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China Communist Party Holds Congress; CNN Heroes: DeAnna Pursai; California Uses Goats To Fight Wildfires. Aired 4-4:10a ET
Aired October 18, 2022 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
COY WIRE, CNN 10 ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. Happy Tuesday. I`m Coy. Grateful to be spending part of my day right here with you on CNN 10.
Great show for you today so let`s go.
Now, we`re going to begin by taking you to the most populated country in the world. This month, the communist party in China is holding the most
important event in its political calendar, the election of its new leadership.
The process takes place once every five years and begins with 2,300 delegates from across China who gathered in the Chinese capital of Beijing.
They also conduct other government business including amending the country`s constitution and approving their policy directions for the next
few years. China`s President Xi Jinping is likely to retain power for an unprecedented third term as secretary general.
Let`s take 10 to break down the takeaways of a nearly two-hour speech made by the Chinese president on Sunday.
President Xi said he will not back down from China`s zero COVID policy and that he doesn`t regret the decision to implement the highly criticized
policies. The president stressed economic improvement and better growth for the nation. The biggest applause of the day came when President Xi
discussed reunification of the country, including taking control of Taiwan peacefully or otherwise.
This year`s Congress is the 20th since the communist party of China was founded in 1921.
In a communist system, countries believe the government or the whole community owns the shared wealth that they create. These systems are often
criticized for being authoritarian and for their record on human rights violations.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WIRE: Ten-second trivia:
Which of these college degrees is considered the highest level of academic degree?
Master`s, associate, doctoral or bachelor`s?
The doctorate degree is the most advanced diploma symbolizing that a person has mastered a specific area of study.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WIRE: Now, the college experience comes in all shapes and sizes. Some students choose to go to school out of state. Others stay at home and
commute day to day. Other students attend online.
I want to introduce you now to CNN hero DeAnna Pursai who`s the founder of the College of Adaptive Arts. DeAnna created this collegiate experience in
2016 for adults with special needs inspired by her sister Angel.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DEANNA PURSAI, CNN HERO: Getting some good stuff.
Angel is my sister. She`s roughly one year my junior so we grew up almost like twins in rural Indiana.
When she was born, my parents were told that Angel would never be able to walk or talk or clothe herself or feed herself because she had Down
syndrome. We were forever just connected at the hip. She was my forever playmate.
I just knew Angel is living the good life like me and we were just kind of parallel living lives and the first summer I came home from college, she
was sitting around at home and she wasn`t working.
You could do this. Could I do this one?
Knowing how drastically her options changed once she was mandated out of the school system at age 22. It was painful.
I felt a lot of guilt because truthfully I truly believe in my heart of hearts that she is so much more intelligent than I am in most ways that
matter. My sister`s story is very much the norm.
College of Adaptive Arts is a lifelong, equitable collegiate experience for adults with special needs of all differing abilities who historically
haven`t had access to college education.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now, how about someone out here? What is up with this warm color spectrum? Jenny?
PURSAI: We started out in 2009 with one class and 12 students, and we`ve essentially just listened to the students about what they want out.
And so, now, we have 10 schools of instruction and they get the same access to the array of classes that any college student can select.
We are now on the campus of West Valley College. They get to go and hang out with student union or get some coffee or walk around campus. It feels
like inclusion at its finest.
Our college accepts adults at age 18. And our oldest adult now is 73. There is no age out limit and that was very intentional because I would see my
sister as an adult. See these finite programs, and when they`re done, I`ve seen firsthand how they revert back to the loneliness and the isolation.
I am so humbled each and every day by their depth and ideas and ways to make the world a better place.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WIRE: Next up, towns across America are hiring new firefighters in herds and they don`t look like you`d expect them to because they`re goats. These
furry four-legged firefighters munch on dry brush, low-hanging branches and weeds, helping to clean out and landscape fire prone areas. It`s a
sustainable and natural way to prevent fires if you will without using pesticides and energy consuming machines. Whatever floats your goat.
CNN weather anchor Derek Van Dam has more.
(BEGIN VIDSEOTAPE)
DEREK VAN DAM, CNN WEATHER ANCHOR (voice-over): As a mega drought rages on across the western U.S. with seemingly no end in sight.
The owners of these homes are in a desperate situation. They`re trying to prevent wildfires from burning down their house, and they`ve turned to
goats for the solution.
That`s right, goats.
This is a trip of goats. Quite literally, this herd is here to feast on all of this dry brush.
Weeds and low hanging branches like this can act as lighter fluid for a fire moving up a steep hillside. The goats eat it up, creating a line of
defense for local firefighters.
ADRIAN ABEL, ANAHEIM FIRE AND RESCUE: They do an excellent job of clearing some of the stuff that we would be doing out here doing a fire fight. If
you had taller grasses, underbrush, this increases the intensity and heat that that fire is going to put off.
VAN DAM: And the danger to your personnel.
ABEL: It`s correct, the danger to our personnel and our firefighters.
VAN DAM: This herd belongs to Alissa Cope. Her company Sage Environmental is betting that goats can help solve some key environmental problems.
ALISSA COPE, SAGE ENVIRONMENTAL: Goats love to eat. They can eat four hours, five hours, sit down and rest digest they have four stomachs. Get
back up again and continue eating.
VAN DAM: And they`re nimble and fearless they can hang out along treacherous areas, reaching locations too dangerous for landscapers and
firefighters. Their work has proven to be extremely valuable.
Have you witnessed a fire actually stop at the defensible lines that the goats have put in?
LINDSEY YOUNG, ANAHEIM FIRE AND RESCUE: We will actually see helicopter shots where you can tell where the fire was stopped along that defensible
space line. So we see the evidence that it`s working and we`re really proud to continue that effort.
VAN DAM: That`s exactly what we saw in 2019 when the Easy Fire northwest of Los Angeles spread dangerously close to the Reagan National Library. But
goats had been there before and the space they cleared helped prevent the building from going up in flames.
Easy now. Buy me a drink first. Hey, you`re not going to eat my shirt. This was an expensive shirt.
As you can tell by now, goats love to eat. But they really love to munch on invasive weeds. Targeting this type of non-native vegetation can help
eradicate it from an area so that the right plants can grow. It`s being referred to as goat-scaping and it`s quickly becoming a go-to
environmentally friendly and natural way to landscape around the country.
COPE: A weed whacker is a machine that goes back and forth back and forth and it spreads the seed everywhere. This herd will eat an acre a day,
ingest all the seeds. The seeds will come out non-viable. And why that`s critical is that it breaks the cycle of the more aggressive plants
regrowing every year.
VAN DAM: Fighting fires and saving the environment.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WIRE: All right. We`re running out of time, but before I go, my favorite part of the day, a special shout out to Sussex Consortium in Lewes,
Delaware. Go Vikings!
We hope that you and everyone watching around the world have a wonderful one.
I`m Coy. You rock and we`ve already begun creating the next show just for you. See you tomorrow on CNN 10.
END
