Activists Occupy Montana Capitol Building vs Tar Sands

Break­ing News: Activists Occu­py Mon­tana Capi­tol Build­ing Demand­ing Gov­er­nor Schweitzer Pub­licly Oppose Key­stone XL Pipeline and Tar Sands Mega­load Ship­ments

Activists from across the nation and around the world join Mon­tana and Ida­ho res­i­dents in demand­ing that Schweitzer final­ly stand up to “Big Oil.”

On the morn­ing of July 12th, six activists from Earth First! and North­ern Rock­ies Ris­ing Tide have risked arrest by occu­py­ing Gov­er­nor Schweitzer’s office in an act of non-vio­lent civ­il dis­obe­di­ence. The activists have locked their arms in a mock oil pipeline made out of PVC plas­tic pipe. In the wake of the Sil­ver­tip spill, Gov­er­nor Schweitzer has pub­licly chas­tised Exxon Mobil, while simul­ta­ne­ous­ly con­tin­u­ing to pro­mote the con­struc­tion of the Key­stone XL pipeline, mega­load ship­ments bound for the Alber­ta Tar Sands and oth­er extreme fos­sil fuel projects through­out the state.

“If the Gov­er­nor has his way, Mon­tana will be trans­formed into what is essen­tial­ly an ener­gy extrac­tion colony for Big Oil. The Sil­ver­tip spill is sim­ply a short pre­view of what this would mean for the lives and liveli­hood of all Mon­tanans,” says Great Falls native Peter Dolan, one of the eight occu­py­ing the office.

Activists inside the Capi­tol are also demand­ing that Schweitzer stand up to Tran­sCana­da and oth­er inter­na­tion­al crim­i­nal orga­ni­za­tions by pub­licly oppos­ing Alber­ta Tar Sands expor­ta­tion. This project is wide­ly known as the most destruc­tive ener­gy process on the plan­et by lead­ing envi­ron­men­tal orga­ni­za­tions. Accord­ing to a recent report by Uni­ver­si­ty of Nebras­ka-Lin­coln engi­neer­ing pro­fes­sor John Stans­bury, nei­ther Tran­sCana­da nor the reg­u­la­tors eval­u­at­ing the pro­posed Key­stone XL pipeline have prop­er­ly con­sid­ered the risks. Stans­bury said Tran­sCana­da under­es­ti­mat­ed both the fre­quen­cy of spills on the pipeline and the sever­i­ty of the worst-case sce­nario spills.

“As the recent Exxon­Mo­bil pipeline dis­as­ter has made clear, Gov­er­nor Schweitzer is attempt­ing to turn Mon­tana into an extrac­tion state, while at the same time pub­licly pro­claim­ing his sup­posed sup­port for clean ener­gy, pro­tect­ing the envi­ron­ment and build­ing healthy com­mu­ni­ties. It’s one or the oth­er. You can’t be clean and dirty at the same time,” accord­ing to Bozeman’s Eri­ca Dos­sa, who also took part in the action.

Earth First! was named in 1979 in response to a lethar­gic, com­pro­mis­ing and increas­ing­ly cor­po­rate envi­ron­men­tal com­mu­ni­ty. Earth First! takes a decid­ed­ly dif­fer­ent approach towards envi­ron­men­tal issues by using all the tools in the tool­box, rang­ing from grass­roots orga­niz­ing and involve­ment in the legal process to civ­il dis­obe­di­ence. North­ern Rock­ies Ris­ing Tide is the Mis­soula based chap­ter off the inter­na­tion­al, decen­tral­ized, grass­roots move­ment Ris­ing Tide. They are an all-vol­un­teer net­work of groups and indi­vid­u­als who pro­mote local, com­mu­ni­ty-based solu­tions to the cli­mate cri­sis and take direct actions to con­front the root caus­es of cli­mate change.

North­ern Rock­ies Ris­ing Tide -

Fight­ing for things in the North­ern Rock­ies

www.NorthernRockiesRisingTide.org

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_vd4QC_rB4

HELENA, Montana—Check out this new short film from the Earth First! occu­pa­tion of the Mon­tana capi­tol against the Tar Sands and oth­er indus­tri­al ener­gy infra­struc­ture in the North­ern Rock­ies, fol­low­ing the 2011 Round Riv­er Ren­dezvous.

Five peo­ple locked down, 20 danced on the governor’s table, 70 peo­ple occu­pied the office, busi­ness as usu­al was dis­rupt­ed! If you can, please con­sid­er donat­ing a bit of mon­ey to the arrestee’s legal fund HERE