Penn State University , Stuckeman Family Building, Jury Space

Lorelei Scarbro, community organizer, alternative energy advocate and opponent to MTR (mountain top removal) in West Virginia will speak at Penn State University, Tuesday, March 15, 2011. Scarbro is a native West Virginian and coal miner’s widow from the Coal River Mountain region of the state. She has become a spokesperson for diversifying “power”, i.e. energy and community power in the mono-economic environment of Boone and Raleigh Counties. The costs-benefits and private rights defense to implement MTR and strip coal mining is a major source of debate in national economic development and environmental circles.In Pennsylvania, it parallels issues in discussions surrounding the Marcellus Shale extraction ventures in the Northern Tier Counties.
She has led protesters to Charleston, West Virginia’s capital and reminded then governor Joe Manchin that West Virginia is the “mountain state not the extraction state”. In her fight against MTR and the leveling of West Virginia’s last major mountain range, she has promoted an alternative economic development plan for a sustainable wind farm on Coal River Mountain, met with government and EPA officials, and has been arrested in protest vigils.
In the standoff between advocates for sustainable alternatives to mountain top removal and those employed in the surface extraction industry in West Virginia, Scarbro is also working to create a “Third Space”, a regional community center focused on healing and building community through regional arts and culture and job development.
Lorelei will discuss the current status of MTR in West Virginia, the prospects for alternative and sustainable energy production in the state, and community building for education and social action.

COMMENTS BY: MICHAEL ARTHUR (Penn State Professor and Department Head of Geosciences) & PAUL WHITEHEAD (Dept. of Labor Studies)

This event is sponsored by the Hamer Center for Community Design and Laboratory for Public Scholarship and Democracy.