American Green: Recent Episodes
Ben Proffer
American Green is the podcast that brings climate change solutions home to Kansas City. Whether its connecting listeners to experts who have been working to enrich our world for years or planning community events to help you join in the solutions, every other week we bring you a better way of life.
Melissa Ferrer-Civil offers us an inspiring tale of resilience and newfound power in the community of KC Tenants. Dr. Tony Reames breaks down the power of direct aid and targeted interventions. We salute our local eusocial pollinators, the magnificent honeybee.
Mayor Mike Kelly gets real about what we need from our utilities, from our elected officials, and from our federal government (he also blesses unions). Logan Heley proposes the beautiful Blue River as the banner restoration project our region is looking for. Gaylene Crouser offers some hopeful indigenous insights from her experience at this year's Climate Action Summit.
Professor Daniel Wildcat explores why leading scientists are looking to indigenous peoples for climate answers; Professor Bridgett Chapin gives us a field guide to checking out the health of our water systems, and reveals the personal cost of ignoring that relationship; and Dr. Leigh Anne Neal and Joan Leavens offer a timely update on integrating nature into our traditional school systems at Shawnee Mission School District.
We begin with our first "Shot of Life," exploring the beautiful relationship between the zebra swallowtail butterfly and the tree that protects it from predators; Ben interviews a young graphic artist whose life was transformed by local nature education nonprofit Green Works. He also interviews the founder of Green Works to find out how she has been such a success, and how that can expand to every school in the city.
Ben explores relationships with nature education by interviewing an environmental planner who helped a local high school turn their football field into a hybrid rain garden. The school, East High School, is home to a large population of refugees and low income students. He also interviews an agriculture teacher who teaches students a common language by cultivating living things.
Ben finds out how a different kind of concrete can cool our built environment and keep our urban vegetation healthier with Professor John Kevern of UMKC; how trees are the best kind of infrastructure we can invest in from Sarah Crowder of the Heartland Tree Alliance; and why our transportation infrastructure makes us hot and angry from Professor Jacob Wagner, also of UMKC.