Climate Fair for a Cool Planet expands at Earth’s hottest moment

The two hottest days recorded on Earth occurred during the past week, which is good timing for organizers staging an expanded version of an annual climate fair in Juneau, even if Saturday’s forecast is for rain, wind and temperatures around 60 degrees.

The fourth annual Climate Fair for a Cool Planet, scheduled from 1:30-5 p.m. at Mayor Bill Overstreet Park, will feature a variety of musical and short theatrical performances — under canopies if necessary due to weather, said Mike Tobin, a board member of 350Juneau, one of the event’s sponsors

One of the main purposes of adding more performers and extending the length of what’s been a two-hour event is attracting more of the people who will be most affected by climate change, Tobin said. The featured musician at the fair is Quinn Christopherson, an Alaskan Native musician from Anchorage who appeared at last year’s Áak’w Rock Indigenous music festival, has performed with famous artists including Yo-Yo Ma and composed a song that won NPR’s Tiny Desk Contest in 2019.

“He’s got some local following here so we hope that will bring more young people in particular out to the climate fair,” Tobin said. “We’ve had lots of 50- to 70-year-olds at the past couple of fairs, so we’re trying to reach out to a younger crowd.”

The fair is occurring five days after the hottest day in recorded history, according to provisional data from the European climate service Copernicus. The average global temperature of 62.87 degrees Fahrenheit beat the previous record by 0.1 degrees set the previous day. Sunday’s one-day record was .01 degrees higher than the previous high July 6, 2023 — and all of the recent records were significantly higher than the record of 62.24 degrees set in 2016.

The intent of the fair isn’t necessarily to inform people climate change exists since most people — especially those inclined to come to a “climate fair” — are already aware of the issue, he said. Rather, the idea is to let people know what organizations are active locally and some of the specific issues — such as new drilling projects on Alaska’s north slope — that are the primary focus of attention.

“There is this constituency for change in how we power our society,” Tobin said. “And a bunch of us live here in Juneau.”

The music and dance appearances by Juneau artists — including the Yées Ḵu.oo Dancers, Lisa Puananimōhala’ikalani Denny, Strange Reality, Stacy and Ziggy Unzicker, Air Jazz, Hālau Hula O Mānoa, Darius Mannino, and Roblin Davis — will be interspaced by four short plays. Tobin wrote two of them, with distinctly different narratives despite the common climate change theme.

One play, titled “It’s a Cliche Out There,” is “a satirical kind of wild comedy poking fun at the oil industry, its political backers, et cetera, and the culture that sustains it,” he said. The other, titled, “Dreaming the Future” features a woman’s basketball team cast in a setting of pondering “what is next after oil, what kind of economy do we want to build? It’ll be going away sooner or later, and what do we need to establish in its place?”

The other two plays — “The Last Bee is Flying Over the Sky” by Pat To Yan and “Us in the Past” by Nathan Ellis — are being produced by members of 350Juneau and Theater Alaska, another co-sponsor of the event.

As in past years, free ice cream will be offered and several organizations will be staffing information tables. The organizations, besides 350Juneau, include Renewable Juneau, Alaska Heat Smart, Juneau Commission on Sustainability, Southeast Alaska Conservation Council, League Of Women Voters and Juneau Veterans for Peace.

• Contact Mark Sabbatini at mark.sabbatini@juneauempire.com or (907) 957-2306.

Know and Go

What: Fourth annual Climate Fair for a Cool Planet

When: 1:30-5 p.m. Saturday

Where: Mayor Bill Overstreet Park

Website: www.theateralaska.org/climate-fair-for-a-cool-planet