proud to say a majority of the faculty gives out of their own pockets. we have trouble raising money. the cost of the two offices and to attorneys full-time is $500,000 a year. they work because they love it and not for high pay. that's it. thank you very much. [applause] >> good job, bob. now an executive director for peace.

this is a guy who is not afraid to talk to confront injustice. i think of something george bernard shaw said you don't make progress by standing on guard. the fact that he used to be 6'5" will give you the idea of the fights i have been in. he has been more and additional to veterans for peace, he is a cofounder of the don't shoot coalition on the michael brown police killing in ferguson, missouri. he was an artillery love and based in clues and american civil liberties union and the steering committee of bringing them home now campaign. to introduce him and veterans for peace, we have a short video and then michael will be right here. [begin video clip] ♪

>> my name is barry ladendorf. i am the president of the veterans for national peace. across the united states we have about 160 chapters and chapters in ireland and okinawa. we are forming a chapter in open our. we have a chapter in mexico. what we have learned in our collective experiences is that veterans is violence goes down. it doesn't pay and it's counterproductive. >> the main initiative is the cost of war. that is what we talk about as an organization most of the time. when i say cost of war, it's not just the financial cost, but the human and environmental cost. it's the cost of war. veterans for peace want to make sure that people understand that war is not a game. there is a deep emotional cost

to war. these are the types of things we talk about and try to educate people on so they understand that war is a choice and that war is not going to solve the problems it claims it solved. >> what knows better than anyone else what the cost of war looks like. it's not necessarily those of us who have been antiwar activists all of our lives, but the people who have gone through wars and come to understand things after wars. it's an important organization. for peace is extremely healing for myself and my other brothers and sisters out there who need that support. our mission is to abolish war and when you look at that, that's a huge task. the fact that we are for peace means we have to build peace. build peaceful communities.

we have to do that by standing in solidarity with communities that are struggling. the way i see it is that it is impossible to build peace abroad and look at international issues when you are not looking at what's happening at home. we won't be able to change the foreign policy from raging war to raging peace or endless war is what we have going on president by ourselves. the peace movement can't do it alone. we cannot move our mission forward if we don't do it together. >> eu can not learn about veterans for peace i going to our website and follow us on twitter. we have a facebook page and i hope you will consider joining us. >> hello everyone. thank you for being here.

my name is michael mcpherson and i am the executive director of veterans for peace and i am very excited to be here to share with you information about our organization and our work. as you can see, i have this hat on because i don't have a veterans for peace t-shirt on. i have on my tie. you wouldn't be able to tell i was a vet because i had on the hat. because who wears a hat like this other than a veteran? off nowl take this hat that you know i am a veteran. this is an important gathering because we know to afford the goals of veterans for peace to abolish war and move the nation and the world towards a more peaceful and just way of living and being, it will take a collective effort of individuals and organizations, many of whom do not necessarily see themselves as working for peace and we understand peace is not simply the absence of war. while i will not try to fully quantify what peace is, i will say this.

taking from dr. king's "letter from a birmingham jail," i don't think we are looking for a negative peace which has the absence of tension and more devoted to order than justice, we are all working for a positive peace which is the presence of justice or in my words although i might have heard somebody else say this, peace is justice in action. thanks. ♪ [applause] michael: i hope they are my words. this leads me to say the elements of peace that i believe all of us are working for. when i say all of us, i mean all of us here and the organizations we have gathered here today. they are that all people have their basic needs met and we feel secure and have dignity and a sense of purpose.

this four-day gathering, "breaking through power," is an opportunity for all of us as people from various advocacy areas and movements and struggles to envision a better world to obtain it. none of the organizations can do it alone or what i am sure we all want. that is to put ourselves out of business. we need each other. the film you just watched gave you a basic overview of veterans for peace. i will now give a little more detail. veterans for peace is a nonprofit 501 c 3 organization that promotes a humane and democratic society by educating the public on the true social, ecological, spiritual and economic cost of war. envisioned by jerry, our original founder who brought together a number of veterans, he was a vietnam veteran and the organization was founded in 1985 by veterans and associate members because of concerns about nuclear proliferation and u.s. intervention and central -- in central and latin america.

from the beginning, the importance of uplifts the unique voice of veterans while working happened in hand with associate members was recognized. our statement of purpose, other than meeting great and dedicated people, i joined because of our statement of purpose. in the 31 years that we have been in existence, the statement of purpose changed very little. i am not going to read it all to we, but the first part, having dutifully served our nation, we serve the cause of world peace and we will work with others. you can see some of our points, our points of trying to achieve. and then the last part, to achieve these goals thark pledge to use nonviolent means and to maintain an organization that is both democratic and open and members will act in

the best interest for the purpose of world peace. thank you. i do believe it's a powerful statement. our members include veterans from world war ii to the current era and every branch of service including the coast guard. when i joined in 2003, we had members who served in abraham lincoln's brigade who fought in 1938 spanish civil war which i thought was crazy that we had people -- they were supersharp guys. and they werethem super-sharp. though we are veteran-led, we peculiar people who agree with our statement of purpose. anyone can join veterans for peace. we work for peace and justice and have about 3,500 members

with 127 chapters in the united states, including hawaii and alaska. one of the greatest successes is that we are an interesting organization with chapters in japan, ireland, the united kingdom and vietnam. we also have members in indonesia, australia, canada, the netherlands, and norway. we have a goal to have veterans around the world speaking out and just imagine the power of that. our board is a 13-person group of diverse veterans. what you see up there is our executive committee, veterans from the vietnam war to the current era. we also have a distinguished advisory board and some names are well-known and others are up and coming and all are accomplished and dedicated to peace and justice. a number of them will be

speaking on wednesday. the day of benjamin, chris hedges, and one who is already -- medea benjamin, and one who has already spoken, ralph nader. using our statement of purpose as a quite, chapters decide which to pursuit that best fit the communities. they decide our national efforts. we believe peace is possible. the name of our organization is not veterans against war, it's veterans for peace with a capital f to emphasize peace. peace."phasize "for we know peace is possible and we know that to advocate for peace, we have to believe in peace. we cannot champion peace if we

do not believe in it. peace at home, he's a broad. peace at home, peace abroad. this is the proactive answer to service members and coming home to fight street violence and homelessness or what people call war at home. we understand if we are to have peace, we must not look at it in isolation and think of peace as an international issue and advocate for peace if they are not at peace in their own communities. if a person faces gun violence -- homelessness -- bigotry, or other social ills, how can they act for peace thousands of miles away? two recent efforts as well as justice for veterans and victims of war are the deported veterans work that seeks to help deported veterans receive benefits. we defend freedom and call for

the end of racism and the demonization of luz limits. our brothers and sisters are military veterans in opposition to those who are trying to deem them as the other and the menry making it easier to justify more. -- as the other or the enemy, making it easier to justify more wars. thank you. so, our national work. we identify our national work in three broad categories, although more efforts then those three. education about the full cost of war and militarism. our strongest asset is the reason we organization myself

because we know as former fighters peek out is e yeek and it's the greatest accomplishment that all veterans are for war. we are changing the conversation about war, peace, and foreign policy. this is the original peace. a view of activists was with the boat between the government and off the islands. they were arrested and tried in honolulu and helped to ignite a storm against nuclear weapons that resulted in limited ban treaty of 1963. they were arrested, tried, and jailed in honolulu. their effort help to ignite a storm against nuclear weapons that resulted in a limited nuclear test ban treaty of 1963. their example helped set into motion many environmental and peace voyagers for green peace and the sea shepherds. among others. rescued the golden

rule and it is traveling up and down and educating people about the dangers of nucle weapons and powers. "before you join" is an effort to make sure people who are thinking about joining the military have all the decision making information they need to make an informed decision before they join the military. vietnam full disclosure, the pentagon happily appropriated to million over a time commemorate the war in vietnam. the vietnam full disclosure is to make sure the complete story is told, good and the united states war in vietnam and not use to justify war or glorify war in the future.

is resistant to united states militarism, efforts to change foreign policy away from war. to end current and prevent future wars. there was an article in the new york times about president obama being the first president who has been awarded the whole time he is at office. i will say to you, that is a marketing point. we have been at war at least, if you count from the first world war until today, 25 years. they just want us to believe they are different wars. but they are not different wars. [applause]

michael: they are the same wars. i think this is crazy in and of itself. the asian peace pivot, the peace campaign since the president said we have an asian pivot, the drones campaign to educate people about the use of drones and who is being killed. and support our resistors and whistle blowers because it's important for them to be resisters to war and we need people to tell the truth about what is happening. healing and building peace. we have the rate nam campaign that seeks to educate people about agent orange and justice for the agent orange for veterans and children and people in vietnam. international peace day, which is unofficially known as world you stay on september 21, we wanted it to be be made a

popular culture understanding that to everyone knows about. the project was launched in 1999 because of the sanctions in iraq, water filtration systems in iraq were destroyed. we have deployed 150 systems across the country. armistice day known by many as veterans day, we want to reclaim that because originally it was supposed to be dedicated to the cause of world these and now it is used to glorify war. as people know, it is a time when countries came together and the us signed that in 1928 and 62 others signed it. most people have no idea about it and we want more people to know about that. we have to go back. okay. so, just to give you an idea about our budget, i only have a

few seconds left. let you compare our budget of around $450,000 to the federal budget and then if you look at the discretionary budget and the reason i put there that one of their priorities might be considered left or right, whereas the other group, the peter peterson foundation is definitely more government-oriented and that to graph up there is projected from 2012-2022. hownt you to notice discretionary spending, half of it is pentagon spending will lastly, i want you to look at how much united states military spends in comparison to the next nine countries who spend money on their military and how we actually spend more than they do.

of course, all of our budgets, the organization's here, is miniscule compared to that .umber of 800 billion it is king said in 1967 time to break silence. on nation spends more money defense than it does on spiritual. and we what we are doing want to stop that and come back from the precipice. please join us and think about joining if you are a veteran. please support us. think about how you will move this nation to a more peaceful way of being and living. thank you. [applause]

>> thank you very much. michael mcphearson. he had a lot more to say if he had more time. about how they do direct action. the wonderful direct action in addition all the other things he related. i noticed that his budget is equivalent of 11 hours. of mr. gabelli. 11 hours. in other words, mr. gabelli works 18-hour day and before he goes to lunch the second day. someone said, we reward what we honor. definitionchange the of priorities and seriousness. because if you ask the american people, what do they prefer most, they prefer their own health, safety, and economic

being get that not all the work groups they are working for. i do not think they preferred the kind of misallocation of resources that have been referred to so far and will be in the next few days to the very few. our next speaker is clarence, the director of the center for auto safety. he has an engineering degree from lehigh and from harvard law school. if you own a car or rented a car, he has affected you in a safer manner. no one has been responsible for more recalls of more vehicles for defect correction than clarence. he has been very busy in recent years, as the press as reported. the auto industry recalled far more cars in the last few years than they have manufactured. they include sudden

acceleration, ignition defects, airbags defects. all kinds of problems. the lack of quality control has grievously failed. he has written numerous publications on consumers, auto safety, air pollution, transportation including the lemon book. lemon law litigation manual, little secrets of the auto industry. autoows a lot about dealers and their relationship with the auto industry. acceleration, driver drive in detroit to build automobiles. time, he wrote a

book on design liability, a six-volume work published annually by west publishing. to say he works night and day is to say the obvious. he has in his modesty, a deep-felt sense that for millions of people that have ther heard of him he holds public trust of preserving their lives over their loss of lives in car collisions. thank you. clarence did low. clarence ditlow. >> thank you. i want to begin by saying that hasunsafe at any speed" been one of the best things for public good. there have been 3.5 million

lives saved by virtue of the safety standards and bringing the highways to safety. i was at lehigh university getting a degree in chemical engineering. i look upon lehigh and educated them some ten years before. i kind of look upon it as having me and you did as a counterbalance to lee iacocca. i once had lunch with him when working right after another recall. when ralph founded the center

for others'safety, along with consumers union, it was one of tacticalreat strategies. he provided the inspiration and consumers union provided the funding. a perfect match. in 1970 i was not there when the center was founded, the staff who were there said the two things that ralph did was he came in with 10,000 consumer complaints. they were stacked up that high. many paper bags. days, we did not have digital complaints. we had paper complaints. so well said, go through all these complaints and find some ink. why are people complaining about cars. what are the rights and the remedies? so the staff went through it and we created the lemon book. what to do with your bad car.

essence, in 1970, consumers had legal rights but no remedies under contract law if you had a lemon you could get rid of it. but here is the dynamics. in those days, cars might have cost 5000-10,000 dollars. was $10,000. by the time you hire a lawyer, go to court, you have to pay $3500 to $4,000 in legal fees and costs. you get a new car. you get your money back. well, think about the dynamics of it. you could take that very same car, traded in, and hope your next car was not a lemon. and that is what most consumers did. but we published the lemon book and got an act passed after that and what it did was provide for an award of attorney's fees and costs.

so now a few had a $10,000 lemon and you sued and got your money back got to keep the entire 10,000 because the manufacture got to keep the entire $10,000 because the manufacturer had to pay your legal costs. the strategies we pursued. creating a legal remedy and a right at the same time. what it did was in the days of 1970, there might have been i've hundred lemon spot back every year. tops. after the passage of the madness and mosques were checked and the state lemon laws, there -- after the passage of the state lemon all of a sudden consumers had a right they never had before. and, one of the things it does if the auto company has to

pay not only the consumer's attorney write your attorney, i guarantee you that whatever your the silkcharges, stocking lawyers charge a lot more. it becomes cheaper to build quality and get rid of the most egregious lemons. so that is what we are always striving for. it makes the system work but it is really in uphill battle. the other thing we did that ralph charged us with was airbags. the center for auto safety staff in 1970, he told us that for the foreseeable future, the next three years, your main project will be to get airbags in every car.

the eternal optimist. we got airbags and every car but we did not get airbags and every car until 1994. thein the interim, we took reagan administration at that time to court over their inocation of the airbag rule 1981. and we got a decision the following year from the u.s. supreme court will stop a nine-zip decision. in that decision, the court's wrote the auto industry has raged regulatory war against the airbag and lost. that is a verbatim quote. that is the supreme court. that is in institution that is not a liberal advocate. when you think about that, that happens time and again. the industry is out there challenging safety standards.

some at a conference where oil companies were at because it fuel efficiency. they thought, if you make cars to fuel inefficient -- if you too fuel efficient, we will not sell oil. i think that has one -- been one of the impediments. why do you oppose every regulation that comes out? even if it's small? the auto industry executives littlef we challenge the ones, the regulatory agencies will not have time to get to the big ones.

i wanted to indicate that our strategies are and& they will not release the names and addresses of those complaining about a defect. why won't they? they don't want to have the name made public. the consumer is writing to 20 different institutions and the attorney general and action lines and the center for auto safety. you name it. they are trying to stamp out media access to victims to build a story around. victims are exceedingly important. the other thing is that i will give you an example, two examples of persistency. in this arena, you have to fight day in and day out, year after year and sometimes decade after decade. that was the story of the air bag. take a look at technical services. a lot of people don't know about them. the agency will not release the name. they are trying to stamp out media access to victims to build a story around. victims are exceedingly important to our winning strategy. the other thing is, i will give you two examples of persistence. fights arena, you have to

day in and day out, year after more.nd sometimes take a look at technical service persons. a lot of people do not know technical service bills because a lot do not make them public. the gm switch, for which we got a recall and for which there have been over 200 deaths. electronic bulletin alerting them there was a defect that could cause the ignition to shut off the on the vehicle. did it go to consumers? no. but we got a law passed in 2000 -- 2013, requiring, finally, that the department of public transportation post on his website he technical service bill they had been withholding

from consumers. forum, what did the department of transportation do? they had all the bulletins. they had them in electronic format. they had to do was push a button and it went up on their website. if they did not do anything. they did not publish them at also we to them to court. two months ago, they agreed after we filed suit to finally publishing these service bulletins. so anyone in the audience that has a car with a problem could go to the agency website and look up technical service bulletins on your car and you , you willthings like -- something like a jeep about feedback?

clarence: we signed a petition for the agency to set a standard for seat backs. there are so many horror stories happening. i could fill this entire four days with what is going on in backs.o industry in seat the government, in 1992-1994, told consumers, put your child in the backseat of the car that is the safest possible spot for a child. and what happened was in 1992-1994, there were only one or two children killed in the back seats of cars every year. move more and more children to the back seats of cars, we are now looking at 50 child deaths each and every year due to seats back collapse where the cpac comes back because

there is an occupant in front of them a hand in a rare impact, it comes back and can kill or seriously injure the child. it can also kill or seriously injure the person in the front seat as well. the department of transportation says there is no problem. our database does not show this happening. we looked at roughly 100 police reports. two of them said there was a seriousk collapse in a injury or fatal crash and did not even those two made it into the government system because the government system does not backa check field for seat collapse. so the mantra is, there is no problem. problem, ife is a we do not know about the problem. so we have gotten the complaints come of the police reports, we have taken it to the government and said -- look, you need to

resolve this problem once and for all. agreed to a petition filed by the public interest research group to require that cpac's not collapse in a 30 mile per hour rear impact. they dropped it over industry opposition. look atay that when you the industry, there is another defect out there that involves rare impact. ford pinto recalled effectively in 1978 because of rear impacts that caused the fuel tank to rupture and explode, bursting into flames. cherokee hasd exactly the same problem. the jeep jerky and the jeep liberty have the problem. the administrator of the agency in charge of the investigation and his very last two days in office signed up and closing the

investigation with a recall that is absolutely an effective. and what does the administrator do? he takes the job with a law firm who represents chrysler. auntie he has the job offer before he left the agency. is no way that any administrator of any agency a closingside over investigation where he knows he has a job offer and he is going to go to work for the law firm representing the corporation he is investigating. that is one of our challenges for the future. door.volving when john clayburgh, who is in the audience, was the administrator, people did not leave the industry to go to work for the auto industry. today, people are leaving the agency to go to work for the auto industry all the time. dozens of former

administrators, associate administrators, system administrators, and chief counsel who have gone to work for the industry as well as staff within the individual departments of the agency. and those people are the ones. i mean, how can you adequately represent the public when you are looking forward to your next job, which is probably going to pay a lot more than your present job knowing that your next job will be an industry job? that is just simply wrong. [applause] i am not running for president, but if i were, i which are close that revolving door. terrible.lutely just to give you, by the way, an example. here is what the center does. when i became the director, we could afford a 32nd commercial

in the super bowl. that is what the auto industry talks about. today, we are down to less the end of five seconds of a bowl ad.l in a super so we are looking at a budget of what we do have less than half $1 million a year. we do a lot on a little. we do not patients, inspiration, good stuff, solid research, good data. it is a tough job but he has got to do it. i think that is my time. [applause] >> now we have got a rather unique public interest organization. jeffrey is the head of it. the public employees for environmental responsibility. i have done a good bit of work

with them across the country and they take a unique approach. they defend and stand up for public employees who are used to and assaulted. made into villains somehow or another. the conscientious public employees trying to do their jobs and being blocked. that is a big problem with government service. not small eurocrats, rather agencys critters and bosses with the ideological, and personal agendas. or, they are just boneheads. whether you are looking at the military, the national park service, whatever. the rank and file employees will tell you the problem is that the top. bulbs in too many

sockets up there. the senator in texas was a particular bonehead and kept doing stupid things and molly said if he got one digit dumber, we would have to water him twice a week. this has been a problem. but luckily when the powers that be try to squish employee who stand up for trying to do their job, we have jeffrey standing up for those employees. here he is. jeffrey. applause] jeffrey. public employees for responsibilities is a jaw breaker of a name. designed toonym

"peer." they are designed to produce the acronym here with double meaning for the work we do. we are a service organization for public employees we work with rangers, emergencies and attorneys and scientists with disciplines from physics to forestry. they call us when their careers and consciences come into crisis. we hear most often from people as they say i never thought i would call here. when they do, our mission statement is how may i help you. we try to operate as a shelter for battered staff. while we work on a range of issues from the deserts to the wetlands to toxics, our target environment or the cubicles and the field labs and field offices where the work is done and our target ecosystem is to make sure these are healthy places to work and make sure they are penetrated by sun light and they are allowed to enter and flow out and a diversity of opinion is tolerated. in this regard we work a lot with whistle blowers and frankly we taught people how to blow the whistle. to the typical scenario, a specialist is very upset about something. the reason they are so upset, they are the subject matter

expert and they know the consequences of the malfeasance is. they are so angry, they are willing to take career risks. in order to set it right. what they often do not realize is that by being right, that is why they are in trouble. by elevating it up the chain of command they are digging themselves into their own career in for no. wayan work with them in a to deliver the information without the messenger and you and void whistle-blowing litigation. it is one of the least ways to bring about change because it is about a personnel decision. whether or not you were fired or transferred. it's beyond the jurisdiction of the court to fix the problem for which you are willing to risk your career. keeping a con chances specialist or other public servant in place -- keeping a conscientious

specialist or other public servant in place is important. we think there are about a quarter million specialists working in all levels of government and a percentage are not able to do their jobs fully. so we work to make sure you get a better job. we will get a couple to protect you and your family. and also what this means to get the broader society. how it works for the employees we help and also what this means to the broader civic society. in working for you, think about public health and places like flint, michigan, to camp lejeune, north carolina, there .re derelicts let begin view an example. a few years ago, some very frustrated the epa employees can just see me with a box of documents and said, we have wasted our time for the past

five years. what they were working on was a cost-benefit analysis for the care and renovation of older homes. about 30 million units that had to do -- that had to be done in way.d-safe it was still dead in the water. generalngs with the counsel, they kept repeating, if we are sued, we're screwed. so we sued them and we forced the adoption and few that happened during the bush administration and the last major pathway to exposure for four -- until exposurek to lead for 1.4 million american children was closed. it turned out that there was a daycare center in a thermometer factory which was contaminated

with mercury. the state agency knew it to and had been negotiating with the operator to figure out some sort of her mediation plan. frustrated staff came to us, told us what was going on, we blew the was a. there was an evacuation. and litigation which has only now just ended. they can about corruption. a lot of what happens in other countries does not happen as much here because public service can be an important checkpoint. we deal an awful lot with an bar mental and enforcement. there is a tendency for what we "ticket fixing" and we bargained them down for political favors and so the penny on a fine with a a dolalr. -- on a dollar.

there is a tendency for ticket fixing and bargain them down for political favors and so that the result and find with a penny on a dollar. we have been involved in a number of cases in states like florida and connecticut where the speaker of the house and the governor respectively ended up going to prison not because they cast rated enforcement, but they pocketed funds that didn't report on their income tax and they went to prison. recently coca-cola gave a part a park a it a -- gave a $3 million gift and when they found out the grand canyon park was about to ban the sale of plastic water bottles, the biggest source of solid waste in the park, 30% of all waste was discarded bottles, the director recognizing that he didn't want to upset a contributor quashed the bottle ban. we were able to expose that and they went into effect. now the service positioned itself to enter into a whole realm of corporate partnerships that would be just as damaging. of course working on the environment and taking one aspect of it, wildlife, and i guess in the united states, it is peculiar to us, the way we

manage wildlife is to militarize them. we kill them. 5 million animals a year. bear, bobcats, beavers, anything deemed a nuisance. we were contacted by outraged state biologists in texas who were concerned that the largest colony of black tailed prairie dogs was about to be poisoning gas to out of existence in lubbock, texas. the helped us identify information we needed to get it through litigation. some of the areas where there was the biggest dispute, we were able to relocate the prairie dogs and today that colony is the biggest tourist attraction in lubbock, texas. and who knew they had a tourist attraction? more recently last year we got a call from somebody who was an expert on an aquatic bird and the fish and wild service has this authorization program where they kill an estimated 43,000 a year.

this made ken sick at heart because it was wasteful and not scientifically justified and it managementr wildlife and tea helped us put together a suit that stopped the practice. and, here's is how we work for public servants. we're guided by the observation of admiral rickover, father of the nuclear navy, said if you must sin, sin against god and not the bureaucracy. because god may forgive your sins, but the bureaucracy never will. and so when people are forced into a situation where they have to become a whistleblower, it is important to do it in the most effective and powerful way and apply shock and awe in and in some instances the agency will cave and in rare instances you'll get an apology and having said that, they can turn into long, protracted battles. we defended the chief of the park police, theresa chambers, who was fired during the bush

administration. it took us 7 1/2 years to restore her to her job. so it is not the sort of thing that is entered into lightly. we do a lot of work with scientists. and they have typically little legal protection because they are not whistle-blowers, not they are not to revealing waste, fraud, and abuse. a good example, one of our clients goss hawk expert for the u.s. forest service, one of the indicator species like spotted owls, and he was featured by the agency, sent away to conferences and allowed to publish. but when it is published work used by environmental groups to sue the agency to stop timber sales because he founded the goss hawk needed a broader area, the agency turned on him and his science. through no action of his own, doing what he had done every day

for the last 20 years he went from golden boy to public enemy number one. it doesn't matter how objective the science is, one of our signature cases involve a fish passage center, multiagency unit. larry craig, center from idaho known for his wide stance, didn't like the information they were putting out, and he reached out and had unit abolished. we were able to sue and get their positions restored. but throughout all of the head of the center asked the question that haunted us, which was, who knew math could be dangerous? so we employ a number of tools to help scientists suing under statutes where best available science is required, use of scientific integrity policies and even tools like the data quality act and industry sponsored law that allows us to file administrative challenges to government agency policies. recently we were able to use this act to get, again, guided by agency toxicologist, the epa to drop its safety assurance for artificial turf made with crumb

rubber. we were able to persuade the white house to order overdue multiagency risk assessment on basically using solid waste as a play surface. [applause] jeff: thank you. and a number of our employees, basically, are in trouble because they found themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time or doing their job too well at an inconvenient time. and when these employees become the victims of which ends, it is terrifying to see. to polarent researchers who had observed drowned polar bears in open ocean after a storm because of the retreat of sea ice. the agency became a upset when their work became an important vehicle to help the public understand the effect of climate change in the arctic. they went after them and started an investigation and it turned into a criminal investigation.

it went on for four and a half years. it caused all criminal referrals, they were without merit. we posted transcripts of these clueless criminal investigators trying to incriminate these phd scientists. the point is, when people find themselves in that situation, they need outside help. so like ghostbusters, who are you going to call? and this is a mark of a civil society. rings people talk about. transparency, accountability. let me give you an example. we do a lot of freedom of information work. the typical scenario is we are approach was somebody with documents and they in essence do not one is to use the league version but go through the front door and forced them to be disgorged by the agency.

so knowing exactly what we are looking for, we file at least one lawsuit each week. informationhe laundromat. our job is to wash the identifying marks off the material and hang it on the line for everybody to see. four institutional change. the point of a lot the of this isn't to win individual victories. it is to force change so the same thing doesn't occur over and over. for example, trying to work with forest service special agents who after the agency blocked timber theft investigations used that scenario to justify creating a new chain of command for the those investigations. the same thing with land appraisers who pointed out you the taxpayer were losing millions if not billion of

dollars on one sided exchanges because the agency had its thumb on the scales. we're enable to enact reforms. lastly, one of the top economists from the army corps of engineers revealed the corps was cooking the books to -- corps reform adopted to require that these studies be checked. the idea is empowerment. make clear staff is not spelled with ph, you're a peer, you have a seat at the table and you be part of balance of power because expertise cannot be ignored. part of what we're doing allowing internal critique to reach the true -- the true employer, the public, and validate that many of the critics of the agencies, their criticisms, shared by those inside and in many instances shared bit people that should know best the feedback look can be extremely powerful. we're facing a number of changes of course, environmental changes such as climate change. a generational shift where a whole group of baby boomers is leave something we're trying to harness the great wave to come back and help the agency. and of course, there's a

presidential transition, you can imagine the demand for our services in a trump administration. what we're doing can be exported to any one of a number of agencies, and the approach is cost effective because we don't hire experts, you already have hired the experts. we're just trying to make sure their expertise can shine forth. so, we're relatively small organization with $1 million budget and 5 field offices. we can always use more support. we invite your involvement with our organization. you don't have to have been a a public employee. you have to appreciate the importance and not centrality of public service. so thank you. [applause] >> so, now let's get into still a consumer effort but one little bit different, consumer

watchdog, based out in los angeles, harvey rosenfield. first of all, he's a trial lawyer, you know powers that be try to make that pejorative somehow or another but as a trial lawyer supporting me when i was running in politics in texas, we take from the rich and give approximately half to the poor. that's not a bad relationship, really. but harvey takes on medical malpractice issues, hmo reform, insurance reforms, utility rates and goes at the big guys, insurance giants, in particular. i grew up in the small town in texas and i learned early on, you should never hit a man with glasses. you should use something much heavier. heavier thing that we have, the heaviest thing that we have, are those values of fairness, justice, opportunity for all, and in particular, people who represent those, bringing the people inside, again.

and that's what consumer watchdog does a lot of, in addition to straight out litigation, they rally citizens into direct citizen action behind issues and referendums. harvey's known for numbers, proposition 9, proposition 45, these are victories for consumers that he and his organization with local people have produced. proposition 103 alone was about auto insurance reform. it has saved over $100 billion for consumers on auto insurance rates since 1988. it's remarkable advances that they're making. so let's bring up harvey rosenfield. [applause] >> thank you. thank you. well, this is an amazingly opportune moment to convene a citizen conference like this. in my entire lifetime, i have not seen people as mad and as

engaged as they are today. there is -- there is deep, deep outrage about the corruption in our democracy and i think that a lot of people across the united states are suffering from a form of posttraumatic stress disorder from the economic collapse of 2008. most people, most americans, not all, but most americans have not really fully recovered from that disaster, either financially or emotionally. and the unconditional bailout of wall street, while leaving all of the rest of americans to fend for themselves, is something that i think was a revelation for even those people who were not paying attention to politics in our country. i once calculated that the amount of money that the federal government handed over to financial corporations in the aftermath as a part of the bailout could have easily paid

off every residential mortgage in the country. but instead, instead, it was handed, unconditionally, to a bunch of banks and insurance companies. so there's a disruption of the current status quo under way in our political or electoral campaigns. it's aided by the democratization of communications, technologies that make it easier for people to communicate and enhance people's creativity. but the bad news is, at the end of the day, i think all of us know that no one person, not even the president, can stop the force of corporate power in this country. nobody has the ability to do that by themselves. and so going in, even as exciting as this election

campaign is, as startling as it might be -- >> feel the bern! >> feel the bern, yep, and feel the donald. as powerful as the emotions are part of the electoral campaign this year, there's no doubt at the end there will be disappointment. that's the bad news. the good news is that for people who do what we do, who are advocates, we can -- we can and must be poised to answer that disappointment to vector the public's engagement, to keep them inspired and bring them into the work that we all do once the dust settles, whoever wins in november. because that is what advocates do, they seize or create moments and issues at points in time when there's -- when the public per serve receives there's a problem and looking for a solution and question is, who

will provide that solution? will the politicians provide it? or will citizen advocates and activists provide it? today's discussion is all about how it's done. so i'd like to summarize the approach the consumer watchdog has taken over the last 31 years. it's an approach that is set forth in our mission statement which consists of three words, expose, confront, and change. so, first of all, expose, we bring a journalist's or a lawyer's eye to uncover and expose problems in our society. in fact, of the 13 people on our staff, 4 are lawyers, 3 are journalists, or former journalists, and the rest are advocates and researchers and what they do, and we expose things, we tell the story in terms that people can relate to,

in human interest terms. so the next thing we do, once we've told that story, we confront the folks who have caused the problem. once we explain what the problem is, then we confront the folks who are the wrong doers. now, most corporate ceos tried to hide behind pr people and other surrogates because they don't want to have to be -- to defend themselves. they can't really very well defend themselves. but what we do, honestly, we're pretty aggressive about it, is prevent the special interests, corporate executives, the greed-driven corporate officials, from escaping accountability for causing the problem. we hold them directly accountable. and these confrontations, by the way, are very dramatic sometimes. we invite the immediate media to witness them.

the final part, final role, the most important role we play, once we created the conditions for it, we seize the moment to supply the needed solution. now, as in corporate -- in the battle between consumers and corporations, corporations are always advocating their own solution. usually it's by scapegoating something else, they never take responsibility. but we advocate the solution that we determined to be the one that best protects consumers, taxpayers, workers, savers, and we ask those voters, those consumers, to support us, and we use our opponents' weight against them. it's kind of like a political jujitsu. we use their weight, their sloth, their arrogance, against them in order to win. let me describe the one kind of seminal example of this that i'd

like to present to you today. and this involves auto insurance. and 1980s, auto insurance rates were skyrocketing in california. the insurance companies were claiming that they had to raise rates because there were too many lawsuits. their solution to restrict the consumer protection laws in a state of california. but we did some research and we exposed the faing that the problem in california was, unlike every other major state in the nation, california had no ruled that regulated the insurance companies. so we put an initiative on the ballot to regulate, to roll back and regulate auto insurance, home insurance, business insurance premiums. the insurance companies spent an unprecedented $80 million fighting our proposal. and i'll give you an example of one things they did, this mailer, which features me on one side, one of the guards that

were guarding the petitions we submitted to put the initiative on the ballot, this went to every household in the state of california. and they spent tens of millions of dollars on tv ads. how did we counter that? first, we pointed out, guess who's behind the ad blitz? the more they spent, the more it made sense to people in the political jujitsu, it's the insurance companies trying to defend their right to rip you off. but we had no money. so we resorted to things like this, where i delivered a truck load full of horse manure to farmer's insurance, that was one of the major backers of the opposition to proposition 103. and then, of course, what happened was, it took off. people -- it galvanized public opinion and every dollar they spent against us, we jujitsued it into a galvanizing people to support our initiative. there was one other element to

our campaign and this is ralph nader, in 1988, farmer's market in los angeles campaigning for proposition 103. and his button says "103 is the one for me" because of the battle involved insurance companies putting three competing initiatives on the same ballot to try to confuse people. but on election day, thanks to ralph, the voters saw through the insurance industry's campaign and passed proposition 103. it passed in blue, democrat los angeles and reagan country, orange county california, and that shows you that when people are approached with a policy issue and a solution to it that makes sense to them, they will support it. turns out that was just the beginning of the battle. there were a hundred lawsuits filed. the insurance companies were relentless. we've defeated every single one

of them. and it took us, just for one provision of the pop significance that barred companies from basing auto premiums on your zip code, it took us 16 years to win that battle. not as long as it took -- and clarence -- to get air bags. but it took us 16 year than perseverance led to immediate $1.4 billion in rate rollbacks. $100 billion in savings for motorists alone. between 1989, when prop 103 took effect, and 2013, auto insurance rates went down in california. it's the only state in the nation where rates went down. rest of the nation, went up 43%. and yet, of course, the -- you can't even read that site, forget about that -- that describes the average in california for auto insurance premiums. and then -- sorry, a little bit

of a delay -- okay, they come back at us. in 2010, one of the insurance companies puts initiative on the ballot to repeal part of proposition 103. they spent $17 million on ads like this, vote yes on prop 17 and used our own tactics against us. if you pass prop 17, it will lower your insurance rates. but it didn't work. we spent -- we had to raise a million bucks and we did the following 15-second ad -- >> this is a consumer alert. why are car insurance companies spending millions to pass prop 17? the california attorney general says prop 17 will raise your rates. stop the hidden rate increases. vote no on 17. >> and then, so we beat them, we beat them in 2010. [applause] and then, and then the same insurance company that did that put it back on the ballot in 2012.

they spent another $17 million. this time we spent $100,000, and we beat them again. [applause] so it's all about -- it's all about perseverance. now in addition to this battle, which goes on to this very day, there are dozens 0 of lawsuits, administrative and judicial lawsuits on challenges part of prop 103 and we challenge the rates under proposition 103 to force over $3 billion in rollbacks just from consumer watchdog's work over the last ten years or so. but we also work on things like hmo reform, health insurance rates. we fought electricity deregulation. we fought to change the unfair and draconian limits on medical malpractice lawsuits in california law. these days, we're doing a lot of privacy, trying to -- trying to

ensure that the nation's auto safety regulators, working with clarence ditlow and joan clay brook, make sure nhtsa national highway safety administration, requiring companies to develop regot cars, driverless vehicles, they don't want to comply with federal law, auto safety laws. we're trying to make sure the federal government hues to the mission it's supposed to follow and regulate auto safety for those companies. so we do a lot of different things besides insurance. but i want to move very quickly and just address -- speak to those of you in the audience at the beginning of a possible career in citizen advocacy or thinking about whether to spend the rest of your lives devoted to the public interest. and i've kind of distilled my experience to ten tips that i'd like to convey.

first, find a battle and jump in right away. now, there are lots of projects out there. you can be a volunteer to get started. and get a taste of it before you decide. don't think you can't do it or you're not skilled enough to do it. for example, there's a big ballot initiative campaign scheduled for november to regulate prescription drug prices in california that needs a lot of volunteers. start by jumping in. number two, you've got to work hard. time and time again, as ralph indicated earlier, a handful of committed people can defeat goliath. never doubt that a small group of thoughtful and committed citizens can change the world. indeed, it's the only thing that ever has and that's what we've all fought and that's what you're hearing about today, people who took it upon themselves initiated something, and then joined with others and then others came along.

but it all starts with work hard, perseverance. third, trust yourself -- >> this is a consumer alert -- >> oops. another consumer alert. trust yourself. when you do not allow yourself to be controlled or limited by other people's perceptions of reality, when i first wrote prop 103 they said it would never pass, it was too tough, and the insurance companies would defeat it. i didn't listen to them. similarly -- thank you. speak up. don't wait your turn. i'm directing this to young people. i know you're told know your place wait in line. don't wait your turn. start fighting now, trust your instincts, and speak up. speak up number 5, do not compromise fundamental principles.

you know, when we put prop 103 on the ballot, it initiated, as i mentioned a moment ago, initiative war that threatened more than just prop 103. it threaten the to change the state's consumer protection laws. it's a vendetta move by the insurance company a lot of pressure to withdraw the initiative. we said no because -- and the truth of it is, when you know you are doing the right job and a great job, when people come to you and say it's too dangerous, you have to compromise, you have to withdraw, next, six, play offense, not defense. seven, never be afraid to say you don't know and ask for help. eight, embrace defeat. because that is part of success. and that's part of perseverance. nine, main name your capacity for indignation. the enemies of our work are not the big corporations. the biggest enemies of our work are cynicism, complacency and compromise.

ten, seek out a mentor, and then when you have learned, become a mentor. one thing that struck me today, speeches from people from the podium made clear the work that they were doing originated in the inspiration and training of ralph nader who built and inspired so many institutions that will be as proud and enduring at constitution hall, we are all grateful to ralph nader for the work he has done, not just consumers but building institutions. [applause] thank you. >> we've heard several times today, including from my mouth, we should learn to collaborate and see if we can't make the

whole of our effort greater than the sum of its parts. but now, we need to also get holy. reverend al fritch our next speaker. he's a hero to the people of appalachia and an inspiration to ordinary people everywhere who dare to stand up to rampant corporate power he takes on the mountaintop removele forces, the mining forces, the abusive environmental forces, abusive human forces over in the mountain stated. he's not -- not only is he the founder of ach labor shah science in the public interest but a pastor of the pastor of lady of mountains in stanton, kentucky and pastor of st. elizabeth of hungary in kentucky. i think of him in terms of a

couple of other folks that i knew over there who were great fighters over the years, tom and pat gish, they had a newspaper, the mountain eagle, it was in every big fight in appalachia that ever happened, taking on racism, taking on the mining companies and supporting unions and et cetera. so they were despised by the powers that be and one day their place, the newspaper office, was fibomb firebombed. the subtitle of the mountain eagle was "it screams" after the firebombing, the next wednesday the payment came out, nonetheless and subtitle was "it still screams." that's the spirit of the mountains and that's the spirit of father al fritch. [applause]

>> hi, y'all. you know, this mid-afternoon, stand up, hold up your hands high for a moment and wave them. wave them to the people in appalachia, the ones that never get waved to too often. 6300 of our people lost their jobs in the past 15 months because coal mines stopped. but i don't try to emphasize this only. we have to emphasize the good things. so for a start, i want to say what the previous speaker said, and that is, let's thank ralph nader for what he's done for us, what he's done in our region, what he's done for the country. it takes a leader to do what ralph nader does. and i'm so appreciative of it, he's a brother to me. also, i'd like to remember many ways the people who work here and the volunteers for really appalachia science and the public interest is mostly a voluntary organization. and we have had a number we had

7,500 kids that came through in the last ten years to be -- to have experiences in some voluntary ways, along with 3,000, little over 3,000 college students, either during a week of break during the spring or fall semester, and also in the -- in summer programs. so, really, we are, to a great degree, a voluntary organization. why do we go to the place we did? because we were trying to open a demonstration center. what was it demonstrating. when i was working in washington with mike jacobson, jim sullivan, for the center of science in the public interest we had a book called "99 ways to a simple lifestyle" and i was hoping to get back to appalachia and put them into effect. we have most done. one on simple funerals, and they're waiting for me to die to put it into effect. but anyway, beyond these, we

have been trying to find a location because we were trying to do the ripple effect, that is, make it such that demonstration would be available to people and then they would go and do it themselves. we had to have a place available for more people. so we chose a site two miles from the interstate 75, which is third highest traveled route in america from upper michigan down to miami. we had that. only two miles from exit 49, in kentucky, and right beside the scenic route and wilderness, really, area of the rock castle river. so we opened the center down there building a variety of things. but that was a reason for the site. we got a good location because the owner had a property that had a cold seam in it and was afraid it would get disturbed.

also the cover on it is the forest, oldest and most varied hardwood forest in the world. we had a hundred native species -- you can't do that too many places in america -- native species of woody materials. there are supposed to be around 1,400 floral species in at least the areas. we only have found some, not many. that many. but anyway, there's 500 mosses and ferns in that region. it's biodiverse. we wanted to keep it that way. and that's why we opened what we did. and so, we wanted an appropriate technology center that really it was going to be low cost, friendly, it was going to be open to the public, and it would still be where the citizens were involved themselves, we didn't have to expert -- have an expert come in and do the work for them, they wanted to do things,

and that was the important part. we also wanted something more. our local bulk materials, that's food, fuel, building materials, and water, should come locally. now that comes to be a challenge at times. we didn't have that much land. but we taught people how to do intense everybody organic gardening or encourage it because it had been done for years and years and old had to unite themselves with the young. and actually make this an effect that could be the whole family affair. and so, food was greatest importance, as mike jacobson was talking about this morning. and water, of course, should be -- we were trying to take it from the roofs -- but to have purifying method of doing and it having safe containers and use the groundwater. and we had dry composting toilets which cuts out half of the water use in a domestic

home. we invented one type oups. and we had four different varieties on the property. and also, we took materials, waste and water materials and put them through artificial wetlands. so we were trying to hard to use the water at hand. building materials, had two that we used for the wood on the solar demonstration center, which was finished, by the way, in 1978, and really was the first complete one, we said in america, but at least in kentucky. and so but we -- besides that, we've done yurts. why? it's a mongolian idea. why bring it to us? because appropriate technology should be suitable for various parts of the world, not just certain area. and so we went on to take the fuel, of course, we moved into nonfossil fuels, and that would be solar, wind, mostly solar, and we used it for passive

heating, for electricity, and we were really the first organization that had its surplus electricity return to the grid in our state. we had -- we also have used wood in burning. wood has been an important aspect for us because we have done a number of overseas projects in haiti, dominican republic. we were trying to show solar energy being used. and also peru, helped with the opening of a woman's cooperative on cooking food solarly. but also, there was more to that, and therefore, the volunteers we sent over to malawi also to peru and to honduras, twice to each of those places, they learned a lot from it. and therefore, developed a very energy efficient wood-burning

device that was used in the home. so, in many ways, appropriate technology was spread. it was not just spread from us to them, but to them back to us. and only -- on site education was becoming a component, looking at older people, but then beginning to think about young people. for the idea of appalachia was to them something that was sort of removed. and they were not proud of the region. and we consider to this day that to get appalachian pride as being the center piece of what we want for our region, and therefore, more emphasis has been coming in recent years on education from kindergartens through sixth grade, and also teachers, and we consider that this is the very important aspect of our program.

funding has always been difficult, you heard that coming up today. well, we're at a lower key than some of em in. budgets that run from 80 to 250,000 a year, low end at this time is still the area of expertise that we want to try to reach. and how do we do it? a variety of different things. now, here i differ a little bit from the other public interest groups in that we did not mind taking money from any place that was not industry, but any governmental source that was still receptive to what we were trying to do. we had ted kennedy's science for citizens program started during the carter administration and it was getting ready to start in a full blast and they called me it to represent 11 groups that were -- we went over to the white house, not too far from here, transition team of reagan came along, i got up to tell them, i breathed a little, started the

first sentence and he said, next speaker, please. that was the end of appropriate technology as far as the federal government went at that time. but anyway, nsf did save us, our project, and a different device. we were able to continue it in some fashion. the -- but the -- we went on to gone to see from that that had to be done we raised money by what we do. so one thing is, if we had appropriate technology center, and a lot of people were trying to do different things, renewable energy, energy efficiency, growing right types of food, and so forth, if those types of people needed an example of how you set it up, over a ten-year period, many just tried everything at once and half of it failed. so, really, we were going around, trying to help people set their -- depending on what they had, therefore, we had to

use their resources -- but we tried to set that up in some fashion. we did 200 of these in 33 states and 2 provinces of canada. it took a lot of time, we had to inspect property, understand resources, and then work with them on what it was that they could actually do to set up their own appropriate technology place as part of their nonprofit work that they were doing. so, that was a major part of my earlier years there. i stopped at 2002, and it has been continuing with more emphasis, more emphasis, both on solar energy, and also on gardening. we had publications got started early. we had -- we were giving visitors the same talk over and over, and found out, well, they were only catching so much of the technology by -- on the fly. so, therefore, we gave them technical papers, and we made 70 of those, on a whole range of

subjects that we were working on. so we had those papers and we begin to send them out to people before the internet came on full speed. but at the same time, we were -- paul gallimore and i, collected, made a book called "healing we made a book called "healing appalachia, sustainable living through appropriate technology" it's the university press of kentucky and it's still -- you can get it, if you care to, googling our doing amazon field. we opened then it was all rural, where we were, 12 miles away in the county seat, we opened a small town demonstration center. took a parking lot, we bought a building, took a parking lot

that was a half acre almost, turned it into a garden, telling people that you can make in your life, you can make what is good in some sense, but even better by trying to grow things on the land in which you have. so, those -- i haven't been watching the different photos that are coming up but hoping that's showing itself in many ways. recent aspi attention has been moving away from fossil fuels. some of our early work was to attack blasting effects on homes in the region by coal mining, coal haul roads. we worked on surface mining and also deep mining issues. but we moved away interest there because we have to have a change. therefore, we put far more emphasis on the positive and that was on solar energy. and so, that has been a major concern of ours. but in the last two or three years, something else has been happening and it's forcing us to

consider sort of what i call negative effects again. and that is, we have a lot of fracking of natural gas and oil deposits in our part of the region. so in doing sort of being concerned about that, we're finding in our local area that they're condensing some of the affluent materials coming from fracking and they're slipping them in to different types of toxic places where -- well, we were already slated with a deposit location that was very near our school, our principal school, and found out that they were slipping from another state, which wasn't allowed from west virginia, they were bringing in this condensate, this material that was heavily radioactive. so our people locally are very concerned about that. as they are about the fact that fracking could come to our

region and we're one which has a lot of car stereos, we have a strong local group going that are environmental in nature. we're really happy how they are trying to defend their property. [applause] thank you, thank you. that's good. we're trying to do also various on site educational practices for the various people. it is always difficult to work on that. a person asked me once, i was talking about composting waste materials and she says, what can i buy to do this? i said, what do you mean? what commercial product is there that i have to start with?

i said, well, a shovel or a spade or something like that. and so, she says, isn't there a tumbler that costs dids 300, $400, don't i have to do something more? and i think we become too commercialized, simple

appropriate technologies can be done by us and they can be done in a way which is, well, physically, enduring to us and it's also something that is a lot cheaper and also does not use as much resource. the -- we have -- we want to constantly return to tourism. and the reason we do is because our region is within a half -- is in a day's drive of half of the american people. and really, we have friendly people, good folks, that really welcome others. we have a tremendously diverse region. we've reintroduced the elk, black bear, turkeys, of course -- too many -- and the deere. we also have really good places for them to do water sports. i live in my parish area is the wilderness area that's red river gorge and a lot of rock climbing occurs and also the natural

bridge of kentucky and that draws many. we draw a million people in our eastern part already, and hope we can draw more as years to come. the -- i did a book with the late kristin joehanssonjohansson, and it was on ecotourism in kentucky. it can be received -- you can buy it from -- on amazon.org. but tourism is one of the areas that is of good -- of great importance to us. and sort of as a conclusion, we need funds, of course. we always do. and that's part of the perennial problem in our public interest work. you people know that. and at the same time, we have great hope for the future. we think that young people are changing. they're not afraid of being appalachian people. we can be poor, but we are also proud of what we have in our past and what we will have in our future. and i think this is being conveyed. we don't have the billions of dollars 0 worth of stuff. i'm not near emphasizing things that were done in a fashion in which some of the earlier ones did. but at the same time, we are people that are trying to make

our future. and i want to say, in conclusion, i'm in the indian summer of my life, probably the older than you can say wolf. i realize that aspi experience must move beyond the rational level. the prescription drug and consumer addictions of our region of the world cannot be solved through purely secular practices, no matter how well intings intingsin intentioned we were all socially adirected to some degrees and need to engage in collaboration. as -- it's 22 12-step program we need recourse to a higher power. without that, our efforts will be in vain. god bless you. [applause] >> thank you he's in the spirit of pope francis, says be of service, be humble, but be bold. that's seeming dichotomous relationship but you can see what they're doing in appalachia that relates to all of that. let's move into the northeast. janet, who i'm known probably 140 years, i think, heads mass mass public research group up there. she has been at it there for 36 years, running initiative and

referendum campaigns and also, by the way, president of the consumer federation of america. but she represents, in my view, need for continuity, for a building of an ethic and a framework for constant action because you lose a bunch of these things. you usually don't win first time out. willie nelson said the early bird might get the worm but it's the second mouse that gets the cheese. always have to let that lay out there a little bit. so enough of this. let's bring up janet from mass perg. >> thank you very much.

thanks so much for the opportunity to speak to you today. it such an honor to be here and huge congratulations to ralph nader on this truly important 50th anniversary. [applause] i was thinking of injecting humor in to my remarks. but all know consumer advocates and can't recall a joke. thank you. i'm going to try in the next 20 minutes to break down 45 years of perg history answering five questions which ralph asked plea to address, one, how and why did it get start? i'm cheating fitting two questions into that one but i'm transparent. in um two, what are the problems we aim to solve? number three, what does our track record look like? number four, how do we do our work?

and number, five, what's next? number one, how and why do the pergs get started? few periods in american history have been suffused with a spirit of civic innovation as early 1970s. new social movements from environmentalism to feminism to consumer movement experimented with new ways to achieve change creating institutions and tools that would make a concrete and enduring difference in people's lives. the pergs were born as product of one innovation, creation by college students of self-funding, self-governing organizations that married the passion and creativity of young people with the naders raiders style expertise of professional staff in service of the public interest. in 1970, a year one of the "time" magazine covers broadcast

the number one domestic problem in our country as student unrest on college campuses the words "student activism" evoked, quote, bomb throwers and building occupiers. but in that same year, ralph nader, who was already a well-known consumer advocate in his own right, co-authored a book with donald ross called "action for a change" the book was an invitation to students to focus time and energy on concrete social problems investigate these problems, expose them, and propose an advocate solutions to them without regard for any ideology

or social theory, beyond the idea that america had more problems than it should tolerate and more solutions than it was using. nader and ross launched a speaking tour of college campuses to promote their concept which they called public interest research groups. soon, dozens of college campuses had perg chapters, students turned off by the factionalism of left on campus were turned on by the opportunity to make a real difference. and of course, college administrators and trustees used to dealing with student groups boycotting classes or occupying buildings or threatening to blow them up were more than happy to get behind the group to do research. chapters took off. in the late 1970s and early 1980s, pergs involved inviting citizen members to the organization through the time-tested tool of door to door canvassing. the action of the organizers and work of thousands of staff, volunteers and members and sore supports over the last 45 years have made america a better place extending critical protections to consume erconsumers, preserving national treasures, giving citizens a meaningful voice in their government and much more. in summary, the right time, the right place, there was a vision and a plan, when enyou mix in hard work and passionate people you get the dna of a great organization. number two, what are the problems we aim so solve? for 45 years pergs have been dedicate to standing up to powerful interests in the

defense of the american people. pundits in media constantly play up the divisions that separate americans, the left versus the right, the rich versus the poor, coastal elites versus denny zans of the heartland. at times there seems little bringing us together. when you talk to the american people, as our organizers do hundreds of thousands of times each year, if neighborhoods, street corners, on the phone, at community meetings and over the internet, you begin to get a more nuanced picture. you find that whether someone spends evenings watching fox news or msnbc, nearly all of us want the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the food our families eat to be healthy and safe. you learn that whether someone supports or opposes government regulation on principle, nearly

reference agrees wall street and main street should play by the same set of rules and that vul vulnerable consumers should be treated fairly. whether you believe in big government or small government, everyone agrees government we have should be transparent in its operations, careful in its use of public monthny and nyny money. pergs's focus on these public interest issues, researching problems, educating the public about them and bringing together diverse coalition of ordinary citizens to create powerful campaigns for pragmatic changes that make people's lives better. that work is more important than ever before. america faces challenges unimaginable to the organizationers in 1970s.

antibiotics that fail to work due to overuse on factory farms, databases hoeding databases holding the most private information vulnerable to hackers, organizations free to give as much as they desire to congressional candidates under the guise of free speech. what remains the same over the decades, we take the words "public interest" literally and solve problems across all constituencies. ok. our track record. this is bragging, so don't tell my kids. if you look back over the decades you not only see an organization of people that is managed to grow and thrive, you see a network that has won hundreds of laws, regulations, executive orders, lawsuits in changes in corporate practices that improved public health, public safety, quality of our environment and strength of our democracy. despite the fact we've grown and learned plenty lessons over the years it's not as if social

change has gotten easier. court decisions like citizens united have made it easier for the wealthiest americans and big corporations to determine who runs and who wins in our elections. and the country's far more polarized than it was when we started. back in the day, republicans were just as likely, if not more likely, to support you on the environment or campaign finance reform or even consumer protect as democrats were. and sadly, that is no longer true in washington, it's getting less true in the states, and it's getting even less true among the you public. however, one of the reasons we keep growing and evolving is to find new ways to win and that's how we've kept winning victoryies for the public environment. california and other states going solar because of victories like our million solar roofs

initiative, consumers across the country who are saving millions of dollars because we fought hard for and won a consumer financial protection bureau to watchdog the credit card companies and big banks. dozens of communities on both coasts are banning plastic disposable bags because of the campaigns that we've helped run. states like oregon that are knocking down health insurance rate hikes thanks to our investigations and advocacy and organizing. cars and trucks getting cleaner and et abouter mileage because of the clean air cap campaigns and the recent adoption of the clean car standards on the federal level by the obama administration. we're proud of this. but our proudest accomplishment is the activist pipeline.

by that i mean, first with perg and our entire network that our organization has been entry point and pipeline for thousands of new activists and organizers. talking about the students who have gotten involved in campus chapters, canvassers who have door to door, the fellows and organizers and at voe indicates and other staff who have learned their craft with us. many of these people are in leadership positions throughout the larger social change sbhunt politics. many in leadership positions within our own network. all add up to our most important and enduring legacy. number four, how do we do it? don't write this down. this is like me telling you my grandmother's secret recipe, ok? first, principles. we've learned to embrace a few time-tested principles when it comes to organizing social change. among the principles are, we are always focused on recruiting. always reaching out to new people, we don't just preach to the choir. we value field by which i mean being out in the field,

organizing at the grassroots, being where the people are because that's where our power is. we value building an organization that we can sustain, not just through next week, next year but the next decade and beyond. we think long term. we value small donors and other members more than we do a few super wealthy donors or foundations. we underpromise and we overdeliver. we do what we say we're going to do and then some. we set clear goals and hold ourselves accountable for reaching them. we focus on winning. we focus on results.

we take a righteous stand on the issues but we are not satisfied with being righteous. we want to win. and we want to make a difference in people's lives. that's what drives us. and we value hard work. that's what happens when driven to accomplish something and win. those are some of our principles. part b is strategies and tactics. one thing we do is separate those, strategies and tactics. it is no the commonplace but it is absolutely key if you want to break through power. we set the goal of the campaign, establish our theory or strategy of how we will reach that goal, and then we pick we pick our tactics. i think it was ralph nader who was the first one i heard talk about those tactics as a tool kit and we like to keep ours

full. organizing, advocacy, research, policy analysis, litigation, ballot initiatives, media outreach, public education, coalition building, socially responsible investing and the latest one on the menu and social media. i'm going to tell you a quick anecdote that brings together a few of the things i've talked about already, including student activism, evolving ways of winning. long story short, in 2014, we launched our campaign to save antibiotics. the center for disease control and prevention says it's a crisis. we're losing antibiotics at an astonishing rate. 23,000 people died last year in hospitals because common antibiotics don't work anymore. why? because of nervous jewish mothers like me whose toddlers got lots of ear infections? even though they would like to think that. the problem is the gross and irresponsible use of antibiotics on factory farms. 70% of the use of antibiotics in this country are on healthy animals on these factories. this must be stopped. fast forward to a big push in our campaign. we're one of many organizations involved. i was there in our war room. so i'm telling it from that point of view. we ramp up to get mcdonald's,

obviously a huge factor in the marketplace of meat in our country. we launch our effort in the fall of 2014. the students plan a social media campaign which includes something called a thunder clap. i don't know about you, but until last year i thought a thunderclap was a weather phenomenon. that is so 20th century. the students scheduled a valentine's day thunderclap which means people agree to send the same message to the same person at the exact same time. 300 social media hits are sent in less than a few hours to mcdonald's ceo. a few weeks later, he announces mcdonald's is phasing out chickens that come from farms that treat with abx. coincidence?

i think not. we get it done with principles, goals, strategies, tactics. and with super sized passion. so where are we going from here? today, the need for civic innovation is as great as ever. while pirg remains committed to the core public interest, principles and strategies that have defined our work over the past decades, the broader movement of which we are apart has broadened in ways we never could have anticipated. in the age of one dimensional communication and historic powerful corporate influence on our democracy, we will use our tools and do something bigger over the next 45 years. while what began on college campuses 45 years ago has grown and inspired a much larger network, it's clear that the institutions of higher learning themselves will be an important factor in the progress that we make as a society. students are no less concerned

about the planet, social justice and the future than they were 45 years ago. as they attempt to make a difference, they face new and different challenges that will require different approaches. for instance, the willingness now of campus administrations to allow students to form, fund, and control their own public interest organizations on campus has steadily declined over the years putting the traditional mechanism for students to establish a pirg chapter out of reach for many. it comes from the same special interests that pirg students challenge in their campaigns is not likely to diminish. declines in state funding for higher education have made colleges and universities only more reliant on support of corporate sponsors and the strings that come attached to that funding. but it presents opportunities for students to organize themselves without relying on the mechanisms of the college administration. indeed indeed, pioneering

students at campuses are using new creative tick tacks to fund a pirg chapter. we're committed to making the most of these tools and in so doing, spark a next wave of public interest advocacy by students. and we expect that creative use of these new tools will not only provide students for students to create institutions. but allow them to be more effective in their advocacy. we will engage tens of thousands of idealists in this ra of corporate wealth on our dcy. i have my own two college students now. while i've been with pirg for more than three decades, that might be the most motivating reason of all for me to keep on. thank you. [applause]

>> all right. now for something of a patron saint of our environmental movement in this country. lois gibbs runs the center for health, environment, and justice. i think that pretty well covers it, don't you? don't know what else you could add to that. and of course rose to prominence in the environmental movement by taking a stand in her home area, love canal, many, many moons ago. she discovered that, you know, people were not willing to stand up, government officials, some of her own neighbors, some of her family, et cetera. they say it's been pointed out a couple times here today that the opposite of courage is not cowardess, it's conformity. lois has always -- she stood up in her own community and then became a symbol that turned other people to her inspiration. because this toxic chemical

fight is constant and it's in just about every community in one form or another and we see it pop up in huge ways, like in flint, michigan, recently. we certainly have it down in texas and the whole louisiana cancer channel down through there. now she's dedicated to helping groups and communities throughout the country and the world taking on these toxic chemical fights. she's assisted more than 11,000 communities and groups in the last several years, winning victory after victory after victory. let's welcome lois gibbs.

>> thank you, jim, one of my favorite thing is breaking through power. i love breaking through power. it's a lot of hard work. but, boy, when we win, i mean, you've heard it all day. there is systemic change, right? i do want to say quickly, when i moved to d.c. after love canal, there was only one person in d.c. who believed in me, and that was ralph nader.

other people said, goes to washington, what are you doing here or something like that. but ralph stood next to me. he stood by me. i'll forever be grateful to ralph to breakthrough that other sort of cultural power if you will that's out there. so thank you, ralph. and let's all give him a round of applause. he's done something for all of us, right? so i love breaking through power. but i have to say i didn't used to when i was gidget, whatever that means. i was a homemaker. i believed in the system. i believed that if there was a problem, something -- someone would come to our aid. some government agency would do

something. how silly. but i believed it. and so we went at love canal, we had 20,000 tons of chemicals. it leaked out of the dump. it was in our communities, for those who don't recall the struggle, because it was quite some time ago. and our children got sick. so we went to the agencies and they said they weren't going to do anything because we don't evacuate communities because of toxic waste. we don't do this. we have no laws. we have no regulations. we are going to do nothing. i thought, well that's not what i learned in school. that's not what my mama and daddy taught me. and so we -- i started knocking on doors and talking to people, and we created local power. and we began to challenge the government, the epa at the federal level, the state department of environmental conservation and department of health and the governor. everybody said, you can't talk to the governor. why not? he's my governor, right? the idea that society has these things that you can do and you can't do and it discourages people. i'm like, no, i'm irish. right? and as a result, we started making -- we started making headway and they were beginning to test and do all these things. but i still believed that they were just not too bright, right? and if we showed and proved that there was a problem and they got it intellectually that set