Minutes from the September 21st meeting

Present: Judith Ferster, Bob Weickert, Blair Pollock, Liane Salgado, May
Becker, John Boren

The waste/composting group had a short business meeting before the longer
meeting planning for the composting facility at Spence’s Farm, when Spence
Dickinson and Tim Peck joined us.

Blair Pollock, solid waste planner from Orange County Solid Waste
Management, was a guest at both meetings.

We need one more person to volunteer to help cover the
waste/trash/composting station at the 10-10-10 event. Bob, Liane and Kathy
Shea are doing one hour each. Is there any other planning we need to do for
this as a group?

There was a discussion with Blair about the possibility of having one-time
compostable garbage somehow disposed of in the regular process that OCSWM
has with restaurants and food stores.  He said that this would have to be
very carefully arranged so the waste stream and procedures aren’t
disrupted.  One instance of this would be compostables at 10-10-10
event. (various
kinds of “biodegradable” plastics, and disposing of whatever compostable
plastics we accumulate.)  If there aren’t too many, and preferably if they
are mostly cups and not the cutlery, we can probably take them to Weaver St
to add to their material for Brooks Composting to pick up.

Bob has contacted Mark Ginsburg at North Carolina Interfaith Power and Light
(NCIPL) about what they might have to guide churches in initiating and
expanding waste reduction.  NCIPL does more energy savings than waste
reduction, but has some ideas about waste reduction.  Here is one lead: you
might want to look at excerpts of the film Renewal – in particular “Going
Green”.  Their website is http://www.renewalproject.net/film.   Bob believes
that “faith communities” are great places to get leverage on waste
reduction, both on their sites and in their modeling for their membership.
He and Liane are going to write a short “manual” on approaching churches,
etc on reducing solid waste with recycling, composting, reducing purchases
and shifting to products made from recycled materials. Blair also
volunteered himself and Muriel Williman to particpate in any instruction if
we get to that point.  Help with this would be appreciated.

We had a long discussion on attempts to get plastic bag reduction and
grocery bag reuse from the various grocery chains. Food Lion seems
particularly unwilling to cooperate. Judith is still willing to approach
them as she had before.

Blair encourages us all to come to the annual Orange County Solid Waste
meeting on September 29 at 7 pm at Eubanks. There were several articles on
new solid waste management plans in the papers this week. And the Solid
Waste Plan is being posted on the internet.

Here are details of the meeting, I will try to go.

The county will hold a meeting on its draft Solid Waste Plan Update at 7
p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 29, at the Solid Waste Management Department, 1207
Eubanks Road in Chapel Hill.All residents and businesses in Orange County
and the part of Durham County inside Chapel Hill town limits may comment. To
read the draft plan, go to wwww.co.orange.nc.us/workgroup.asp (look for
“Three Year Solid Waste Plan Update”).

Here’s one of the articles:
http://www.chapelhillnews.com/2010/09/22/59627/food-waste-next-recycl…

Our next meeting is Monday October 25th at 7 pm at Carolina Meadows where
we’ve been meeting.

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