Kevin hopes his fame will help fight state's environmental battles

Back - Index - Submissions - - What is RSS? Date: Aug 18, 2002 Source: Kentucky.com Submitted By: Gina Cates Cause Celeb Backstreet Boy hopes fame will help fight his home state's environmental battles By Heather Svokos HERALD-LEADER POP CULTURE WRITER "You come out of the Daniel Boone National Forest at about 8,000 feet and on the horizon, instead of seeing green mountain-scapes and rocks and sandstone and limestone cliffs, all of a sudden you see, as if the mountain were a stick of butter, literally, it's like someone took a butter knife and sliced the entire top off of a mountain. All you see is rocks and dirt. It's like a moonscape. It's like you're looking at Mars." This, from a guy whose public persona is more known for making young girls shriek and swoon than it is for waxing poetic on the evils of mountaintop removal. But if you look just beneath the slick, bump-and-grind veneer of the eldest Backstreet Boy, you'll find a 30-year-old man with a solemn commitment to the environment. Back in June, his interest in the cause earned him non-Backstreet headlines. It also stirred up an old debate: do celebrities and politics mix? The brouhaha began when the Kentucky-reared pop star was added as a last-minute witness at a congressional hearing, and a U.S. senator announced he would boycott the hearing. The issue before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee was mountaintop removal mining. The practice, which has become common in Kentucky and West Virginia, shears off the top of a ridge or mountain to expose a coal seam, pushing dirt and rock into nearby valleys and waterways. Sen. George Voinovich, R-Ohio, did indeed boycott the hearing, saying the last-minute inclusion of Richardson as a witness made a mockery of the committee and the issue. "It's just a joke to think that this witness can provide members of the United States Senate with information on important geological and water quality issues," Voinovich said in June. "We're either serious about the issues or we're running a sideshow." Richardson testified anyway, but the comments stung. The musician grew up in Estill County, in the mountains of the Daniel Boone National Forest. For the last few years, he's been schooling himself on such issues as water quality and mountaintop removal strip mining. In December 2000, he started Just Within Reach, an environmental foundation. He's part of several other environmental initiatives, including one started with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. -- the Kentucky Riverkeeper, a fledgling organization for river restoration. "I was really frustrated," Richardson said from Los Angeles, where he's now recording the new Backstreet Boys album. "It's a shame that he (Voinovich) didn't do more research on me before he made those comments -- I think he made himself look bad. He didn't know I grew up in Appalachian Kentucky, that I grew up in those Appalachian mountains, that my grandfather was a coal miner, and that I have a vested interest in that hearing. "I have flown over those sites, I've seen the damage, and what it's doing to those mountain ranges in West Virginia and Kentucky and Tennessee. They're raping the Appalachian mountain range for profit." Richardson, who owns a farm near Lexington, says it's also a shame Voinovich didn't attend the hearing. "He could've cross-examined me. I'm not a scientist but I am an eye-witness. I had every right to be there as a native Kentuckian and a concerned citizen and the head of my own environmental foundation." Voinovich's office didn't return a phone call seeking comment for this story. Some personal reasons The singer was motivated to start Just Within Reach partly because of his then-recent marriage to actress Kristin Willits. "We want to have children," he said at the foundation's launch in December 2000. "I want them to grow up healthy and have clean water to drink." Instead of "sitting around on my butt worrying about problems," he said then, "I thought I'd use my status as a celebrity to ask more questions and maybe change things." Just Within Reach is run by Richardson; his wife; his brother, Tim; and friends Jim and Vicki Hanna of Los Angeles. Vicki Hanna sees nothing wrong with working the celebrity angle. "The way we see it, the regular citizens who live with it (mountaintop removal) have been trying to get the government to act for years and years," said Hanna, the foundation's director of programs and publicity. "So then they get a celebrity spokesperson and Kevin says: 'You're right, that is why I'm here.' "Kevin has spent a lot of time the last two years educating himself on the topic. He wants the senator to quit talking so much about the celebrity thing and get to work on the issue." 'We have the laws' And the issue, to Richardson, isn't about dismantling the coal industry. "I realize that coal is an important part of the Eastern Kentucky economy, and I'm not trying to eliminate the coal business," he said. "What I'm trying to bring attention to is the lack of responsibility of the coal companies, who are destroying the water tables, destroying homes and communities, destroying people's lives." When mountaintop removal pushes dirt into valleys, it creates "valley fill," and covers streams for miles. "The law says anytime you pollute a watersource, it is illegal," Richardson said. Last May, a U.S. District Court judge in Charleston, W.Va., agreed. Richardson is part of another group -- Kentuckians for the Commonwealth -- whose lawsuit spurred Judge Charles Haden II to order a halt to new mining permits. His ruling is being appealed. "We have the laws," Richardson said. "They just need to be enforced. But the Bush administration has provided the coal companies with a loophole, by asking the Army Corps of Engineers to redefine 'valley fill' so they can get around the Clean Water Act. "There's a way to mine coal responsibly so it doesn't have as bad an environmental impact. The Environmental Protection Agency is not keeping an eye on anything." The lament of the coal industry is that tighter regulations will cost jobs. "Haden's ruling will shut down mining in Appalachia, both surface and underground mining," Kentucky Coal Association President Bill Caylor said in May. "That's not true," Richardson says. "If they take care of the environment and restore what they tore down, there will be more jobs and it'll leave the community with hope for other things. Literally, these mountains are being torn down. It's so sad. It doesn't have to be like that." 'People listen' The Backstreet Boy might be a thorn in the side of detractors like Voinovich, but some, like Alan Banks, are thanking their lucky stars for Richardson's involvement. Banks, director of the Center for Appalachian Studies at Eastern Kentucky University, got to know Richardson through the Kentucky Riverkeeper, a coalition dedicated to Kentucky River restoration, advocacy and education. "It's been a great surprise that he has the level of commitment and compassion that he does," said Banks, who's also on the Riverkeeper board. "One thing I said to him, I said: 'Kevin, I really respect you as a Backstreet Boy, but I respect you a whole lot more as an eco-warrior.' And he just sort of puffed up, you know?" It doesn't hurt that where Richardson goes, cameras follow. "He can talk about when he was growing up (in Kentucky) and what his mother taught him, and people listen," Banks said. "He helps give the whole issue legitimacy. He's just a powerful voice -- not necessarily for anything radical -- but for cherishing our natural resources, for following the law, for looking at the clean water act as a powerful weapon." Despite Richardson's passion and knowledge, some will continue to dismiss him as the boy band singer who dabbles in a cause. "A lot of people, whether it's on this issue, or anything, because I'm a Backstreet Boy, they assume I'm some young kid who has no clue about anything," he said. "I seem to be prejudged. I'm a 30-year-old man -- I'll be 31 in October. I've been to 37 countries around the world in the past 10 years with our group. I've seen a lot with my eyes." That still won't matter to those who think politics are best left to politicians and "experts." At the time of the June hearing, Voinovich said the trend of celebrities testifying was "disturbing" because it uses celebrity witnesses to gain media attention at the expense of substantive testimony. "Politicians don't like it when celebrities show up in their designerwear and their glasses and expound on things," said actress Annie Potts, another celebrity Kentuckian, and a former spokesperson for the American Arthritis Foundation. "Politicians think: 'This is not within your ken. Hey, this is bureaucrats' business, for heaven's sake.' "I know that there's a lot written about ours being a celebrity culture, but I think we're lucky to have people like him (Richardson)," Potts said. "This kid sounds like he knows what he's talking about. You know, they're heroes to a lot of kids, and kids will follow their example. So if he's an environmentalist, they'll want to look at that, too. "I think it's very dangerous to criticize anybody for putting their time, money and heart into a good cause. I mean, what's to criticize there? I think they should be applauded." Richardson's Backstreet Boy cousin, Brian Littrell, has his own cause, and his own foundation in partnership with St. Joseph Hospital: the Brian Littrell Healthy Heart Club for Kids. But Littrell's cause hasn't ruffled many feathers. "He likes to keep his views kind of private, and we don't really discuss politics," Richardson said of his cousin. "This is kind of a battle of mine." And one he plans to continue in the political arena, whether Voinovich and Co. like it or not. His next strike? Coordinating flights over coal fields with Sens. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., and Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., who already have accepted his invitation, said Vicki Hanna of Just Within Reach. Hanna added: "If Sen. Voinovich thinks that Kevin Richardson is going to shut up and go away, he's very badly mistaken and misinformed." Comment on this item. Recent Comments Submitted by: i love pron nrBYPh I truly appreciate this blog article.Really thank you! Cool. Comment on this item. Next Item: Newsbits for August 16 Prev Item: Nick Carter Newsbits for August 24