Cascadia today: Will Tacoma ICE camp be sold to feds? Union at Vancouver Amazon warehouse under threat + hiking with drag queens in Portland

Concern that ICE camp in Tacoma will be sold to feds

KUOW reports on speculation that ICE is looking to purchase the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma from the private company GEO Group. The ICE camp, which has been at the center of hundreds of complaints of unsanitary food, inadequate medical care, and sexual abuse by guards, seems to fit the criteria ICE is applying to purchase of privately-run immigrant concentration camps. The main reason for the purchases is to avoid enforcement of state laws. Washington state department of health inspectors have continually been denied access to NWDC and have fought to gain access in the courts. In related news, 140 detainees at the NWDC are currently on a hunger strike to protest lack of food and medical care.

Join La Resistencia and the Japanese American social justice organization Tsuru for Solidarity from 1-3 pm, Saturday Aug 15 for a protest and rally at the NWDC at 1623 East J Street, Tacoma. It's time to shut down the ICE camp in Tacoma.

Mapping Cascadia's future power grid

Whether or not the AI data center boom turns into a bust, it's clear Cascadia is going to need more electric power in the future, and a major upgrade to its transmission line system. Washington State Standard looks at a new report that finds that Washington, Oregon, Idaho and western Montana need to add 11,000 megawatts of power by 2032 to meet the demand, which could double by that time. The report estimated this will cost more than $2 billion. Unfortunately, the proposed plan includes new fossil gas power plants. With wildfires burning out of control thanks to climate change, that's a non-starter. Washington's Clean Energy Transformation Act, passed in 2019, requires Washington generate all electricity with renewable energy by 2045. Unfortunately, the gas industry, led Puget Sound Energy, is trying to flaunt that law and build fossil gas plants.

Hiking season runs into wildfire season

The Washington Trails Association has info on hiking areas closed in Washington state by wildfire activity, including some areas in Mount Rainier (Tahoma) national park, parts of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness, and many areas outside of Entiat and Chelan in central Washington. In other outdoor recreation news, Columbia Insight reports that even though the Oregon legislature banned drones in Oregon state parks, multiple loopholes exist that allow the annoying buzzing craft to fly in some parks. And here's one piece of legislation I can get behind: an Oregon lawmaker is proposing to make all Oregon state parks free to residents. I'd go one further and make them free to all visitors. Parks and libraries should be free to all.

Unionized Amazon warehouse in Vancouver threatened with decertification

The only unionized Amazon facility in Canada, a warehouse known as YVR2 in the Vancouver suburb of Delta, is in the midst of a heated campaign to decertify the union, the Tyee reports. Amazon has engaged in blitz of union-busting tactics at the facility, including numerous ill-founded complaints to BC's Labour Relations Board against the union, hiring additional workers and attempting to convince them not to join the union, and other union-busting tactics. All Amazon facilities need to be unionized. If you're an Amazon employee, learn more here.

Hiking with drag queens in Portland

OPB reports on the whimsical program known as "Drag Me Outside," in which drag queens lead hikers on walks in Portland parks such as Mount Tabor, while sharing knowledge of plants, birds, and local history.

“My favorite bird is the Cedar Waxwing. They will pick berries off of plants and feed them to each other and pass them around. “If they eat too many overripe berries, they will be lying on the ground drunk. – Effemera Gendera, hiking guide for Drag Me Outside

Thanks for reading! Keep loving and keep fighting. -Andy