In March 2011, there was a trial going on downtown, and I went there for a radio assignment. As I drove by, there were hundreds of protestors on the Main Street sidewalks, so I expected a great deal of rancor and ill sentiment when I got out of the car and started recording. But that wasn’t the case. The protesters weren’t picketing or shouting demands of the government. Instead, they were singing, and every protestor was upbeat and smiling.
Of course, this was the trial of Tim DeChristopher, the activist who messed up a controversial oil lease auction at the end of the Bush administration. After just one day’s worth of monkey wrenching, DeChristopher constructed a movement around him — a movement built on song and embrace instead of animosity. The result was Peaceful Uprising, the organization he co-founded.
“I remember my first meeting with Peaceful Uprising,” says Henia Belalia, the organization’s director. “They ended it in song. I was blown away.”
DeChristopher was silenced by a two-year prison sentence, but the effect of his actions, direct or not, are being felt in Salt Lake City today. Climate change awareness is at an all-time high in Utah, and this issue of Wasatch Magazine chronicles the repercussions.
Here at the U, researchers are traveling the globe to understand the effects of global warming on ice caps and weather patterns. You might not have noticed it, but your favorite ski resort is likely implementing sustainability measures such as locally sourced food and compressed natural gas snowcats. Both of these trends are covered in our pages.
And, of course, we take a look at DeChristopher, who faces an uncertain future after he finishes his sentence on April 21. He’s not the only one with cloudy skies ahead. Peaceful Uprising, the organization that lived vicariously through DeChristopher in its early years, faces a potentially awkward transition. Its founder and poster boy will be freed, but he might not be a part of its day-to-day actions.
Utah’s climate, both physically and politically, is changing, and a lot of the credit goes to the former U student who simply raised a paddle at an auction two years ago.