My first vivid memory of Kay was from my first days in my Greenpeace career that later spanned 13 years ending up as Director of the global toxics campaign for Greenpeace International in Amsterdam.
It was 1985 and I was an aspiring film maker in Eugene, Oregon who refused to make it big in Los Angeles. But I did concede to go to the big bad City of Seattle to seek my film fortunes. My girlfriend, Kit, came with me and between us we had many a dubious job to pay the rent on our West Seattle bungalow. Somehow one day she learned that a buck could be made canvassing for Greenpeace Northwest. I tried it. I was good at it. I was already a hardcore environmentalist from my early days growing up in LA — even doing my own direct actions when, as a 12 year old, I used to pull out the surveyor stakes to slow down the hill raping developments near my San Fernando Valley home.
Canvassing was fun. You could work at night, leaving the days free, summer nights would find us skinny-dipping in Lake Union afterwards. I was good at canvassing and could make a living at it, but I became increasingly intrigued with the campaigns at Greenpeace. And for some reason I was drawn to the new anti-pollution campaigns being organized by Jon Hinck. But before I became the Toxics Campaigner of Greenpeace Northwest, and began to forget my cinematic dreams, I became Greenpeace Northwest’s Canvass coordinator. It was Kay who hired me following an “all-thumbs-up” consensus decision of the steering committee. I was very grateful for her trust in me and was taken by her “no nonsense style”.
That summer I hired a certain very tall, blond and charming canvasser from California. I will call him Edwin because that was certainly not his name. Before long we began to detect a concerning trend where Edwin would be late to the pick-up point and come back on those nights with very few collected funds. Him being late kept all of us back and was highly annoying. He would say, “sorry I got to talking with a lady.” It was not long after that, that I fielded a complaint from somebody Edwin had “canvassed”. She accused him of “inappropriate aggressive womanizing.” What I had earlier guessed became clear — his approaches to ladies and the resulting delays went far beyond “talking”. I confronted him about it and he told me it was none of my business if he had conversations with women on the beat and as we paid by commission it was not a problem if he did not make money any given night.
Now this was way back in the mid 80s, years before the paradigm shifting “me too” movement, but it was obvious to me that Edwin was a not only a walking time-bomb for some woman out there, but also for Greenpeace Northwest, which I was becoming very fond of. I told him that since it was clear he was not willing to change his ways, he was done and he could turn in his clipboard.
Of course, it’s never that simple and very soon Edwin had rallied a rebellion among my troops, my former canvass mates, most of them took on his cause making the case that the new boss role had gone to my head and I was accused of unfair termination. It was embarrassing but I was forced to defend my hiring/firing decision before the Steering Committee, and the canvassers lined up to testify, with Kay presiding. For a newbie to the organization it felt like a big deal. And, with a progressive group like Greenpeace, there was a good chance I would be found in the wrong.
First the canvassers brought forth their signed statement and each one stated in turn that I had overstepped and wrongfully terminated Edwin without due process. Next it was my turn. I was nervous. So I recall very softly explaining the decision I made and the how I had arrived at it. Edwin was not repentant and I felt he represented too high a risk. If a sexual harrassment scandal or lawsuit were to rock the office in a town like Seattle I believed it would be just a bit of a problem. The Steering Committee heard both sides out and then after a pause Kay looked around the room and then took the floor.
“Thank God we hired you,” she said. “You did absolutely the right and intelligent thing and likely saved us from a lot of shit. We in the office don’t really know what goes on out there in the canvass but now we can have faith that our door-to-door representatives are good ambassadors to our cause.” The rest of the steering committee roundly concurred, and I was a momentary hero with a tiny tear in my eye, rather than a mean, callous manager.
I had many other dealings and discussions with Kay over the years that followed, until we lost her. Lost her to toxic pollution. In my work I like to think I am defending Kay among others, as I am still working on toxic pollution. Her advice was always good advice, always helpful, her way was always cutting straight to the chase, egoless, unafraid, always calling out the BS in everything, suffering no fools, but always willing to suffer for the good — in people and mother earth. We all miss her.