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Independent and Progressive Journalism and Community for Central Pa.

Voices 2012 Fun!Raiser March 19th at India Pavilion

March 15, 2012 - 11:16pm — voicesweb

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CSA Fair photos

March 2, 2012 - 10:13pm — voicesweb
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Hertel of Greenmore Gardens explains CSA details to a fair goer.Dave Sandy and Sara Eckert of Healthy Harvest Farm offer cheese samples to fair goers.
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Bethany Spicher-Schonberg talks to fair goers about the Plowshare Produce CSA.A fair goer asks questions of Dave Ruggiero of Village Acres.

Original link to the fair, for background info:
CSA Fair, learn more about Community Supported Agriculture memberships and local foods

Board of Trustees faces calls for reform

March 2, 2012 - 9:14pm — voicesweb


John Surma (right), vice chair and spokesman for the Board of Trustees, announces the firings of Coach Joe Paterno and President Graham Spanier on Wednesday, Nov. 9, 2011. Steve Garban, 2010-2011 chair of the Board, sits to his left. Photo by Sean Flynn

by Elizabeth Timberlake-Newell
with Alanna Pawlowski

Before November 2011, Penn State’s Board of Trustees exercised their powers of governance with little fanfare. They publicly met six times a year to discuss the university’s budget and to listen to reports from the president and Board committees.

Then former football defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky was arrested for alleged sexual abuse of children, and two Penn State administrators were charged with perjury. In the week preceding the Nittany Lions’ last home football game, the Board made a pair of fateful decisions that thrust them into the national spotlight: they dismissed Penn State’s president Graham Spanier and football coach Joseph Paterno. 

Many Board members have since spoken out about the careful consideration they said went into those decisions. 

Board member Keith Eckel told Voices that the Board “made a decision not based on legalities but our responsibilities and came to the conclusion that the president could not lead through this situation.”

According to other Board members, the same care and deliberateness was applied to Paterno’s dismissal.

“The same decision was made about Joe Paterno [as made about Spanier],” explained Board member Keith Masser. “We couldn’t have the team focused on the Sandusky case when they were not involved in it.”

This decision set off a firestorm of controversy among students, alumni and the larger Penn State community. The night Paterno was dismissed, students rioted in the streets, overturning a news van and damaging public and private property. 

However, the response of alumni who have called for reform of the Board of Trustees may ultimately be more far-reaching. Read more »

Lend us your voices

March 2, 2012 - 9:05pm — voicesweb

     By William Saas
     At a recent meeting, the VOICES editorial staff huddled around the following question: 
     What, exactly, is VOICES?
     The result was two-hours-plus of enthusiastic give-and-take. There was talk of demographics (who reads us?),  distribution (where can people find us?) and the future (where are we going?). Each question begat productive tangents, each tangent begat deeper questions. To stay sharp, we drank lots of coffee.
     I come to State College via Las Vegas, and, as I shared with the editorial staff, I had no idea what VOICES was when I first picked it up in Fall 2010. It certainly wasn’t the kind of weekly I’d grown used to back home (as another editor duly pointed out, we don’t advertise “escorts” in our backpages). Not that that’s a bad thing.
     Point is, my concept of what VOICES is and can be is not fixed yet. I’m still in the flirty getting-to-know-you phase.
     Still, as I sit writing this late Thursday evening in the VOICES office, deep in the bowels of the soon-to-reopen Webster’s cafe, I wonder if the editors’ discussion was not a bit misguided (if also with its heart squarely in the right place). 
     Perhaps a better approach would be to ask, here and now: 
     What is VOICES to you, the reader?
     Of course, you know that we are a non-profit monthly news and culture magazine. You know that we are mostly volunteer-run (and that you can attend our weekly open writer meetings). And you know, we hope, that we offer a unique and distinctive voice in the midst of a largely one-sided media scene. 
     These are all, in a sense, the givens. So what else is there? You tell us. 
     In coming months we’d like to field and publish your thoughts on VOICES in the opinion section. What is VOICES to you? What would you like to see in the future?
     Lend us your voices! E-mail oped@voicesweb.org with your thoughts.

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Mangan’s works evoke spirit of nature

March 2, 2012 - 9:02pm — voicesweb

John Mangan’s works evoke spirit of nature
The landscape portrayed through Mangan’s paintings reflects his annual, personal travels to Ireland. Here the Coomassig Mountain is represented as part of the beauty of untamed lush land, and a flowing waterfall. Photo by Rachel Camaerei

by Rachel Camaerei

If art is a lens, then the one fashioned by John Mangan captures his cultural and personal relationship to nature in both his ancestral Ireland and the rural scenery of Central Pennsylvania. Mangan does this with a profound sensitivity to the ancient spirit guides of his landscapes. Read more »

PASA speaker tackles Marcellus leases

March 2, 2012 - 8:55pm — voicesweb

by Sean Flynn

Property owners who lease their land for Marcellus shale drilling face any number of practical concerns — allegations of poisoned water and air are abundant — but getting ripped off by the gas company can add insult to injury. 

Professor Ross Pifer spoke to a packed room about the legal issues surrounding natural gas leasing in a presentation about the legal issues related to natural gas drilling at the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture’s (PASA) Farming for the Future conference in February. Pifer is the director of Penn State's Agricultural Law Resource and Reference Center, which provides the public with information and resources on agricultural law and policy issues.

Without knowing how to conduct informed negotiation, he said, landowners can miss valuable opportunities. For instance, gas companies are sometimes willing to issue payments at various stages of the drilling process beyond standard royalty payments.  Read more »

Reclaiming domesticity from a consumer culture

March 2, 2012 - 8:50pm — voicesweb

by Lucy Bryan Green

Shannon Hayes, author of “Radical Homemakers: Reclaiming Domesticity from a Consumer Culture,” was one of the featured speakers at the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture conference in February. After earning a PhD at Cornell University, Hayes rejected a career in academia in order to raise her family on a farm in upstate New York. Her book reviews the history of domesticity and feminism, critiques America’s cultural and economic systems and examines the lives of men and women across the country who have also made the decision to become “radical homemakers.” She sat down with VOICES on Feb. 3 to discuss radical homemaking. 

VOICES: Your book delves into the lives of a fairly diverse bunch of people in terms of background, age, sex, geographical location and living situation. What makes them all “radical homemakers”?

Hayes: These people are all living by four tenets: ecological sustainability, social justice, family and community. And they’re not allowing the conventional pressures of our culture to bully them out of these tenets. … If you’re choosing to live by those ideals, you may not have as much money coming in. [Radical homemakers] make up for any shortfall by reclaiming domestic skills that enable them to live on a single income or less. 

VOICES: Can you describe the process of becoming a radical homemaker?

Hayes: I noticed that everyone who [became a radical homemaker] went through these three different stages. … Basically the renouncing phase is they go through this period where they question everything around them: Why am I doing this? Why am I working this way? Am I happy? Am I not happy? Is this what I set out to do and is this my greatest purpose on earth? And am I making a change with what I’m doing. …  Read more »

Department of Welfare to reinstate asset test

March 2, 2012 - 8:47pm — voicesweb

by Sierra Dole

This May, Pennsylvania plans to assess eligibility for food stamps based on a household’s savings and assets such as cash, checking and savings accounts, stocks, bonds, second vehicles and boats. While the reinstatement of the asset test—which was last implemented in 2008—is intended to ensure that only those who most need the help will receive it, many believe that it will only hurt people who are already struggling to get by. Read more »

Alcohol sales reform stalls in Assembly

March 2, 2012 - 8:43pm — voicesweb

Alcohol sales reform stalls in Assembly
Shoppers walk out of the Wine & Spirits shop in Hamilton Square Wednesday after waiting in a long check-out line. The Hamilton Square location is one of six in Centre County and ranked fortieth in sales last year out of over 620 stores state-wide, according to a report by the PLCB. Photo by Alanna Pawlowski

by Alanna Pawlowski

Despite pressure from the governor, attempts by state legislators to change alcohol sales laws in Pennsylvania have stalled. When Tom Corbett took office as governor, he made the privatization of the state liquor system one of his goals, but those for and against privatization have been at a virtual stalemate for a year. 

The debate centers around what system will create more state revenue, maintain more jobs, be more convenient for customers and—especially in Centre County—mitigate more social problems. 

The amended liquor privatization bill, H.B. 11, drafted by House Majority Leader Mike Turzai (R-Allegheny), no longer calls for full-scale privatization of the state’s wine and liquor stores.  Read more »

The March 2012 issue of VOICES is out!

March 1, 2012 - 6:40pm — voicesweb

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