Oil Train Week of Action July 6-13, 2014

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Are explosive Bakken crude oil trains coming through your town?  / Actions you can take now!

July 6, 2014 marks the one year anniversary of the first major oil train explosion in Canada which took the lives of 47 people.  The week of July 6-13, 2014 is an international week of action to mark this anniversary and make sure these folk’s lives were not lost in vain.   Your actions should not be limited to this one week as we are dealing with an entrenched oil and rail industry and don’t settle for anything less than the a complete ban on any oil shipped by DOT 111 and DOT 111a cars.

 Actions are being posted on www.stopoiltrains.org

 When you organize a protest please contact us at vancouveractionnetwork@gmail.com

 We have come up with tactics here in Vancouver, Washington to take this from a defensive to an offensive fight against the oil by rail industry.  Please consider using these tactics as they are and will be effective.  If you begin using this tactics please contact us so we can help document your work.  If you need tech support contact us. 

Take care, matt landon with Vancouver Action Network vancouveractionnetwork.blogspot.com

Check out this map to see if oil trains are coming through-- http://priceofoil.org/rail-map/

Oil trains are bad because they have blown up at least 8 times in the last year killing innocent railside residents and polluting the environment.   As the US and Canada have increased their oil extraction and production--and as resistance to oil pipelines becomes more effective--the use of trains to transport oil has skyrocketed, leaving communities vulnerable to explosions, oil spills, and unmonitored oil train air emissions. We must take action now to stop this trend!

Call to Action— Nationwide protests and formation of an International Oil Train Activists movement

This is a call for activists to join in creating an International Oil Train Activists movement and to help organize mass non-violent protests across the North American continent against explosive oil trains.

We have three nationwide protest actions.

1)      First contact your state Emergency Management Agency and fill out a public records request for information which the railroads have provided to the EMA’s in relation to DOT Emergency Order DOT-OST-2014-0067 and which was due by June 7, 2014.

Find your state EMA-- http://www.fema.gov/state-offices-and-agencies-emergency-management

For more info about DOT Emergency Order-- http://www.dot.gov/briefing-room/emergency-order

 Information on public records request in WA--  http://www.mil.wa.gov/about/about_public_records_disclosure.shtml

Here is the request form for Washington state-- http://www.mil.wa.gov/about/documents/mil_public_records_request_form.pdf

Please print the above form and fill in the following information including your name, date, email and signature and return to the WA state EMA or your state EMA.

We have filed an information request here in Washington state and the EMA informed us that the railroad would likely seek a court injunction against our request.  This is GREAT because it means that the railroad is spending between several hundred and several thousand dollars to keep one person from one group from getting this information!  Let’s see how many people we can get to request this information and how much money we can cost the railroads.   We plan to request this information in 49 US states.

When you request info from your state EMA please let us know  vancouveractionnetwork@gmail.com

2)      Since the railroads won’t release their oil train information we can just generate the information ourselves.  You can start a 100% Oil Train Watch in your city, town, or neighborhood by using Twitter on a computer or smart phone.  If you see a 100% oil train Tweet the time, location, direction of train travel, and your state’s abbreviation in the hashtag such as #waoiltrainwatch for Washington state  or #tnoiltrainwatch for Tennessee.  By watching and recording these trains we can be a warning siren for first responders, elected officials and the general public with real time information.  We can also use this information to provide a check on the info the railroads provide to the state EMAs, and on possible total oil train volume violations of air quality permits of current export facilities.

         To view our Train Watching activities go to vancouveractionnetwork.blogspot.com

Let us know you are Tweeting about 100% oil trains at vancouveractionnetwork@gmail.com

3)      The Department of Transportation and Federal Railroad Administration are the two agencies that regulate Hazardous Materials shipping via railroads.  We demand that they immediately issue an Emergency Order halting the hauling of any type of crude oil in the outdated and unsafe DOT 111 and DOT 111a railcars.  By organizing a protest in your own city or state you will be joining in the growing movement to bring a halt to these explosive oil trains before the next city is vaporized, life is lost, or environment spoiled.

The Department of Transportation has the authority to deem the DOT 111 and DOT 111a railcar fleet unsafe for hauling explosive crude oil yet they have been dragging their feet on taking real action.  We demand they take immediate action.  Each state has multiple regional DOT offices and we need protests at each one.

Department of Transportation state/ regional offices and headquarters in Washington DC-- https://fhwaapps.fhwa.dot.gov/foisp/staffnetStateDOT.do

and

Federal Railroad Administration regional offices -- http://www.fra.dot.gov/Page/P0244

Headquarters Washington DC   Region 1 Cambridge, MA Region 2 Crum Lynne, PA Region 3 Atlanta, GA  Region 4 Chicago, IL  Region 5 Fort Worth, TX Region 6 Kansas City, MO  Region 7 Sacramento, CA  Region 8 Vancouver, WA

 4)       Consider attending the Washington Oil Train Summit August 22-23, 2014 at Evergreen State College in Olympia, WA.  More info at http://washingtonoiltrainsummit.blogspot.com  This summit will mainly be focused on solidifying the WA Oil Train Activists actions but we are inviting representatives from other groups to attend as well so that we can grow the International movement.

Thanks Matt Landon with Vancouver Action Network vancouveractionnetwork.blogspot.com