Nuclear Free-Zone film series and speakers coming to Takoma Park

 

NUCLEAR SAFETY

PROBLEMS AND POSSIBILITIES - THEN AND NOW

Nuclear Free Takoma Park Committee

Spring Film and Discussion Series

Takoma Park Community Center Auditorium

7500 Maple Avenue, Takoma Park MD

Tuesday, April 5 – 7:30 p.m.

Paul Jacobs and the Nuclear Gang

This path-breaking film chronicles reporter and Mother Jones founder, Paul Jacobs’ exploration of the health hazards of low-level radiation as they affected service men and civilians living downwind from the Nevada test site or near the site of explosions in the Pacific, and farmers living around the Rocky Flats Colorado Plant which produced plutonium triggers.  The film includes interviews with scientists who tried to warn the public.  Among the film’s awards are an Emmy (1980), and the George Polk Award for Investigative Journalism on TV.

                                        

Speaker:      Robert Alvarez, Senior Scholar, Nuclear Policy Project, Institute for Policy Studies.

Current research focuses on spent fuel storage ponds and the Japanese emergency

Tuesday, April 12 – 7:30 p.m.

Deadly Deception: General Electric, Nuclear Weapons and Our Environment

Driven by intensely personal testimony and painstaking research this film exposes a shocking pattern of negligence and misinformation spanning several decades. Nine months after this film won the 1991 Oscar for Best Short Documentary, GE pulled out of its work with the nuclear weapons industry and Corporate Accountability International, (formerly Infact) organizers of the GE boycott declared victory in their grassroots campaign.

Speakers:   Leo Slaggie, Deputy Solicitor, Nuclear Regulatory Commission

                    Cindy Folkers, Radiation Health Specialist, Beyond Nuclear

Tuesday, May 10 - 7:30 p.m.

The Return of Navajo Boy   

This film’s focus on a family struggling with the effects of Uranium mining on tribal land confronts several issues in the industrial production of nuclear power including environmental racism and the denial of retribution for continued abuses. It was included in the 2000 Sundance Film Festival and aired that same year on the PBS documentary series, Independent Lens won Programmer’s Choice Award of the Planet in Focus Festival. Currently it is being used as an educational tool by the Indian Health Service.

Speaker:        Arjun Makhijani, President, Institute of Energy and Environmental    Research  

                                                     Linda Gunter, International Specialist, Beyond Nuclear