Details on the Great American Cleanup in Clifton (Cincinnati) - Saturday, APRIL 16th (8:30am-1:00pm)

**IF YOU FEEL ANYONE YOU KNOW WOULD BE INTERESTED IN JOINING US FOR THE CLEANUP, PLEASE SHARE THIS WITH A FRIEND.**

We are rapidly approaching the Great American Cleanup for 2011. As the founder of the CTM Green Clifton Committee, I really wanted to get Clifton on track with annual cleanup events, after what I understood as a long dormancy. My goal is to make this second annual effort bigger than the last. Before I get into the details of this year's event, I want to thank everyone who has expressed any level of interest.

The basics...

Date and time: Saturday, April 16th at 8:30am

Meetup place (or home base): Clifton Plaza (333 Ludlow Ave)

Morning kickoff: Please arrive by 8:30am, so that we can coordinate the efforts with team leaders, assign teams for our volunteers, get liability forms signed, and get acquainted over coffee and eats.

Duration: We're looking at a 9:00am start time, expecting teams to return to Clifton Plaza by noon.

What's next?: I am working on a couple local partnerships within our business district that would provide food for our volunteers after great hard work. No one has any need to worry about not seeing food in front themselves after the cleanup. Lunch will be served from 12pm to 1pm.

The cleanup and supplies...

What's being picked up? We will be picking up trash and recyclables separately. Keep Cincinnati Beautiful will be supplying all teams in Cincinnati with different colored bags, white for one and clear for the other. Weeding out recyclables from our pickup materials is taken very seriously.

Electronics? Yes, electronics are being collected, as a part of the Great American Cleanup. However, they will not be a part of the regular cleanup activities. Instead, KCB has arranged for two drop off locations during the event--one is Blue Ash and another at a still unreported location central to all of Greater Cincinnati's neighborhoods. I will keep you up to date on that piece.

Supplies: Based on supplies from Keep Cincinnati Beautiful from last year, volunteers will receive bright KCB volunteer t-shirts. As stated earlier, KCB will also supply separate bags for recyclables and trash, latex gloves, a pocket first aid kit for home base, and posters for the event. You may see some posters around Clifton in the days leading up to the event. Until the Supply Day--Tuesday, April 12^th--I will not know exactly what we will receive but I planned for supplies for 30 volunteers. Do not fret--KCB overcompensates with supplies for team volunteer estimates, and I will make sure we are not running low.

Routes...

You will find a draft map of team routes attached to this email. The highlighted routes are suggested based on main vehicular or pedestrian routes, common cut-throughs, and known problem areas. I would encourage team leaders to cover other neighborhood streets within their zones if time permits. But I think these routes will take up a significant portion of our time. I will provide individual route maps on cleanup day.

Team leaders...

I have already received interest from individuals becoming team leaders. Due to the large expanse of our neighborhood, we may need two or more team leaders per route. It depends on the turnout by 8:30am or so on April 16th. Feel free to email me, if you are interested in becoming a team leader.

Please let me know if you feel that I am leaving anything out here. If you have any questions at all, please do not hesitate to email me.

Very much thanks,

Christian Huelsman

Clifton Town Meeting, board member

CTM Green Clifton Committee, chair

GAC Clifton site leader

christianhuelsman@cliftoncommunity.org

Dawn of a new era

2010 will mark a new era for me, which technically began just a few months ago. Since September, I realized that I became so restless with my desire for a more sustainable community. Although the City adopted its Green Cincinnati Plan and Climate Protection Plan in 2009, I still do not feel that we have a strong, comprehensive, city-wide effort. Our neighborhoods can be greener. Our transportation priorities can be much greener. Our concept of localism can be much greener.

In November 2009, I decided to start the conversation of creating community green opportunities for our neighborhood, particularly in Clifton. At Clifton Town Meeting, I presented a slideshow on various possibilities of how our neighborhood can partner with other entities to achieve greater recycling volumes, community composting, better connection between residents and community gardens, and overall waste reduction. My bit was so well-received, in fact, that the trustees of Clifton Town Meeting requested that I setup a green subcommittee under their umbrella. Over the past two months, I have been working to assemble a working team that will address these issues in our community.

Little did I know the attention that my presentation would receive. Soon after, after many carbon copy e-mails, I was requested to do a similar presentation for the CUF Neighborhood Association meeting. The reception of that engagement overwhelmed me. I could not even get through my slides, as hands flew into the air. One man said he could not even remember the last time then had a presentation effect everyone in attendance to such magnitude. The e-mails also reached representatives of other community councils in Uptown, who have a vision of a larger, regional green strategy.

Now I and many others envision a collection of green assets for our region. It will be used to help recognize our existing strong points and areas of greater desire, such that money may be leveraged for more sustainable neighborhoods. It matters where a neighborhood gets its food, where it is sourced, and who benefits or suffers from the current system. It matters where our waste goes, how much energy is required to get it there, and what alternatives we can find to redraw our waste stream. Food, post-consumer waste, personal energy exerted, and our physical limitations--measuring and gauging how these types of energy are wasted, reused or diverted is vital to the enhancement of our natural environments and communities.

The above is primarily a proclamation, but it is also the beginning for a new focus of this blog. Up until now, I felt that my aforementioned efforts were not mature enough to spout about it here. I anticipate that I will have a lot to say my own personal goals to live more sustainably as well. Plastic will play less of a role in my life. The local grocery and farmer's market will have greater priority in my daily grind. The new, local, food delivery co-op also has caused me to reassess how I get my food. The way that information is dispensed to others can also exhibit a more sustainable path. The oft-encountered crossroad of "less sustainable and more sustainable road" can depend on which results in a greater net benefit. The mind swirls with these thoughts, but I feel that I am close to attaining that green confidence I have been wanting. Even so, always more can be done.

Until next time...soonsoon.