Pamela K. Miller, Alaska Community Action on Toxics

Pamela K. Miller is a biologist and director of Alaska Community Action on Toxics (ACAT). ACAT works to protect human health, water and air quality, and the natural environment by collaborating with affected communities under right-to-know and other laws. ACAT exposes polluters, seeks to hold them accountable, and offers technical assistance to citizens who want to eliminate contaminants from their environment.

Yesterday I took part in a walk and edible greens gathering expedition with our staff and volunteers along the bluffs above Cook Inlet. We spent several hours there searching for and picking greens. Sterling gathered fireweed tips. Felix specialized in gathering bluebell flowers and nettles. Lydia picked fireweed tips and yarrow. I picked nettles -- just the new growth at the top three to four inches of each plant. I have several "secret" and prolific nettle patches that I go back to each spring. Geran, our resident botanical expert, and her dog Arlo kept us all working hard out there. I think we all needed a break from the office and a celebration of spring in Alaska!

Here's my special recipe for nettles: Gather the nettles using garden gloves (nettles sting, but the steaming takes the "sting" out), pick only the young leaves and stems (the tops regenerate), steam them lightly in a vegetable steamer (about a minute after the water in the bottom of the pan boils), saute the nettles in olive oil with lots of garlic, then serve hot with a dash of fresh lemon juice. They are delicious and nutritious! I crave nettles in spring so I go out to pick them two to three times a week during the early morning and eat 'em up for breakfast.

We gathered the wild greens in preparation for our commemoration of Rachel Carson's birthday Wednesday evening. The event featured organic and wild edible foods, readings by community members, and an organic gardening workshop. Over 100 people came to this event sponsored by both ACAT and the Alaska Women's Environmental Network. It was a great event because we had an opportunity to combine activist work (advocating for organic foods and protecting Alaska Native subsistence foods) with hands-on learning about organic gardening, and readings of Rachel Carson's inspiring books! It was wonderful to see some of the high school students from Alaska Youth for Environmental Action there -- they worked very closely with ACAT in getting the Anchorage School District to pass a "least toxic" pest management plan. Our motto: "Children First, Pesticides Last!"

The phone in the office rang constantly yesterday. I had a stack of messages that seemed to keep growing faster than I could keep up. Many of our calls concern immediate life and death issues. Calls received: A woman called ACAT from a western Alaska village where raw sewage is getting dumped into the sea from an improperly installed system designed by the federal Indian Health Service. A man who is concerned about what he perceives as a cluster of brain cancers near the petrochemical facilities on the Kenai Peninsula called ACAT to ask for assistance in organizing community-based health surveys and raising attention among the agencies. I spoke with a tribal environmental coordinator to develop strategies for getting the military to clean up a nasty toxic waste site at Cape Romanzof near the villages of Scammon Bay, Hooper Bay, Paimute, and Chevak.