Get Informed and Be Ready to Vote 
To paraphrase an old saying, if you are paying attention, you are likely outraged. As you will read in this month’s action alert, there are plenty of ways to turn outrage (or even despondency!) into action, plenty of ways for you to get engaged and join us in demanding a better future for our region.

Of course, a crucial aspect of civic engagement is exercising your right to vote. Click here for a quick way to make sure you are registered to vote. In West Virginia, you must be registered by October 16 in order to vote in the November 6 general election. West Virginians may register online here. And if you haven’t already done so, please be sure to see this blog, West Virginians: Be Registered & Be Ready to Vote, about ID needed at the polling place.

The WV League of Women Voters, a nonpartisan volunteer organization, has videos explaining the two constitutional amendments voters will vote on, as well as assorted voting guides, all housed here. Also see the Our Children, Our Future 2018 Non-Partisan Voter Guide.

Meet the candidates forums are taking place around the state. Your local newspapers are one way to find out when and where these events are taking place. Note that tomorrow, October 4, the LWV hosts a Meet the Candidates event in Cabell County. Later this month, the Huntington-Cabell Chapter of the NAACP will host a candidates forum. Check for updates on our calendar page.

Voting season is the perfect time to get involved in our Clean Elections work, for which we’ve launched the Pro-Democracy, Anti-Corruption Platform. In addition, each Monday in October, WV Citizens for Clean Elections is hosting a screening of Dark Money at 7 p.m. at the Underground Cinema, 230 Capitol Street, Charleston, WV, 25301.

An excellent way to engage with other folks who are thinking about the upcoming election, as well as the next WV Legislative Session, is to come to 
West Virginia Environmental Council’s Annual Meeting and Fall Shindig, this Saturday in Charleston. Details here.

#PetroFreeWV #NoASH
As you may have noticed, we are urging resistance to the proposed Appalachian Storage Hub; if built as our fossil-fuel-funded “leaders” plan, it would mean a massive build out of dangerous underground storage caverns for natural gas liquids, highly polluting cracker plants that would produce planet-choking plastics, a network of pipelines to supply the plants, and an increase in fracking that is already threatening our air, water, land and health. 

Tonight, if you are near Moundsville, WV come learn more about ASH and meet Dustin White and OVEC’s newest staff member, Alex Cole: Public Meeting on Petrochemical Complex/Ethane Storage Projects: Moundsville. No matter where you are, you can help build the massive resistance we need by getting involved in this work; contact dustin@ohvec.org and/or alex@ohvec.org.

OVEC and multiple other grassroots groups based in West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania have been circulating a sign-on letter to our states’ governors, in which we call for an alternative future in the Ohio River Valley, one that is not based on extraction and harm.

Organizations, including national groups, are invited to sign-on here.

Individuals are invited to sign-on to a similar letter, here.

The letters will be part of the Defend Our Water day of action, during which members of the Seneca Nation, native leaders, and allies will gather in Pittsburgh, where the Shale Insight conference will be taking place. There will likely be other actions on the day before and after Defend Our Water day; we will be updating details on our calendar page.The deadline to sign is October 19. 

Upcoming Events
October 3: Public Meeting on Petrochemical Complex/Ethane Storage Projects: Moundsville

October 4: LWV Meet the Candidates Event in Cabell County

October 6: WV Environmental Council’s Annual Meeting and Fall Shindig

October 6-7: National Solar Tour, with plenty of hosts in WV!

Every Monday in October: Screening of Dark Money

October 12: WV Premier! Sandra Steingraber in UNFRACTURED: Free WVIPL/OVEC 2nd Friday Film Night

October 13: Defeat hate! Vote! Huntington-Cabell NAACP Annual Freedom Fund Banquet

October 14: Opening Reception: Builder Levy: Appalachia USA at the Huntington Museum of Art

October 16: Deadline to Register to Vote in General Election

October 19: Deadline to Sign-On to Letter: Yes to Innovation Valley, No to ASH

October 19-22: 2018 Fall Summit on Kayford Mountain

October 22: Huntington-Cabell NAACP Meets the Candidates Event

Check our calendar page for additions, updates and changes. If you have events you would like OVEC to consider posting, e-mail the details to info@ohvec.org. 

October 24: Defend Our Water! Day of Action in Pittsburgh

WOC On(Line)
If you hadn’t already noticed, OVEC’s quarterly newsletter, Winds of Change, is online. Check it out here.

As you read our newsletter and see what we have been up to, please remember that your donations and membership dues help make our work possible.

E-mail info@ohvec.org or call the office at 304-522-0246 to check on your membership status. Use the button below to donate. Thank you!

Oh, and if you shop at Kroger and link your Kroger Plus Card to OVEC, please be certain that link is still active; you need to update it once a year. Details here. 

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