Bay Area Vegetarians

The latest and greatest in San Francisco Bay Area veg news & events:

• Have a Heart, Go Veg Leafleting!
• Humane California

– 90,000 signatures needed still

• Blog Migration
• Ultimate Guide Updates

– 3 closures, 1 new

• Heart Smart Cooking
• Event Calendar

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Here’s an update since we first announced this in the October 2007 BAVeg News:

People in California who are opposed to the cruel treatment of animals on factory farms have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to do something to improve the lives of millions of animals. Californians for Humane Farms is entering its final days of signature gathering to qualify a historic ballot initiative for the November 2008 election. 90,000 signatures are still needed.

Sponsored by the Humane Society of the US, Farm Sanctuary, and others, the initiative would outlaw gestation crates, battery cages, and veal crates in California, giving 20 million animals on factory farms each year improved conditions. This sounds and is moderate–just giving them these basic improved conditions–but would be a huge improvement and make a significant difference for these animals, especially for egg-laying hens who, if this passes, would be able to lay eggs in nests and to dustbathe (the way chickens keep themselves clean), which are critically important to them.

Getting this initiative on the ballot would also raise a tremendous amount of awareness about factory farming and, as has been shown from similar initiatives in smaller states, continue to build momentum against factory farms that has already led to pledges from pork and veal producers to phase out some of the cruelest confinement systems facing animals on farms.

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Gillyflower Vegetarian, a Chinese restaurant, closed in January, 2008. It opened in the Fall of 2006 and barely made it a year.

We’ve changed our blog software. So, heads-up! If you have it bookmarked, link to our blogs on your website, access them through RSS feeds, google reader, etc., please note that there are some changes in the blog categories. You may find there are some differences if you’ve linked to specific blog posts or subscribed to RSS feeds.

You can find them it all at:

http://bayareaveg.org/blog

Our heart-felt thanks to our volunteers who shared the compassion in their heart for animals at our “Have a Heart, Go Veg” Leafleting & Dinner activity on Saturday, Feb 9th, organized by Tammy and Alex. Leafleting with BAVeg is an opportunity to get our veg message out to the public and then celebrate our good work & fellowship over a yummy vegan meal.

We give a big welcome to Melisse, her first-time leafleting, and were happy to see Juan (his 2nd time leafleting), Jordan, and George join us again. Miranda and Jack from Vegan Outreach joined us, too. Jack is the President of Vegan Outreach but Miranda gets top billing because she is an amazing, Amazon leafleter. 🙂

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A new veggie restaurant called Wild Greens has opened in Petaluma North Plaza Shopping Center.

Dishes, including ratatouille, potato enchilada and veggie burger made in-house from scratch, vary from vegan to vegetarian, but all dishes can be made vegan if requested.

New Whole Food Market has just opened up in Napa.

Vital Ital Calabash has closed it’s door for the last time. Apparently the owner has been trying to sell the business for a while, but finally gave up.

Saturday, January 12th was our first veg leafleting event to make 2008 the Year for All Animals.

Alex, Juan, and Tammy met at 1 pm at Powell and Market, and Jordan joined them for the final leg, as they distributed 650 leaflets in less than two hours (600 Vegetarian Starter Kits and 50 Why Vegans). In fact, it was so busy at Powell and Market, the team distributed all the leaflets there, only passing through Union Square to reach Golden Era for their ultimate goal, sharing a vegan dinner replete Golden Era’s housemade vegan flan and Black China’s vegan mocha chocolate cake.

People were very interested in the materials provided, several were very enthusiastic in their thanks. And, even better, people who originally declined would turn back around and request one. More of our focus was on distributing leaflets than taking snapshots, but you can see from the photographs the response people had to it.

If you (or anyone you know) is interested in joining us on our next leafleting activity as our team photographer, please let us know. You’ll need to have your own digital camera.

If your goals for 2008 include…

• making the world a kinder place
• meeting new people
• getting out more
• making time for fun and yummy vegan food

then join Team BAVEG for our next oureach activity scheduled for February 9th in SF.

Leafleting is a numbers game

The more leaflets we distribute to the public, the more opportunities we have to create more change towards a more compassionate & cruelty-free plant-based diet. Vegan Outreach, which focuses specifically on leafleting colleges using Why Vegan and other VO materials, estimates 5-10 new vegetarians are created for every 300 booklets. So, with that estimate, we created 10-20 new vegetarians in less than two hours!

We are planning to do a general veg leafleting once a month, and we are also looking for volunteers to revitalize our Bay Area Veg team in the Adopt a college program, too. We distributed 3,402 leaflets in Spring 2007 and are looking for volunteers for the new semester. Please contact us if you are interested.

Now available in the BAVeg Photo Gallery are snapshots from the SF Walk for Animals, a benefit for Farm Sanctuary.

This year BAVeg organized a team, “Animals are Friends, not Food”. The team was organized less than a month before the event, but it was very successful. Most of the participants were first-time walkers and we raised $1,845 for Farm Sanctuary.

According to the walk organizer, Bud, 2007 was significantly larger than last year.