| Hello everyone
The very best wishes to all of you for 2025 from The Dirt Gang! Thank you for your support during this past year and welcome to our new subscribers.
It’s been a crazy year for all of us trying so hard to demand accountability from the Nova Scotia government and protect the water, air, forests, flora, fauna and coastlines of our precious little province and counter the misinformation so prevalent online in social media and corporate greenwashing campaigns.
But we will continue to do our best in 2025, and offer any support we can to the many community groups who have reached out during the past year and to new groups finding their way in the world of active community involvement.
We have been busy, in fact so busy that we are looking for a volunteer to help keep our website up-to-date. (all offers and suggestions greatly appreciated). Among the many things on our list last year were:
- We brought together the Coastal Coalition of Nova Scotia, a 60-member collection of concerned citizens, community and environmental groups who worked hard to persuade Tim Houston’s Progressive Conservative government to finally proclaim the Coastal Protection Act. This Act was passed in an all-party vote in 2019 and was one of the many election promises Tim Houston made during his campaign in 2021, and one of many promises he did not keep. Now that the postal strike is over, we will be able to continue counting the signatures on the petition. Before the strike, we were almost up to 5,000 signatures. “Coastal Protection Act Now” signs can be seen all over the province. We aren’t giving up.
On a sad note, we lost an environmental warrior this year. Karen Reinhardt, who championed democracy and environmental protection passed away on Dec 12th. Karen was instrumental in making not only the Owl’s Head and West Mabou Beach sign campaigns successful, but by making sure that “Coastal Protection Act Now” signs are visible from one end of this province to the other she helped put Coastal Protection on the political road map. Karen will be sorely missed.
- The efforts to stop the spraying of herbicides laced with glyphosate on forested land will also continue into 2025.
- We have taken time out to learn as much as we can about ecological forestry so that we can better support those who are doing their best to steward the forests under their care and to counter the propaganda being spread by the Forest Products Association of Canada.
- Then there is the never-ending saga of Northern Pulp / Paper Excellence , and the threat of a massive new pulp mill in the province, even as the murky corporation continues to harvest timber from 425,000 acres of Nova Scotia timberland it purchased with a loan from the province, which it has not and will not be repaying. Recently, Paper Excellence ended all pretence of being separate from the notorious Asia Pulp & Paper (APP), with its horrendous environmental and human rights record, by merging with APP.
- Dirt Gang president and founder, Lil MacPherson, is working on a documentary that will focus on food security, local, organic, regenerative farming and solutions that are in reach. The working title is “Unpacking the food box… to save the future”. Stay tuned for progress updates.
- The “green” hydrogen / ammonia hype has also taken up a fair bit of our time, but luckily we have Joan Baxter’s amazing fact-checked articles and knowledge to guide us along.
So, on to 2025… we are here and we are ready, and we are never ever gonna give up or give in to environmental scoundrels, greenwashers, or political leaders who fail to protect people and the environment!
What we have learned since launching The Dirt Gang website is that a weekly newsletter was just far too ambitious. We will continue to keep you updated on projects, news and events but on a more sporadic basis, when we or other groups have important news to share.
We will need the next couple of weeks to work through the backlog of news and research, but please do check back regularly for updates.
The website is and will remain a work in progress. Please check it out. If you have any suggestions for additional pages or content, we’d love to hear from you. thedirtgang.ns@gmail.com
The Dirt Gang continues to provide a networking and information service to all groups and individuals who are looking for information, research and like-minded organizations throughout the province that are working to protect the environment and the people of Nova Scotia .
All the best,
The Dirt Gang
thedirtgang.ns@gmail.com
www.thedirtgang.ca |
