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Well, there's alot of news. 

Kevin and I have attended our first Chicago Conservation Corps (C3) session. (here's the C3 blog site) C3 is a Chicago Department of Environment program.  Very energizing. Around 25 people are designing environmental community projects. We heard from Margaret Frisbee, of Friends of the Chicago River, Joel Brammeier of Alliance for the Great Lakes, and Joyce Coffee of the Department of Environment, and Michael Howard of Eden Place Nature Center.

We were invited by Michael Howard to come to Eden Place on Saturday, October 21st.  Bobby and I are going in the afternoon and we'll invite others.  Later, we were given a demonstration on rainbarrel installation and a tour of the Center for Green Technology building. I really enjoyed seeing the rain gardens particularly.  I think we'll put on on Toad  Lane.  (the working name for our new co-op home)

We've had nine Green Dinners so far in Beyond Today.  Neighbors at each have shared their environmental ideas and brainstormed about our projects.  The committees are filling up and taking shape.  Thursday, Alderman Schulter and Debra Shore will join us at a final Green Dinner for this series, to celebrate the end of the planning and the start of the work. 

Gary Zuckerman, of Recycle Plus is going to install rainbarrels on Toad Lane soon.  That way, neighbors can see an example.  I'm thinking we should get several different rainbarrel types on our home so we can compare and get creative. 

There's lots more news, but it will have to wait because it's a beautiful day and it's a shame to be on the computer any longer.. Julie.

5 or so years ago, when I moved into this neighborhood, Pete Leki gave me a copy of a book.  In this book, a community living by the river grows.  More sharing, more interaction, more music.  Someday, I hope that we can share this book with more new friends...  in it, the community puts money earned in specially marked garbage cans and uses it to buy property to expand the neighborhood. 

Last night we continued a conversation with Ted Ernst, whom Kevin and I met at a C3 meeting.  (a program with the city's Dept of Environment).  My friends and I invited Ted to dinner to learn about how the HUB co-op works and to discuss what we might want to do here as we transform our home into a proper coop. When Bobby and I bought the house late last summer, we shared the dream of finding others to join in ownership and making it a home for people who are also working with our commmunity group, Beyond Today.  Perhaps even keeping room available for discounted intern housing. 

So last night we learned alot.  And I think one of the really exciting things is actually how positive a response this creates in people who hear of it.   From Kevin we learned that retirement money can be invested in a company which purchases property.  This way, neighbors who feel that they would rather not invest in the stock market (for ethical reasons) could take 5 or 10 thousand and invest it in this neighborhood run company- so that when a building or house goes up for sale, the neighborhood could purchase it.  This neighborhood company could manage the properties in an environmentally and socially concious way.  I've already shared this idea with some neighbors and friends.  Some simply said, "yes, let's do it" others said "we should get experts in to teach us about this and then hold a meeting to present what kind of shares would be available and the paperwork" (paraphrasing).  This whole project, to me, is about faith and trust and love for our community's dedication to our mission of environmentalism.  I would feel proud to give my power (money) to the neighborhood environmental company... 

But back to the task at hand... Last night, Ted spoke of many useful new ways to improve communication in our community.  We have an issue with the webite and email coming from one person (me).  I do my best to channel everyone's input to both, but it's not the best as far as decentralization goes.   It's also a weakness.  So Ted spoke of looking into installing Wordpress, which would help us to allow more of our neighbors to add to the website, - it would be kind of half-blog, half-webite -if I am understanding correctly...  And also allow neighbors to update the calendar by setting it up like the one on wikimaas. 

Glad to expand my circle of friends ... Ok, enough computer for one morning.. we have another green dinner tonight.  and there's much to do before then.  J.

We'll try to post here more often...

For now, here's a short update. 

Today, we are editting and working on our group email and website updates as well as planning for the forth green dinner.  Green dinners are small neighborhood meetings (potlucks) where we run through a list of general environmental topics, brainstorming and sharing ideas for how to develop our environmental neighborhood project as we more forward.  Alderman Schulter is coming to one of our green dinners on October 12th.

Our calendar has some new interesting items...

Our interns and volunteers are back at school, but often coming after school and weekends, so that's good. 
That's all for now...

Julie.

A new project and a new volunteer!

The plastic number project is born.  Karlyn and Hannah brainstorm questions which need answers:
the recycling plastic number project involves much more than they realized at first. We need to be able to identify the plastic numbers, including the following information: is it accepted by the city for recycling?  if not, is it accepted by other recyclers?  Is it reusable, dishwasher safe, microwavable, durable, will it easily melt, crack, etc?  What are the toxicity issues? Stay tuned for more eco-questions!

More work was done, more progress made. 

Here's a few photos.  Our Beyond Today interns and volunteers went to Somme Prairie Woods to learn about prairie restoration.  They are going to write an article about why it is done.  A beautiful and fun day!

We'll be at the river this morning.  As soon as the interns finish their first guitar lesson and I finish my coffee.  

And, unfortunately, the CDPH feels they need to spray again. 
See our website for the schedule and map of spray areas.

We've had a flurry of activity with the spray alert. 

It now seems that our neighborhood won't be sprayed this week.

Today our interns will help us make signs and banners so we are ready if they try to spray the neighborhood this summer. 

Yesterday the interns interviewed a local resident about their desire to do some green remodeling.  We'll follow the progress and do our best to provide resources to help. 

Later, we went to the eco-transportation fest organized by The Foresight Design Initiative

We loved the Twike! (see previous posting) We'll post the MP3 of the interview later today!

I found a video of a twike! 

Could we get 10 of these and have them around the neighborhood as part of an experimental i-go (car-sharing) project?

more info.