Jessy Tolkan presented at the Clinton Global Initiative today, in front of the press corps (that includes several It’s Getting Hot in Here bloggers) on the Energy Action CGI Commitment. Jessy, Billy, and Jake have been sporting snazzy Power Vote t-shirts and have been one of only a few youth-led projects highlighted at CGI. Jessy unveiled the major new commitment, you know the one we have been looking forward to, Power Shift 2009. Lets hope that people fund it at CGI, so we can get to the hard work of doing rather than talking about the event. We have a matching grant of up to $400,000, so if have a few thousand or hundred thousand dollars lying around and you want to save the planet or a few of the people on it - you should consider making that investment. Probably the best return on investment you can make.

Jessy spoke on stage with Gene Karpinkski, ED of the League of Conservation Voters, David Sandalow, author of Freedom From Oil, and Tulsi Tanti, Chairman of Suzlon. Clean energy companies have been making major ‘commitments’ that are based around keeping up with the overwhelming demand. One major theme that Tulsi Tanti mentioned was the shortage of skilled people to keep up with the blistering pace of business. Once again, it seems the height of folly that we are planning massive bailouts to keep the economy and employment afloat, but we can’t get investment in the training to get people hired for good jobs that going empty.

I sure wish someone was trying to raise awareness about this…oh, right. There is this Green Jobs Day of Action! If you aren’t actually doing anything yet…go find an event and help make it a success.

Posted in global warming, News and Media, Youth Leaders