I have two spectacular show ideas that are of interest to everyone I know. First, the life of Corbin Harney, a hero in the fight against divine strake and nuclear testing. Second, the documentary, Trespassing, on the same topic which was 9 years in the making, banned at most film festivals and then regaled with numerous awards. Links are included below.
Watch a powerful clip of Corbin praying for the aboriginal land and a trailer for the film.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AbrlqoLdx4%20

Corbin Harney, Western Shoshone spiritual leader and political activist, passed away on July 10th 2007 from cancer.
You may know he and his tribe were instrumental in stopping Divine Strake at the Nevada test site. He traveled the globe to speak against the hazards of nuclear fallout and radiation pollution including at the UN in Geneva. He was known for his traditional healing songs which reverenced the life in all things and all things that give us life. He carried those healing songs to regions as far away as Kazakhstan where Russia conducted its nuclear testing and the water is poisoned with radiation. He authored two books and founded a traditional healing center.
You can find all the info and contacts you will need at Shundahai.org. We need heroes to emulate in this time of environmental crisis.
I live in Salt Lake City. My grandmother who lived in southern Utah died of cancer as a result of nuclear fallout. This is a story to inspire and incite all Utahns.

Posted by Tamara Robinson, Thursday July 26th, 2007 @ 5:45 pm

Where is Salt Lake City's water inventory?

How can one operate an 83 million dollars utility without an inventory transparent to the public & city council members to use to make informed decisions?

252 million was spent to build a water treatment plant at the point of the mountain. Without an inventory, how does one know what water will be treated with the new capacity?

GRAMA Request January 26, 2006 : “15-The amount of water in acre-feet Salt Lake City claims its owns within 10,000 acre-feet.” “No record,” :Salt Lake City water department response.

GRAMA Request July 2, 2007: “1. The amount of “surplus” water sold outside city limits for the time period 1950 thru 2006.” “No record,” Salt Lake City water department response.

GRAMA Request July 2, 2007: “2. The gross amount of money billed for each year” “No record,” Salt Lake City water department response.

We don't seem to be able to get good numbers from the water department. Perhaps KUED could challenge the SLC water department to post their water inventory on its website.

We have a 10 minutue question video clip with some good questions on water issues on Utahwater.net. Plese contact me if you have further questions.

Posted by Evan Johnson , Tuesday August 21st, 2007 @ 3:53 pm

I recently found out that November is transgender awareness month. I also learned about a non-profit group called Transgender Education Advocates (TEA) that provides education and participates in (also new to me) National Day of Remembrance on Nov. 20th. I consider myself to be well informed but this was all new to me. I think the "T" in LGBT isn't covered much and could use some exposure. TEA is an affiliate of the Utah Pride Center. The website is www.teaofutah.org

Posted by Jennifer Morgan, Wednesday November 7th, 2007 @ 10:22 pm

My name is Jerry Reed if Utah NOW or anyother program would be interested in doing a segment on the issues faced with gifted resources and the lack of theses resources available to people in Utah. My family and I are a certainly educated but lower income and have four children who are all qualified for MENSA and the ten and nine year old are in highschool as well as college Algebra through SLCC. And because of our circumstance we have learned a fair sum of information concerning the needs of parents and what can be done to meet these needs inspite of the fact it is virtually unsubsidised by local government. However this is a challenging road to travel and it is virtualy an unmanned front in public education. The following is a clip of a story they did on Darius and our program please give it a look and see if we can have a real dialog about this. If so I would certainly want to be involved as an educator, researcher and parent on the frontlines of this issue.Thank you for your time this is a real issue that no one is doing anything about. These bright young people are being left by the way side simply by the virtue of their ability not demand alot from our educators in terms of the curriculum being offered.

Posted by Jerry Reed , Wednesday February 20th, 2008 @ 3:40 pm

It would be lovely and impactful if Utah NOW would run information about suicide statistics and prevention efforts in Utah. Suicide is the #3 cause of adolescent death nationwide, and is the #2 cause of death to Utah's youth ages 14-25. My son was a statistic. I took his death and made it into a book, Blessings In The Mire. The book evolved into a website, and now into a non-profit dedicated to the prevention of suicide. We save lives and we cannot do it alone. YOU can help simply by spreading awareness of this dire issue.

Posted by Jan Deelstra , Thursday June 5th, 2008 @ 8:54 pm

Dear Utah Now,

I believe a program exploring sexuality education would be both timely and relevant, given public discussion in Utah since January.

Since the first of year, we have had a number of issues come up around adolescents and sexuality in the public conversation - from moving the Blue Boutique, to teens sending nude photos of each other on their phones to the teacher in Heriman. In addition, Utah is experiencing an increase in STIs. Nationwide, STIs and teen pregnancy are on the rise.

In Utah, several churches, such as Holladay United Church of Christ and First Unitarian and South Valley Unitarian, offer comprehensive sexuality educaiton programs to our youth (and adults!). As one of the instructors at Holladay, I would welcome the opportunity to help create the program and to offer a unique, faith based perspective on sexuality and sexuality education.

Posted by Glenden Brown , Tuesday June 10th, 2008 @ 12:24 pm

I feel a show on what can be done to specifically improve the academic achievement of our Hispanic learners would be very beneficial. I have a number of excellent resources/contacts when you are ready to do this ptogram. THANKS!

Posted by Barbara Lovejoy , Saturday June 14th, 2008 @ 9:03 am

I enjoyed your profile and interview of artist Brian Kershisnik.

Rural Utah seems to have a wealth of accomplished and very talented artists. I would love to see more profiles of these individuals. I can think of a handful here in tiny Garfield County.

Thanks and best.

Posted by Bowdie Pollock, Sunday June 22nd, 2008 @ 12:26 pm

It seems to me that there is a sort of movement going on in the U.S. around our connection with food and even more so with our ownership of our food sources. More people are gravitating to local food sources and slow foods, bet there seems to be even less talk about the growing number of people, like myself, that are moving toward even greater control over our food by growing, harvesting and preserving much of our own foods, and raising small animals such as chickens or rabbits for food and "inputs" for our gardens. I'm on only 1/4 acre in a very suburban area of Syracuse UT and still manage to farm it quite well and increase it every year.
I read regularly on blogs and web sites around the country about this move towards urban homesteading and wonder how Utah fairs in that movement.

You can check out sites like http://www.freedomgardeners.org (where you can find me listed as CornerGardener), or KitchenGardeners.org for instance to see the type of things going on. Or please contact me. I'd love to talk about it.
P~
http://apaetoday.blogspot.com

Posted by Paul Gardener , Monday August 4th, 2008 @ 4:18 pm

I would like to propose a show featuring music and the brokering of peace in the world. After performing 50 years, performances in the Middle East, Europe, Asia, The West Indies, Central America, South Seas, Australia, Canada and all over the USA with specific vedio and interview in the Middle East, I am prepared for a very informative and exciting show. Demonstrating the reality that music can move souls to peace, countries to peace, varied religions to peace, people of varied color and economic status to peace and on and on is very important to reveal. Music is one of the most understood mediums of peace yet perhaps the most under-utilized medium in the world at large. It trumps political, social and religious differences. I hope we can do a show all about this with video, live performance by me and others plus testimonials from everyday people at large from various parts of the world.

Posted by Marvin Goldstein , Sunday November 23rd, 2008 @ 7:25 pm

Very little information could be found about the state and directions of today’s serious (or so called academic) music. Is classical music dying? How is music understood today? Will the technology eliminate the need of life music? What is the future of music? Should the principles of music education change? Why today the word composer, and word songwriter means different things? Is there any ways to break the huge gap between serious and popular music? The concept of “junk” music as a result of music “obesity.”

These are some questions that many people are involuntarily asks themselves, but few may have the answers. I am convinced that the topic is worth discussing, and will continue to be of great interest.

It would be nice to invite to the show not only the professionals, but also music lovers, who do not necessarily have the music background. In such a way, the dialog, rather than monologue, will develop into exciting program.

As a composer, working in many genres, I can contribute by finding the interesting talkers and providing the audio examples.

Posted by Igor Iachimciuc, Monday March 2nd, 2009 @ 1:32 am

May is National Foster Care month and I think it would be beneficial for viewers to learn about the foster care system and the need for families. A round-table discussion with current foster parents, alumni of foster care, and representatives from various foster care agencies could be beneficial (Utah Foster Care Foundation, Rise, Utah Youth Village, etc.)

Posted by Casherie Bright , Sunday April 5th, 2009 @ 8:43 pm

"The Profit in Preservation."

The current Ken Burns series highlights that most every attemp to create a National Monument or Park was opposed by interests of one kind or another. The loss of imagined profit from exploitation seems always to be the #1 reason given.

Many reasons against preservation, stated and emotional/unconscious, could be discussed about the essentially same debate today over wilderness preservation, grazing, mineral extraction and the like. The question of local economics seems to remain the key.

I propose a program examining the history of older national "set-asides" and the impacts on local economies long term. Do preservation jobs and visitor/tourist support businesses out-weigh the value of cattle or coal in the long term? Does the rising popularity of place and the resultant rise in property values and the influx of population by monied outsiders not pay off?

I would speak if asked about the intangible capital of the human heart and spirit. If ignored, to not invest that in natural beauty will cause the loss of whole civilizations. This can be seen in the histories of explotation's fallout on places and populations. It is awful and abundant. Perhaps that could be part of the discussion, too.

It may be too involved a discussion to explore the small fears that so largely drive popular opposition and the associated political pandering. Closed rural communities foster individual fears of change, outsiders and imagined loss of control. I am empathetic, but it is un-democratic to let such unfounded small fears drive policy that costs our whole nation spiritual and spendabil cash. Placated fears, if given legitimacy, damage the frightened by metastatic enevitability. The verbal denial of such fear driving behavior means nothing when the associated behavior is obvious. No person benefits from exploitation. Only inhuman corporations are fed on the souls of those they should serve.

Thank you for your consideration.

Posted by Paul Williams, Wednesday September 30th, 2009 @ 6:06 pm

What's the deal with Utah's municipal courts? Afer living in SLC for 14 years we moved to suburbia and this week I find a jury summons in my mailbox for the Salt Lake City Justice Court. So I wonder how can I be considered an eligible juror for a municipality in which I enjoy no right of sufferage? What right does an employee (municipal judge) of Salt Lake City Corp have in compelling me, a nonresident of the city, to make myself available as a juror in that city's municipal court. What tortured reading of the Utah Constitution allows this to happen? After searching the internet for answers to this paradox I found a Utah Bar article written by Mike Martinez which explains the whole thing.
http://webster.utahbar.org/barjournal/2009/03/utahs_justice_court_system_a_l.html

The answer is perdictable - follow the money! What a great show idea!!!

Please blow the lid off this continuing travesty of justice in Utah!

Posted by Mark Renda, Wednesday November 4th, 2009 @ 4:59 pm

As the economy has worsened, the job market has withered all over the country. However, there is one area of the job market that has seen a tremendous growth: internships. College, High School, Home School, Post Graduate, Interim, Study abroad and a host of other types of internships are opening up all over the country as businesses are tightening budgets. I know this because I've recently started hiring ALOT of interns, just from Utah. I will soon be hiring them from all over the U.S. An internship is a great opportunity for the young person as well as the business person. I had to go through an internship myself that was a horrible experience, because there just wasn't that many openings. Things have changed, and many students are in high demand. A great piece for the business crowd I think.

Posted by Adam Torkildson , Monday January 25th, 2010 @ 7:17 pm