Ann Garrison is an independent journalist based in the San Francisco Bay Area. In 2014, she received the Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza Democracy and Peace Prize for her reporting on conflict in the African Great Lakes region. She can be reached at (at)AnnGarrison or ann(at)kpfa.org . She grew up around a radioactive toxic mess called the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard, in a gorgeous place, Washington's Olympic Peninsula, by way of Western Oklahoma, another gorgeous place. She is a compulsive writer and sometimes some times signs as AnnieGetYourGang.