This is Larry Gibson and App Voices own Austin Hall on (or in this case under) Capitol Hill.

We took this after a day of lobbying for the Clean Water Protection Act (HR 2719) to end Mountaintop Removal coal-mining. Our staff, volunteers, and interns busted our butt for weeks to make the trip a success, and it was! But after three days of intense lobbying, a congressional breifing, and some star studded pictures with some of least favorite Senators…
(Stephen, Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska, and some guy)
…we went home.

Larry never stops. He lives on $4.5 million worth of coal. Coal companies have killed his dogs, vandalized his home, and blasted boulders the SIZE OF MINIVANS onto his property. The property he lives on happens to have been in his family for over 200 years. He comes form a long line of coal miners. This is no hippy environmentalist. This is a hard-working, down-to-earth, hard-nosed Appalachian man. Larry was raised in the coalfields, and he’ll die there. But he sure as hell wont move off his land.

Now, Larry has the chance to speak to the United Nations in New York City.

OVEC needs to raise $3500 to make a trip to the UN a reality. Please help them here. You can earmark your donation by attaching a note that says “UN trip.

Larry has founded an organization called the Mountainkeepers.