My Experience at the Power Shift ‘09 Climate Conference

I was just looking at some photos from Power Shift 2009 and recalling all the energy that was in D.C. last weekend (Feb 27).

12,000 young people went to Washington to address the climate issue — which Iain Keith from Avaaz.org called a “crisi-tunity” in his workshop on email campaigning.

“Crisi-tunity,” a supposedly-Chinese word coined by Homer Simpson, refers to both crisis and opportunity. That is what we face today. We could talk all day about doomsday scenarios, but there is just as much reason to be excited about the visions we have for a sustainable future.

Power Shift workshops

I participated in New Media workshops, because my interest is in using the web to market sustainability-minded organizations and I wanted to learn all I could about that. I attended these workshops:

• Online to Offline Organizing
• Uniting the Network Online: Blogging & Online Networking for Campaign Success
• Broadcast Yourself: From Video to Blogs, Telling Your Story & Listening to Others’ Online
• Your Email Crisi-tunity: Building Your List, Organizing Fundraising & Connecting With Your Base

Largest climate lobby day in history

There were also a couple of breakout sessions, where we talked about issues specific to Florida; and a lobbying training workshop, where we prepared to lobby congress for clean energy. I, along with my fellow North Floridians, spoke with a staffer of Cliff Stearns, the House Representative in our district.

A rally was going on throughout the day on the Capitol building lawn (which was covered in snow), and people everywhere wore green hard hats in support of green jobs. As we dispersed, the city was filled with us in our green hats, so no doubt everyone in D.C. knew about our presence.