Green Team

Morgantown Municipal Green Team Monday, August 6, 2018 Meeting 5:30–7:00pm Minutes Attendees: Jing Zhang, Karen Kalafat, James Kotcon, Holly Purpura, and Dan Pan Updates  Energy and climate change Climate Action Plan: The Sierra Club allocated funds to Downstream Strategies to put together it, per Jim Kotcon. LED streetlights: It is unclear if Abby Clayton has sent the team a printed report on her work. To date, the team has only received the PowerPoint she presented to us and City Council.  Green Space The last City Council meeting included extensive discussion on needs the Board of Parks and Recreation (BOPARC), and whether a levy or referendum for funding on additional lands was appropriate. Falling Run Trail workday August 13–14. Looking for trail crew leaders. If interested, please contact Jim Kotcon.  Recycling Kenny Holloway will be the City Liaison with Republic Services. Contact him with any issues. Karen heard back from Molly McWilliams at Republic Services, who stressed the need to address a problem with plastic bags placed by customers in their recycling bins. These bags are sucked into and mess up the machinery at sorting facilities. Customers should be told that their bins will be rejected if any plastic bag are found by Republic streetside collectors. Molly said that Recycle Source is Republic Services’ new sorting facility. Green Star is operated by Waste Management; Republic Services is its greatest competitor. Getting data based on our recycling may not be possible. Morgantown is so small, it is not in the contract, and the Pittsburgh numbers from such a larger location is a general figure based on everything they pass through. West Virginia passed a resolution years ago to require reports on recycling from each county. The Mon County Solid Waste Authority, however, has no information and collects no information, because they are not the ones that handles it. Downstream’s report came up with a 5 percent diversion rate from the City of Morgantown. Abysmal – the national average is around 30%. Karen was told that the only information we can get from Republic or its sorting facility is the total volume of recycling, but no total of the solid waste collected was given. The team should ask Republic Services for the current 1  contamination rate in recycling bins. How many bins are rejected weekly or monthly? Do they keep records on this? Updating recycling information on City website. Pam has been working to update the recycling brochure and our flyer on dos and don’ts, both to be posted on the City website soon. It is not possible at this point for Republic to reprint the many brochures it has already sent out. As part of this work, she talked with Pittsburgh’s recycling office, which also uses Recycle Source. Pittsburgh gets a breakdown on its recycling, only because of the size of what it recycles. Her contact also noted that he expected the big companies to limit what they would accept in the future due to lack of market demand for some. Karen will ask the Morgantown Utilities Board (MUB) about getting a flyer on frequently asked questions in the MUB mailing. Composting. Not contracted with Republic Services to provide, only research on it as a possibility. Pam had agreed to research successful composting programs in the region, but was unable to do so this summer due to travel and work. She will take this on this fall. New Business  Green Team Transitions. Holly Purpura has accepted an offer from the Marys River Watershed Council in Corvallis, Oregon (www.mrwc.org) and will be moving the first week of September before our monthly meeting on Sept. 10. She will therefore have to step down as chair. The team discussed possible transitions, and tabled the topic for the next meeting. Pam Cubberly will be returning to Morgantown mid-August and intends to put more time into teamwork as team secretary as well as on specific projects (including recycling grants, responding to City requests, and communications).  Third Solar Coop. In the works, WV SUN has begun working with the Sierra Club on a possible third solar co-op in our area (the third since 2015). If so, panels could be installed by 2019 in time for the federal tax-credit. [Update: WV SUN has launched the Mountaineer Country Solar Co-op, centered on Morgantown but open to participants throughout Monongalia, Marion, Harrison, Taylor, and Preston counties. The new coop will be highlighted by WV SUN at the September 8 Rise for Renewable events at the Farmer’s market discussed below]. Announcements  August 25 (5pm to 7pm): The WVU Organic Farm Field Day with workshops, activities, and a twilight walk to avoid the heat.  September 8 (2pm–5pm): Alongside a nationwide effort, Mountaineers for Congress and the Sierra Club are working on a Rise-Up Renewables event—a day of action fair on September 8. Saturday. The event will be held at the Morgantown Farmers Market Pavilion.  October 16: WV Sun will be hosting a solar open house on October 6 [TIME?] at Jim Kotcon’s. The goal of the related National Solar Tour, October 6–7, 2018, is to hold a solar open house in every community across America on that date. Next Meeting. The September meeting will be held on Monday, September 10 at 5:30 pm at the Morgantown Public Library, second-floor conference room. 2