group activities update

[Gil Ben-Meir]

hi all,

since we didn't arrange a group meeting this year yet, I wanted to give an update to all of you of the progress that we have been making.

Sierra Club-

Tom, Dana, and I have joined the Rockland county chapter of the Sierra Club, a national organization dedicated to enviromental action to preserve our natural environment. the rockland chapter includes about 700 members so we hope that by joining a larger organization we will have more power when dealing with local authorities. We attended their first meeting to discuss the "cool cities" campaign and invited their members to join our group and discussions. Also, Tom, Dana, Laura, and I valunteered to be considered as Clarkstown environmental committee.
the Sierra club rockland chapter next meeting is on April 9 at 7pm in Valley Cottage Library, so if anyone in the group wish to join this chapter please come to this meeting.

here is a link to the sierra club "cool cities" website: http://coolcities.us/

Bluefield Farm-

Ann and I are working on establishing an education for sustainability program for her fourth grade kids. So far we have been exchanging notes and last friday we managed to arrange a visit at a local farm in Blauvelt which might be able to serve as a place where the kids can learn about nature lifecycles from waste to food and back to waste, about the importance of healthy soil, clean water, and solar energy in maintaining a sustainable lifestyle.

although the farm is pretty private, the owners are very warm and welcoming and will be happy to host visits of any members of the group by appointment. they have goats and chickens and grow flowers which they sell to the Hungry Hollow Co-op and vegetables which they sell to Relish in Sparkill. If you are interested in scheduling a farm visit please let me know.

Eco-team

So far I only got the excell surveys back from Daphy and Tom. I am still waiting for Maskit and Mark replies. Based on 60% of the group data it looks like we have an avarage of about 30,000 pounds of carbon savings per household.

That great!

That certainly demonstrate the power of this program and why we need to continue spreading the word of our experience to others.

As for the complete results, I will advertise them as soon as I have the complete data and for those of you signed in to the group page who didn't participate in the Eco-team program, if you wish to hear more about it please let me know.

Also, if any of you is involved with other group related activities which you are willing to share, please do.

Gil

[Thomas Daly]

Dana noticed that in the Nyack Villager latest issue, that Mayor Shields of Nyack is looking to create a Nyack recycling program, as well as other "Green" projects. They are looking for volunteers to form a Green Committee (sort of what we were talking about the other night at the Sierra Club meeting)

I called the Mayors office and volunteered myself, well, I left a voicemail asking to be called back to discuss it further. This is a really great thing! We don't need to create that petition afterall!!

Anyone interested in volunteering for the Green Committe should call 845-358-0229 (Mayor's Office)

If any of us gets selected, let's make a point to recommend any other of us who are interested. There's many projects to be done, so I'm sure there's a few seats on the committee...

Thanks for posting the update Gil... The farm in blauvelt sounds like it could work out... Also, Tanja and Erich live next to an organic farm in Saddle River, so you have another option, I'm sure they'd be happy to get you the contact info for the farmers there...

Looks like we're going to have an action-packed spring! I'm looking forward to it.