Trip Blog

Daily blog posts from our trip to Washington, D.C. to lobby for climate action and sustainability!
For permission to use the photos that appear in this blog, please e-mail sfspths@gmail.com

Thursday, March 27
Students for Sustainability bus
     We arrived at the park and ride this morning to a group of enthusiastic supporters. Many people from the Jefferson County Democrats, the Port Townsend Food Bank, and Local 2020 showed up to support us. Friends, parents, and other family members cheered us on. The bus was lively all the way to Poulsbo. There we were greeted with a bus that had a capacity of about 25 people. 15 of those seats were already taken. Fortunately, a Kitsap Transit supervisor offered to give the people who could not fit on the bus a ride as well as taking much of our luggage. We made the ferry and had a long walk with our luggage to King Street Station. Amtrak was willing to hold our bags at the station while we went and had lunch.
     We found a quaint Greek restaurant near Pioneer Square. When we returned to the station we met with Michael Foster, who brought two Plant for the Planet ambassadors to the station. They delivered two large posters addressed to Senators Maria Cantwell and Patty Murray, and to President Obama. They also gave us petitions to give to the elected officials from Washington State that we will be meeting with. We really appreciate that Phil Johnson, County Commissioner from District 1, traveled with us to King Street Station. Mr. Johnson also made many of our connections that we will have in DC possible. At King Street Station, we also met with with one of our donors named Thomas Moran. It was a great opportunity to discuss our cause with someone who also believed it.
     We boarded the train at about 4:25 and departed Seattle shortly after. The journey up the sound to Everett was beautiful with the sun setting through the clouds. We headed east out of Everett and headed up the Cascades as it got dark. Amtrak was only able to accommodate us at 8:30 for dinner reservations, but we had a large part of the dining car to ourselves. Chris, our server, did a wonderful job of making experience fun and memorable. A quick ten-minute stop in Wenatchee  at 9:30 concluded the day. We're definitely looking forward to our first full-Amtrak day in the morning!
-Ewan Shortess

Friday, March 28

Here we are, passing by Minot, North Dakota!
Displaying sfs at work.jpgWe just finished dinner and are doing research in the observation lounge. The open prairies of North Dakota are pitch black, aside from the raging fires of the fracking wells.
As we were passing by a fracking flare, a fifth-grade girl from Montana sitting next to us said to her grandmother, "Those are poisoning the earth." After talking to her and telling her our mission, she was eager to fill out one of our petitions. We are exicited to voice her opinion in D.C.
Our trip on the train so far has been an amazing experience and a great time for team bonding. We spent most of our day researching our topics and playing cards to pass the time. We brought our own food onto the train to make breakfast and lunch for the group, which was fun. Amtrak has been very accommodating - especially the waitstaff. Shout out to Chris and Sarah from Amtrak for their excellent service!
Thank you to all our donors, we are so grateful for the support for this trip. We are so excited to arrive in Chicago tomorrow!
-Micah Evalt

Saturday, March 29
Students for Sustainability snowEveryone was pretty beat from the lack of sleep the night before. Ewan got up at 7:30 and everyone else slowly followed suit. Due to freight rail traffic overnight, we were running about two hours behind schedule. We stopped in Minneapolis for a short break and had some bananas. Then we ate breakfast and played games in the observation car. Lunch was sporadic as people took naps. We had a good research work session as we approached Milwaukee. We finished everything we needed to by the time we reached Glenview, Illinois. Students decided to sing songs as we approached Union Station in Chicago. By then the train was running two and a half hours late.
              We took a cab from the station to the Blackstone Renaissance hotel. It's very classy but still reasonably priced. After a little bit of time to freshen up after the long train ride, we headed out for some deep ­dish pizza and evening entertainment. The Jazz club which we were thinking of going to was too expensive, and so we decided to look around for other places. The options were limited by distance and age requirements. Instead, we decided to just have pizza. We went to Lou Malnati's pizza joint, a place recommended by Chris, our dinner server on Amtrak. It was 11:00 by the time we were done. Then we came back to the hotel, played some pool, and decided to call it a day. It sure will be a real relief to sleep in real beds rather than our Amtrak coach seats.
-Ian Hadden

Sunday, March 30
Displaying sq_ph1_033014_130202024_01_sq1l12x6290_01.jpgToday we woke up in real beds, which was a relief after having spent so much time on the train. It was also our first time to have showers in a number of days. We had a lovely breakfast at the hotel. Our train did not depart until 6:30, so we had a few hours to explore the city. We went to the Shedd Aquarium, right on Lake Michigan, which we were able to get into for free thanks to Anne Reichel, a supporter of the aquarium and Students for Sustainability. We also went to the Dolphin Show. The experience showed us up close the ecosystem which is threatened by the effects of ocean acidification.

              We also met up with Juchi Pratt, brother of SFS vice president Stein Pratt. Juchi attends the University of Chicago. He was able to tell us a bit about the city and Chicago life. While walking back to our hotel from the aquarium along the lake, we noticed how much trash was in the water. We came across one particular pile of waste that was floating. Looking closer, we saw that there were four dead ducks and one large dead fish floating in the pile. We were appalled by the lack of cleanliness in the lake.  From the hotel we rode in the taxi to Union Station, where we boarded the train for Washington DC.
-Rilke Rutenbck & Ian Hadden
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Monday, March 31

The scenery was beautiful going up the Youghiogheny River in southern Pennsylvania. Although the trees were bare, the sun shone through and creating a beautiful landscape.
We cleared the summit at Sand Patch at about 9:30 a.m. There was quite a bit of snow on the summit.
We went through cool towns such as Harpers Ferry, West Virginia.
In U.S. History, we all learned about John Brown's raid and we were excited to see an old armory on the hill.
Amtrak picked up speed and we arrived only an hour and fifteen minutes late. Union Station was amazing. Both Amtrak, Virginia Railway Express and Maryland Transit Administration use it. We got to see a palette of Amtrak's equipment, from a brand new ACS-64 locomotive (about 4 months old) to a 66 year old diner car.
Eamonn Clarke (SFS's media representative) met us at Union Station. It was great to see him.
Eamonn flew in from Seattle overnight because he was competing at the Washington State Mock Trial State Championships. The PTHS Varsity team placed fifth.
We also met with Alicia Lee, Amtrak's social media representative.
From Union Station, we headed out to Silver Spring, Maryland to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) headquarters. There we met with James Shambaugh, a management and program analyst in NOAA'S Planning and Programming divisions. He gave us a fascinating presentation using a giant globe to show climate models.
We were able to add some additional foundational components to our position papers. After, we went to NOAA's Gateway program to check out NOAA's history.
We spent the evening going over our topic presentations and getting necessary work done.
Tomorrow we look forward meeting in person with senators Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell.
-Ewan Shortess

Tuesday, April 1
Today we awoke to a delicious continental breakfast provided by Hosteling International.
We were out the door by 9 a.m. en route to the Friends Committee on National Legislation building via the Metro. There we met Emily Wirzba, whom we had spoken with once before in Port Townsend on Skype. She helped us understand the lobbying process and what to expect when meeting with the Senators.
During the meeting we rehearsed a mock lobbying session and we were all feeling confident and anxious afterwards.
After practicing with Emily, we hit the streets of D.C. in search for lunch.
We regrouped outside of the Hart Senate Office Building in preparation for our first meeting with U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA).
Initially we had planned for the meeting to be in her office, but we were told she was currently on the floor voting, so we were escorted to the Capitol Building by a Port Townsend High School grad Nico Janssen! He led us through a series of tunnels connecting the Senate Building to the Capitol Building. We arrived in a lobby adjacent to the floor where the term lobbying originated from.
As soon as Senator Cantwell finished her business on the floor, she greeted us enthusiastically where we were waiting.
We met with her for about 30 minutes and left with the feeling that she was genuinely impressed with the work we have done.
A rewarding feeling after a four day train trip.
After we spoke with Sen. Cantwell, Nico led us back to the Senate Building to the office of Senator Patty Murray (D-WA).
Maybe by coincidence, both of the U.S. Senators representing Washington state had Craisins in their offices. Maybe they both just have good taste.
Sen. Murray greeted us just as enthusiastically as Sen. Cantwell, if not more so.
She presented us with a Environmental Youth Award given by the EPA to Students for Sustainability and allowed a photo to be taken with her and President of SFS, Ewan Shortess.
Unfortunately, Senator Murray was unable to stay due to her busy schedule but we wrapped up the meeting with one of her staff members Anna Sperling.
After both meetings we left the Senate Building with a sense of accomplishment and were pleased with the work we had done.
We spent the remainder of the warm day touring the National Mall including trips to the Washington Monument and several memorials under the moonlight.
-Lily Murock & John Reid

Wednesday, April 2
Today was busy for SFS. A few of us were on the subway by 8:30 AM for a 9 o’clock meeting with one of the staff of Senator Casey from Pennsylvania. Despite the fracking that goes on in Pennsylvania, the staff was very supportive of our efforts. She was mostly interested in Ewan’s story about his grandmother who allowed fracking on her land. He expressed his concern for her safety because of the possibility of her well being contaminated.

While we were drinking coffee in the cafeteria of the Dirkson Senate building, former representative Norm
Dicks came and sat with us. He asked about our club, and congratulated us on our award for District 10. Then we had to rush off to our next meeting with one of Minnesota Senator Klobuchar’s staffers. Klobuchar has a slightly better environmental score than Casey, and her staff member gave us some good advice. He said we need to recruit more people for our club, and the we need to be strategic about how we approach people of different opinions and backgrounds. He told us to be aware that not everyone will be on board with our goals, but if we show them that climate change is directly affecting an aspect of their way of life we will more easily get their support.
-Peri Muellner

Our next meeting of the day was with Representative Derek Kilmer, the representative from our own district. This was more of a recap meeting as we had met with him the week prior in Gig Harbor. He was interested to learn what we had been doing up to that point, and expressed support for the ideas we were promoting.

We skipped lunch to get a tour of the Senate building, and it was really interesting to see the history of the place where we have been lobbying. The tour was amazing yet hurried; we were in a rush to make our meeting with the State department.
-Micah Evalt

In the afternoon, we met with several senior advisors from the State Department Office on Climate Change.  This proved to be an exceptional experience.  The advisors eloquently articulated their plans for combating climate change at the international level, and were very receptive of our plans and ideas.  This session was a highlight, particularly because the office is not tied down by the burden of congressional approval.  The Senior Advisor, Clare Sierawski, offered up the idea of potential State Department internships for some SFS members, an inspiring option for the future.  To finish off the night, we had an exquisite meal at an Indian restaurant.
-Daniel Charlton

Thursday, April 3
            Today was a little more relaxed than the previous two days on Capitol Hill.  Rather than waking up at the crack of dawn, we had the chance to sleep in.  The extra hours of recuperation felt incredible, and left us eager to continue our lobbying efforts.  After several hours of studying, we left the hostel at 11:30 AM for our meeting with Minnesota Senator Al Franken, who had previously starred as a comedian on Saturday Night Live before venturing into politics.  Prior to the 1:00 meeting, we stopped by North Dakota Senator John Hoeven’s office to drop off several pages of research pertaining to fracking.  Senator Hoeven has historically voted against the environment, and so we inquired why he or his staff never returned our calls to set up a meeting.  At Senator Franken’s office we met with one of his lead staffers and discussed a myriad of environmental issues, making sure to thank the Senator for his co-sponsorship of the sustainably progressive Shaheen-Portman Bill.  Meeting with an environmentally-conscious senator was inspiring, and gave us hope for the future. 
-Daniel Charlton

            Following the meeting with Senator Al Franken of Minnesota, the group moved on to a 2:00 PM meeting held with the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ). Compared to the previous interactions with Senators and Representatives, the one with the CEQ was less structured and more discussion based. With a more relaxed air, we were all able to open up more, especially Laura, who provided a very moving speech. Post appointment, the members of SFS went in all directions to explore DC. Some of us explored the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum while others visited the Lincoln Memorial. However, much of our exploration was curtailed due to hunger, tired feet, and a set 6 PM rendezvous time back at the hostel. The boys in the group proceeded to make a dinner of spaghetti and meatballs, a Cesar salad and some delicious bread with fresh garlic. It was intended for just the girls to wash the dishes, but soon everyone joined in, all being in high spirits. After cleaning, we tried to get the group together for a movie but many were tired and we decided to call it for the night. Excited for a White House tour early the next day, we got an early night.
-Stein Pratt

            While part of the group toured various Smithsonian Institutions, Ian, Ewan, and I ended up walking down the mall to the Lincoln Memorial. It was quite an impressive site and it is hard for any photograph to do it justice. From the top of the steps the view back down the mall was incredible, and we could see all the way to the Capitol. Amazing clouds over the mall made a great photo. Walking around to the back of the memorial, we discovered a bridge directly behind it which led to Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia. Just for the sake of it, we decided to walk into Virginia, which took about 20 minutes. We were running short on time by then and took the Blue Line Metro from Arlington back to McPherson Square, the closest station to the hostel. After dinner we spent the night packing and doing laundry to be ready to leave in the morning.
-Eamonn Clarke

Friday, April 4
Today was our last and shortest day in DC. After an early breakfast, we walked down New York Avenue to a side gate to the White House complex. Thanks to a connection set up by Phil Johnson, our county commissioner, we had been given spots on an early tour of the White House, and after clearing security were allowed inside. Our original plan to meet up with the staffer who had gotten us in was squelched when we were unable to contact her, but we still all enjoyed the tour immensley. After the tour we seperated to spend our last four hours exploring DC. Several of us took the Blue Line Metro from McPherson Square to the Pentagon to see the 9/11 Memorial there. The memorial was a truly moving and thought-provoking sight. Walking around the Pentagon and waiting in the station, we enjoyed noticing the different officers, and trying to figure out which one was the highest ranking that we had seen all week.

From the Pentagon we took the Metro to Arlington National Cemetery. A speedy walk to the top of the hill gave us time to visit the Kennedys' graves before going to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier to watch the Changing of the Guard, an amazing display of military precision and respect. A quick walk back down the hill got us to the station right as the train was pulling in, and we made it back to the hostel to grab our luggage, before taking the Red Line train from Metro Center to Union Station, where we grabbed lunch and boarded the Capitol Limited for Chicago.
-Eamonn Clarke

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