work a year with Community Shares in order to remain in good standing. I have signed myself up to help recruit other UMD volunteers to fill some of these hours but imagine that I will be filling a good portion of them as well. I think that the first step though is that UMD will have to apply for a solicitation permit from the city of Knoxville which is some different paperwork to fill out. I am going to set up a meeting with UMD's non profit manager so that we can figure out a fundraising strategy so that we can begin applying for grants in a strategic and timely fashion. I also began working on a promotional video for Mountain Justice, one of our partner organizations. The video is about the 6th annual Mountain Justice Training Camp that just occurred in Kentucky but will be a promotional video about the work of the Mountain Justice organization of which UMD is a part of here in TN.
I also worked to set up a permit review meeting with the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation and UMD's law intern to review some permits of concern the UMD is currently pursuing including Davis Creek Energy Mine #4 and Kopper Glo Straight Creek Surface Mine, both of which have blackside dace fish living below them.
I also worked with UMD's other interns today by helping spread the word about Sara's songbook project through the UMD and Mountain Justice email listserve. She has already gotten numerous responses from people interested in helping on her project.

Canoeing trip on Sequatchie River, Americorp Contact, Work with UMD volunteers, UMD weekly volunteer meeting

Today I worked on establishing an annual canoeing trip the Sequatchie River which drains historically coal mined lands and stands to drain a potential new coal mine in the Rock Creek Lands Unsuitable for Mining Area to the Northwest of Chattanooga, TN. I worked to identify a stretch of river which would be capable of handling a a canoe by calling the Canoe the Sequatchie River guide business. I learned that there is a really good put in located on Cherry Street in Dunlap, TN and a good take out on Condra Switch Road in Condra, TN which is about a 12 mile paddle. I am working on locating canoes to borrow for this event from some friends in Chattanooga, TN and Knoxville, TN. I helped UMD volunteers adverstise for the event at the weekly UMD volunteer meeting and by placing an announcement in the meeting notes that get sent out over an email listserve. I am working on the creation of saftey protocols which I will write down and provide an on site training for all particpants including UMD volunteers.
I tried to contact John Harris of the Knoxville/Knox County Community Action Coalition who is the East TN Americorp coordinator, but alas he is out of the office on vacation for the next two weeks. I left him a message and will follow up with him when he returns.
We also had a UMD volunteer house meeting this morning so that all three of UMD's interns could figure out what the weekly volunteer schedule looked like and so we could plan events accordingly.
I also attended UMD's weekly volunteer meeting in Knoxville which occurs every Tuesday at 7PM upstairs at Barley's Resturant. I volunteered to be the note taker for the meeting as I was the only person with a computer.

Researching New Americorp Positions for UMD, reviewing coal permits, greeting two new UMD volunteer interns

Today I spent time reviewing the latest coal permits by looking through the Lafollette Newspaper and direct mailings sent from the Office of Surface Mining. I made note of upcoming comment periods, a public hearing, and a mine site visit which I will attend with other UMD volunteers. I also communicated with a UMD volunteer about attending the mine site visit and about starting a Mountain Justice chapter at his school in Maryville, TN. I also spent time speaking with the Volunteer Tennessee Americorp Manager,Jamie S. Dent, in Nashville who informed me that I should contact the AmeriCorps Program Director in East Tennessee. I learned that this program, Knoxville/Knox County Community Action Coalition (KCAC), essentially operates as a intermediary between Volunteer Tennessee and organizations that need members. Since they require all new programs in Tennessee to apply for at least 7 members, this option may be the best route. So, the Program Director there is John Harris. He is an alum and leads one of the most successful programs in Tennessee. They also have an environmental focus. His contact info is john.harris@knoxcac.org or 865-546-3500. This seems like a good lead for possible Americorp positions and funding for positions here for United Mountain Defense. I also spent time greeting and helping two new UMD interns settle in to the volunteer house. One of the new interns will be working on a music anthropolgy project dealing with Appalachian music as it relates to coal mining. The other intern will be helping work in the gardens at the UMD volunteer house with tasks such as weeding, planting, creation of a new garden beds, and helping to set up the new 275 gallon rainwater cistern. I will provide them with some training tomorrow so that they can complete their projects over the next 2-3 weeks.

VISTA Handbook and Learning about Beehive Design Collective Americorp

Today I read through the entire VISTA member handbook so that I could become more familiar with the policies and procedures of the Americorp VISTA program. It was informative. I also made a call to the Beehive Design Collective and spoke with my friend Emma Bee about the Americorp program that they have running. Here are the notes from my conversation with Emma.

Beehive Design
Emily Simmons is the contact person for this position but she was unavailable so I spoke with Emma instead who was familiar with the program.

Americorps program

Not through Americorp directly—Some community organizing program in Portland, Maine

4 years ago they had a guy who wanted to help a volunteer in order to pay his student loans
The guy found out about Americorp and wrote a position. Had to complete 1700 hours of service in the year. Got a living stipend, loan deferment, and education award, health care. The guy had to bail because he had private loans instead of federal government loans.

Beehive Design Collective didn’t have to put any money up front to get this position. They had to figure out the check thing for the stipend.

The person is given the living stipend which is paid by the sponsoring organization, but they worked behind the scenes which made the group pay the check to the Beehive Design Collective which they sent back to the corporation to cover their portion of the stipend. They kept this part of the program going for 2 years.
They no longer use that program.

They are now using the Education award only program— Americorp volunteers don’t get health care, or living stipend, but still get the $5,000 education award. They have had these positions for two years now. They can choose their number of people to be in the program. There is one person in the program right now. Volunteers have to log their hours every week, and there must be a quarterly review from the supervisor, and an Americorp member summary.

Food at the Beehive Design Collective--
The Bees have figured that people can pay $3 a day for 3 meals to cover the cost of eating. Food is purchased collectively and meals are cooked collectively as well with different volunteers taking turns cooking and cleaning up.
The $3 a day doesn’t apply to full time Bees. $3 a day only applies to shorter term volunteers.

Possible model applications for future UMD Americorp positions--
1) We should get future UMD Americorp volunteers to sign up for food stamps before signing up for Americorp or before recieving any money from Americorp if at all possible.
2) We need to look into how to get Americorp positions, if any agency is willing to fund our work, and how much money we will have to put down to pay for the positions if any.
3) I think it would be preferable to have the Americorp volunteers recieve the health care, education stipend, and buy their food with food stamps and recycle the stipend back to the corporation.

Contacting two new UMD summer interns

Today I called character references for two new summer interns from New College in Sarasota, Florida. Their references checked out and I am currently waiting on follow up phone interviews with the two interns. They should be here in Knoxville for about two-three weeks. They will be working on expanding the gardens at the volunteer house and also working on the creation of a songbook of songs about coal mining and coal issues from a radical Appalachian prospective.

A blog to keep track of progress for the UMD VISTA 2010-2011

This blog is designed to help keep track of the progress of the new Americorp VISTA position for United Mountain Defense.