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  National Newsletter                                                                                June 23, 2015


ADPSR works for peace, environmental protection, ecological building, social justice, and the development of healthy communities. Please consider joining ADPSR to support our education and advocacy work. Annual membership helps us raise public awareness of critical social and environmental issues.
2015 Lewis Mumford Awards Call for Nominations 

In 1992, ADPSR instituted an annual Lewis Mumford awards program to honor people and organizations whose work exemplifies social responsibility. The awards were named after Lewis Mumford (1895-1990) an American historian, sociologist, philosopher, and critic, noted for his study of cities and urban architecture. Lewis Mumford's writings continue to inspire and remind us that architecture, design, and planning must respond to human needs, harmonize with its surroundings, and reflect the aspirations and social context of our civilization.

 

Each year, Architects/ Designers/ Planners for Social Responsibility (ADPSR) recognizes and honors individuals and organizations that further our mission of Peace, Sustainable Development, and the Environment. The 2015 Lewis Mumford Awards will be presented at our Awards Ceremony September 18th, 2015 at the Seattle Public Library, organized in partnership with the Seattle Design Festival.

 

Nominations for the 2015 Awards are open. This is your chance to reward those deserving recognition for outstanding achievement in any or all of these three categories.

 

Please fill out our nomination form to nominate worthy individuals or organizations. Please provide a separate form for each nominee. If you have any questions, please contact mumford@adpsr.org. Nominations must be received by July 24th, 2015.

 

Nominations are reviewed by the National Board of ADPSR, who will make the final decision. We look forward to your participation and your nominations.

 

A list of previous recipients can be found at our Mumford Award History page. Our most recent awardees are:

 

2014 Awardees: 

Peace: Ethan Zuckerman & the MIT Center for Civic Media

Environment: Slow Money, Maine, as representative of Slow Money, National

Development: Ken Smith & Youth Build Boston, as a representative of Youth Build National

 

2013 Awardees: 

Peace: The International Coalition of Sites of Conscience,  

New York

Environment: The Foundation for a Green Future, Inc., Boston

Development: The Center for Urban Pedagogy, New York

 

2012 Awardees: 

Peace: The Nobelity Project, Austin

Environment: The Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems, Austin

Development: Project Row House, Houston

 

Additional information is available here.

  

Nomination forms are available on-line.       

 
70 Years of Nuclear Weapons - At What Cost?
August 6, 2015, Livermore
30 years ago ADPSR was founded to counter growing militarism and the spread and potential use of nuclear weapons.  This year is the 70th Anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasa ki, and in spite of the folly of nuclear weapons our government plans to spend a trillion dollars "modernizing" our nuclear arsenal.

We'd like to have a strong ADPSR presence at this year's protests, especially the main event 8:00 am, August 6th at the Livermore Nuclear Weapons Labs, Vasco Road at Patterson Pass Road.  All ages welcome. 

Email greg@adpsr.org if you are interested in joining us, and check here for more information on several events.

Speaking Engagements for Dr. Mindy Fullilove

Dr. Mindy Fullilove, author of Urban Alchemy: Restoring Joy in America's Sorted Out Cities, spoke at Albany's Roundtable May 21st. As she projected a 1930's map created by the Federal Housing Administration, she explored the challenges Albany, New York, citizens face due to decades of racial discrimination. "Residential segregation is a problem because it is an easy vehicle for disparate treatment, which then spirals into neighborhoods with vastly different assets and needs, and weaker regions over all," says Miriam Axel-Lute in her article "Stitching the City Together."

 

Durnham, North Carolina residents can hear more from Dr. Fullilove July 19th at her Harm Free Zone Brunch and Book Study Kick-off-the entire city will be reading Urban Alchemy! Find details on the New Village Press events page.

 

Dr. Fullilove was also recently featured in the NYTimes magazine.
Green Schoolyards America

 This May, schools throughout California participated in the first annual Living Schoolyard Month! Green Schoolyards America's new blog is featuring different schools and how they designed and constructed schoolyard green spaces and used them for outdoor teaching. The website also offers free, downloadable resources for schoolyard transformation. 

 

Green Schoolyards America, an organization under the fiscal sponsorship of ADPSR, is headed by Sharon Danks, an accomplished researcher, designer, and advocate of ecological school grounds. She is the author of Asphalt to Ecosystems: Design Ideas for Schoolyard Transformation , published by New Village Press.

 
Lily Yeh received 2015 Livingkindness Arts and Activism Award

Lily Yeh, international artist, visionary leader, and author of Awakening Creativity, received the 2015 Livingkindness Arts & Activism Award at the Women's Voices, Women's Visions symposium, June 6-8 at Skidmore College. She also led a workshop there on art as a transformative tool to foster community empowerment.
ADPSR Human Rights Campaign

Good news! In recent years, Los Angeles County has proposed a number of schemes to rebuild and expand what is already the U.S.'s largest jail system, but the County just announced it will put jail design and construction plans on hold until they evaluate alternatives to incarceration including mental health and other community services. ADPSR members in California have long advocated for these alternatives, including with our 2013 charette " Envisioning a FREE and Healthy LA."   

 



The recent court battle over the release of the U.S.'s longest-serving prisoner in solitary confinement, Albert Woodfox of Louisiana, prompted inquiries yet again into the role architects play in the creation of harsh prison environments. You can read and listen to ADPSR President Raphael Sperry's interview on PRI's The World, a leading international radio news hour, here.
 

Our petition to end the design of spaces for torture and killing continues to generate debate and draw attention. Views on ADPSR's petition were the first question in the Architect's Newspaper featured "Voices of Architectural Criticism." The range of responses -- from full-throated agreement to subservient hand-wringing about the scope of architects' role in society -- prompted a second round of discussion in the May issue (so far, print only). More debate is sure to continue -- please join in with your reasons why architects should uphold human rights!
ADPSR List Subscriptions
We also have separate newsletters for each of our major projects: New Village Press, ADPSR Advocacy (including Ethics Reform and Alternatives to Incarceration), and ADPSR Green Building. This allows you to select which news you'd like to receive. You can remove or add yourself to any of these lists at any time with the Subscribe and Update Profile links at the bottom of each newsletter. We apologize if you had removed yourself earlier, we want to give you the chance to select the information that suits you best.

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In This Issue

Architects/Designers/Planners for Social Responsibility
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