town meeting tonight in Blacksburg

The Air We Breathe! How safe is it?
What can Virginia Tech, the state of Virginia and we do to improve our air quality?

Monday, September 25 at 7 PM
Blacksburg Town Council Meeting Room, Blacksburg Town Hall

Speakers:
Tim Thornton Growth and Environment reporter for The Roanoke Times for the last 18 months. He has been a journalist for 24 years, the last six years for The Roanoke Times.

Rob Lowe an Environmental Engineer working at Virginia Tech for Environmental Health and Safety Services. His primary responsibilities are environmental compliance oversight.

Billy Weitzenfeld Executive Director of the Association of Energy Conservation Professionals, a non-profit energy education and advocacy organization. He has more than 20 years experience in the energy field including weatherization, energy education and training, legislation advocacy, and residential energy efficiency and conservation applications.

Key developments on verified voting: The above program is presented by the Montgomery County League of Women Voters, which was pivotal during the past national convention in influencing the national organization to take a stronger stand on verified voting. On the latter subject, the following are of particular note:

1. A recent study by the Princeton University Center for Information Technology demonstrated how a Diebold voting machine was easily hacked to steal a mock election, leaving no trace of the theft: itpolicy.princeton.edu/voting

2. An article by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. in Rolling Stone Magazine, describes in detail how, based on a Diebold insider source, the 2004 Georgia Senate and Gubernatorial races were by all indications stolen using precisely this technique. http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/092106R.shtml

Close to a critical mass of US states now has legislation requiring verified voting. Action in upcoming months on the Hugo bill that would require this in Virginia may turn the tide nationally if successful. If anyone is interested in helping with some focused work on this local effort, please stay tuned to the ideapark.org news loop.