- I mean, sorry. Hey friends, we're here. We've done it. It is October 16th at six. Well, it's actually
- six of two, but there are enough of us to get some business done. So we're going to jump on in and start
- up today. Okay. Very all right. Night and here. Night and absent, not probably here. We should tell
- is not here so far.
- Great, great, great. Thanks to the folks who are here.
- Um, so the first thing on the, uh, well, not for the next thing from the agenda is the approval of the
- September minutes. Those were included in the packet for today's conversation. I mentioned to Rachel that I.
- I had an edit and I wasn't sure in our rule of communication where that what we do with our edits, but
- it's a pretty easy one. It was just, I was wanting to include, we had a member of the public who just
- like introduced themselves and I wanted to include that. So that was Steve Stanford, who was the wastewater
- operator. I don't know if he gave us that he helps utilities with industrial customers, but he was present
- for it. I know that we were kind of talking around some of the topics that might involve him. So I wanted
- to add that little piece.
- I apologize for leaving early last week. I started in the middle of the day, I noticed I started to
- feel a little sick, but I didn't really think about it when I was in here and couldn't control myself.
- No, I feel so bad for you. You're totally fine. Feel free to do that. Everyone here is an adult. So
- if you need to leave for whatever reason, attend to whatever real world things happening, please do.
- But yeah, sorry I didn't miss you for part of it, but glad you seem to be feeling better.
- I move we approve September minutes as amended. Second. Okay. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. I don't think I've
- heard. Brown.
- We have five yeses, since we need seven is the question. Because we have so many absences. Yeah, it's
- majority in the room. I think it passes. As far as the
- minutes being posted, I apologize. I did upload them and then they weren't uploaded. They were blank.
- So Matt told me today, they were not on the website. So I apologize if people tried to access them.
- Heidi, I can show you, I can show you actually where they are. They're in the meeting shop events and
- they're going to be here.
- I think I put the link in the email as well. They kind of tucked away though. Yeah. There was a time
- when we would just send them by email, like here are the minutes, give your thoughts or whatever. But
- at this point we have them in the agenda packet. So they kind of come in a few days before the meeting
- happens. And if you have edits, it sounds like you can either bring them to the meeting, we do what
- I just did, or you could send them to Rachel. Yes. And I can include them in the packet.
- Okay. Yeah. Fun with voting. Okay, great. Well, thanks folks for taking a look at those and being on
- top of when we need to update them. The next item is a public comment. So if there are any members of
- the public on Zoom, we would be happy to have them share that or anyone in the room would like to introduce
- themselves. Please do. Sorry folks. Yeah.
- Is there a preferred place for me to stand and be or anything? Yeah, you can sit if you want to. Yeah,
- you can join us at the table. Hi, I'm Alex York. I helped install solar on both of these people's houses,
- so this is being said. I'm currently a member of the Bloomington Commission on Sustainability, and I
- am spearheading a project where we are getting a O'Neill Spear School capstone.
- And I thought that the project might be of interest to this commission as well. Background is Ann Arbor
- last year through a referendum enabled what they're calling a sustainable energy utility. It is a municipal
- electric utility that will run in parallel with their Duke energy equivalent. And yeah, they're envisioning
- it as a way to have
- provide 100% clean electricity to more people in the city. And there's a lot of other benefits that
- come out of that, but they have a goal of net neutral energy consumption by 2030, and they can't get
- there without doing something over and above the path that their utility is taking. So this is what
- they've enacted to keep that goal. I'm happy to talk more about that, but that's not the meat of it.
- The capstone project that I have commissioned for spring semester 2026 is to do a feasibility study
- into Bloomington adopting an SEU, a sustainable energy utility. What Bloomington does, what Bloomington
- doing this with the plane? That's what the study is for. So yeah, lots of questions there.
- The Bloomington Commission on Sustainability on Tuesday gave this project their blessing. SPEA has given
- it their blessing. We're on the book. Everything's moving forward. But there is time between now and
- classes starting to kind of massage research questions that we want the students researching for us.
- So that would be one place that your commission could be involved, like helping to massage those.
- I know Matt very well, I'm happy to send him like current draft of what research questions are that
- he could share with the group here. And like, maybe you could look at that, think about what might be
- missing, what isn't needed. Other places you could be involved that would be useful is just engagement
- during the project, which we're looking for other partners. And at the end, kind of my primary hope is that
- At the end of this, there's a strong recommendation and data to support the idea that Bloomington doing
- this, adopting an SEU would be a good thing. And so if at the end, your commission were to entertain
- either coming to a presentation or hopefully we could get like the student researchers to come present
- to you. And then you could like maybe sign on to some type of statement with the commission
- on sustainability, like recommending that the city council
- take this off, you know, just that coming from an additional partner would give it more weight and things.
- So if you have some other way that you think you could be involved, great. I'm open to options, but
- I'm spearheading this project and I love engagement for more services. Hi, my name is Aaron. Alex. Sure.
- What is the timeline for the
- the start basically when you have your details locked in and then when the whole thing will be running?
- It'll be spring semester 26, so early January to the end of May. When presentations would need to happen,
- it can be kind of tricky, like they might not be able to come present at your regular meeting. That's
- all things that can get worked out down the road. When details need to be locked in, it's kind of tricky.
- We had to have a project, a project
- Project description submitted this week. It's already submitted, but within that, we can massage the
- research questions pretty much up until the students start working. And even once the students start
- working, there's a little bit of little rooms, but once we get into the work, these are not experienced
- consultants. They're being led by some experienced professors who
- I must be a graduate. I went through the semesters program. I know the two professors that we're working
- with, they're great. I have a lot of confidence in them, but the students don't. So like changing the
- scope of work on the students in the middle of the project would be me. So we should avoid doing that.
- But yeah, the sooner the better on the research questions, because that gives more time to like,
- have everyone rowing in the same direction and have momentum instead of like, spurring around at the
- last minute and there being a miscommunication, like the project started in the wrong direction and
- us having to correct it at the beginning. And so earlier, better, but certainly January would be probably
- the latest. We could be kind of making any major changes. Can you share with us what you've presented
- then? I mean, Tustia?
- Or submit the proposal. I could share that document with all of you. Yes. I'll just send it to you now.
- And we have there's some memo that was made for within a month to kind of introduce all of that. I can
- share all of those material. Yeah. Any other from votes before we're going to get attention on these?
- Well, I mean, it's not the kind of thing that we like to do. I feel like this is supposed to be right
- up our alley. So three things that we could do will potentially have research questions, which we could
- either send them to Rachel and then Rachel sends them all to Matt and then Matt sends them to Alex.
- We could gather them and quickly talk about them at the November meeting, which is already a little
- bit packed, but we could still do that if you'd like. We could do the conversation at the December meeting,
- but that would also be
- you know, going to a very busy time of year and have to do that. So that's one thing. It's kind of how
- we want to pull together research questions, especially if we're able to get some of this material to
- better kind of dig into what we might think through. And then engaging during the project. I might ask
- about that just a little bit more. And then having them present would be, I think, super fun. And we
- could always have like a little special session that works for their timeline. Or if there are other
- commissions that they're presenting to see if we can like reserve the chamber to something like a little
- bit bigger to
- try and get- And I feel we're all gonna get like council members and things for that. Right. So it might
- be good to try to get the chambers and get a coalition all there. Yeah. That'd be great. And then potentially
- with like a letter of recommendation and so forth, I'm not gonna fact, if it's a sound for PubMed, it's
- getting- I mean, yes, if it's a sound, well, if this doesn't make sense, Wilmington should not.
- It's like, oh man, turns out, no.
- I'm imagining that if it's going to work for Ann Arbor, it probably is going to work for Bloomington.
- Our solar potential is better, but yeah, it's not just solar. It's also, you know, it's a utility. So,
- you know, you can do things like energy rebates. You can build financing to help people afford,
- you know, energy efficiency and heat pumps and all of these things. So yeah, it's, there's a lot of
- potential. Yeah.
- They already have the project laid out and a lot of research questions listed, so it's not like we have
- to build anything from scratch. It's just looking at it and seeing if we have anything we'd like to
- add or anything we think is redundant or anything. I today got feedback from somebody who had a, I think
- it would be interesting to explore this. I was like, that was not something on the list. Thank you.
- I put together the research questions mostly myself. I do have a background that makes my guesses are
- pretty good guesses on what would be valuable to the city, but I am not the city.
- I am not, you know, first in all fields. So like, I know I'm going to be missing things. I'm, you know,
- we'd love to have that additional feedback. I was just going to say, when I receive it, I can pass the
- information on to Rachel so that she can distribute it with the commission. And then I'm not sure how
- we want to proceed timeline wise. Yeah. I mean, I think it sounds like maybe the best option is to
- As soon as we get them, everyone take a look. And if they have any immediate responses to it, just send
- us to Rachel as well. And sorry, Rachel, about the emails. Send them to Rachel and then she can kind
- of gather them and you can decide maybe by the November meeting, if we're able to get those, assess
- at that point, if it's worth like talking through, if it's like, no, it's just a couple of thoughts.
- And my last question for you is when you think about the engagement during the project, does that look
- like anything particular at this point? I don't.
- fully know. I know I'm going to be the point person, which means that I will go, you know, probably
- the first couple of classes, like I will be part of, maybe it'll just be me, maybe it'll be me and some
- other people, like there'll be an initial presentation about kind of what we need, what we're looking
- for. And then throughout, like, there'll probably be some, like, there'll be some check-ins that I will
- certainly be involved in. And there will be, the students will undoubtedly have questions.
- I will be the primary person that questions will get relayed to. I'm guessing most of those questions
- I won't have answers to, and I will need to find the person who has those correct answers. So if there
- are other people engaged, those are other people that I can be like, hey, do you know where I should
- take this question to? If I don't know offhand, but I'm trying to engage with lots of people on the
- front end too, so that I know where to distribute my questions.
- I have a contact at utilities who I'm reaching out to because I'm sure that there will be questions
- that utilities will be the right place for because it's a utility. I don't know entirely what your engagement
- during would look like, but certainly I'll make some presentations to students. I'm happy to work with
- people on that instead of doing it myself. Sounds good. Any other questions for Brian?
- Sounds good. Sounds like we're totally interested in helping look at the questions. If there's anything
- that might make sense to add in or continue your sport in the middle and then afterwards give it a listen
- and potential recommendation. Okay. Matt will help them before I leave this room. Thanks. Thank you.
- All right. Okay. Well, that's fun. Something for as we go into the winter seasons and to think about
- Great, well then, if there aren't other members in the Zoom, we'll go ahead and move to new business,
- which means annual planning meeting. Remember that, it's year already, which is wild. So in November,
- our November meeting, which is the third Thursday of the month, is our chance to talk about our goals
- for the year to come. We used to do it in January, but then we figured out that after
- doing it in January and then kind of recovering in February. We typically weren't even starting this
- plan until like, March or April. So we're doing it ahead of the year. But it's just a chance for us
- to kind of do a quick look at what we committed to last year and how we feel about that. We made some
- plans for sort of a three to five year like goals that we had and structured some of the plans for 2025
- around those goals and
- then make sure that we had working groups that supported those, that people were attached to those working
- groups to make sure that we were all contributing to making this progress. And then, yeah, take a look
- back and say, okay, what do we want to do for 2026? And there might be things that we thought we wanted
- to do that with the changing of the whole world around us all the time, it might not feel like the right
- choice anymore, or we might have something new, but this would actually be a more interesting or more
- valuable thing we can do.
- Whatever it is, but it's mostly just a casual meeting. We don't really do a lot of the businessy stuff
- in that meeting. If Nadia is choosing to present her thesis for her program, we might have her do a
- little presentation, but otherwise it's just going to be like a pitch in the potluck environment. So
- typically people bring something edible. It can be just a bag of chips. It can be a,
- a crock pot of your grandma's special stew, whatever it is. I can do whatever you'd like. We typically
- just kind of email around to get a temperature check of what kind of things we have covered. And we
- don't really have any similar reports, like bowls, cups, plates, utensils, but we don't really have
- a lot of that in this building. So if you were bringing a stew, for example, you might bring bowls or
- tell people like, hey, bring a bowl if you want some stew.
- I think there is a trina allergy and a shellfish allergy. Yes. That's one of those things. And if anybody
- else has the allergy, don't publicly disclose it. I'm happy to say there is an allergy. Yeah. If we
- know people aren't going to be here for that meeting, we can probably also share that. But yeah, those
- are two of the pictures. And I think there's also a member who is vegan. But obviously, that's not a
- a health risk to being in the room with something. So that's more just to think if you're looking at
- a room. Anyway, so it's a pitch in. It's from six to eight as usual, but the main thing is for us to
- talk from you typically use the Drag Race board and write stuff down and come up with ideas and end
- up kind of voting on what we think would be fun. Any questions on that?
- Will it be possible for us to be reminded in some way of last year's conversation beforehand? Sure,
- sure. We have to see what we've done and what we still want to do. So I have an annual report slide
- to make sure to send up going through last year. And then I can't remember, Rachel, if you took notes
- or if I took notes, but one of us I know had a full list. It should be in like the December reading.
- OK. Thank you.
- And I'll look and see if I've written anything particularly legible for two. Should be some kind of
- list going of what people plan to bring just so we don't have like five people bringing these or something.
- Yeah, dude, what would be a good way to do that? Like, do you want to just like email each other? I
- think that's an, it's an appropriate thing to email each other about snacks or bring to a meeting. I
- don't think it's, but I think it's much better. So we can do that. Or if you want to just like,
- Say something right now, we can do that too. Do you feel scared? It's not moving. It's moving.
- It's moving. It's moving. It's moving. It's moving. It's moving. It's moving. It's moving. It's moving.
- Okay. Anybody else have an idea of what they want to bring? Oh, that's a fun one. Okay, mac and cheese.
- Wait, so peanuts are not tree nuts. That is true. Peanuts are not tree nuts. You think that's okay?
- upside down for you. Let's say yes, but I will send a note through to the group with the things people
- are bringing in and just say like, double check, does anyone have a peanut allergy? I'm thinking a noodle
- tofu peanut sesame thing. Nice. That sounds great. She had a noodle peanut tofu. Sesame thing. Yeah.
- Love it. Love the salad. Sort of. Like a Thai salad. Yeah, like Thai salad. Yeah. Sesame thing, Thai salad.
- I was going to leave these words exactly if I wrote that. It's going to be great. OK. All right. That
- sounds great. All right. And I'll send this to the group. And then folks can say, OK, cool. I'll supplement
- with this or that or whatever. Awesome. Thanks, Jen. And yeah, like I was saying to Shannon, I can send
- through a copy of whatever notes I have from last year, too, just so we can look at what we have. And
- typically, the annual meeting, the goal is to double check those three to five-year goals and then
- objectives if we call them. Anyway, three to five years plan and make sure that all still makes sense
- for us and then identify what we want to do for 2026 specifically and then all those working groups
- that we have. The goal is that all of the working groups that we are have active apply to the things
- that we're doing next year so we're not just like spinning our wheels on this project over here and
- don't have a supporting working group or something that's like trying to tie those two and so if you're
- not in a working group or if you're
- looking to fill your time with lots of working groups, that will be the time when I really lay on the
- pressure. You think I lay on the pressure already? I'm gonna get real testy and we'll make sure that
- we've got folks involved in things that makes sense for them. Great, any questions about the annual
- planning meeting? I don't know. Cool, okay, well I will send some follow-up emails for that.
- In the meantime, we will get to the next item, which is the handbook revision.
- And I believe, Rachel, you added this because of the fun we had at the ECPC meeting? Yes. Great. So
- we had the ECPC meeting, right? We met with the city planner, we met with Rachel, and we were talking
- through some development variances that are in consideration. And so many of us were excited to go.
- It exceeded the number of people that are out in a room at the same time, and so we couldn't have all
- of us stay, which was
- Great. It's a great bond to have, but then we're, I'm kicking, we're all kicking ourselves. We're like,
- Oh, we should have made the quorum higher. Because once you hit five people, it's an official, like
- enough EC members are there that it's a real EC meeting when it's supposed to just be a working group
- meeting. Yeah. In which case you could still have it. It would just supposed to be recorded and supposed
- to have an agenda. You couldn't have it. You couldn't have it? The note is one that you can notice.
- If we knew the five, a certain amount ago, we could.
- without a notice to say it's a special EC meeting. It's all about this one thing that's actually a working
- group title, but that's okay. But the formality of it changes. And so the great news is that we have
- a whole bunch more commissioners now than we did when we changed those bylaws because we were all tired
- of not having quorum. So the quorum for a EC meeting is five. The quorum for a working group is two.
- We currently have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 commissioners out of 12. We do have someone graduating
- soon, so it is possible that that 12 will turn, or that 11 will turn into 10. I don't know if that is
- possible. So the idea is, do we want to change this number, minimum of five, or the subcommittee, minimum
- of two, knowing that we have a subcommittee that
- has five people in it who are interested, probably six people actually who are interested in being on
- it. Subcommittee rule is okay because it means that it can work with just two individuals in a subcommittee.
- The issue is our main quorum, and the biggest issue with our main quorum originally was that instead
- of half of the commission members plus one, it was half of the possible commission members plus one.
- So do you remember, do we have to have the minimum number articulated or can it just be? And what I'm
- saying is the five is too low right now. Yeah. Can we just strike that? Yeah. Can we just strike that?
- Yeah. So you would like to have 50% plus one. Yeah. Of appointed commissioners. Of appointed commissioners.
- Which is always going to be six. Yeah.
- Not necessarily, unless there's like nine commissioners. So that would be a half of what's going to
- be five commissioners. Yeah. I'm sorry. I was thinking at the maximum. Yeah. Okay. Do you round down
- or up? Round up. We should talk about that too. But that would probably be okay because if we have fewer
- commissioners total, there's slightly less likelihood that as large a percentage will show up than we want.
- Um, some committee meeting. I mean, it's still possible. Yeah. But yeah, that's true. But that's where
- the team comes in where she's like, if you were people, we can't possibly have the five people for a
- subcommittee meeting. Okay. So the idea is moving forward to have an environmental commission meeting.
- It would be 50% of the appointed commissioners, which right now there's 11 of us. So it'd be six.
- Five and a half, and then the one would round it up to six. Is that how we do it? Or do you round it
- to six and then plus one? D6. I think it would be six. That's why we put five, I think, because we were
- like, like this question. Okay. So six would be kind of the, at this moment in time, the number that
- would put us into a full. Okay. I understand your question now. Okay. So there's five and a half.
- You can't have a person. I have to ask legal. I think how I would interpret it would be five and a half
- would be five people present. That's why it would be six. I'm not 100% sure on that. That's how I am
- thinking about it, though. I think you're right. So is this language all that needs to be changed with
- the handbook? Thanks. Oh.
- I think there, somebody brought up to me, but the working groups should, if there should be any type
- of requirement to be a part of a working group, or if that should just still be optional. So I wanted
- to give space for that. How many would be an environmental commission member? Yes. If they're required
- to be. Yes. An active member in a small working group. What do you all think? I haven't shown. Yeah.
- I thought, I mean,
- But that was actually already a requirement. Yeah, I think the issue is historically, we don't want
- to shove anyone into it the moment they jump. So it'd be like, oh, you get a few months to get your
- footing and then, yeah, we'd really like you to be in at least two hours. Yeah. I think it should be optional.
- Just because, well, for the reasons that you're mentioning, but it may also be, I'm sort of thinking
- selfishly here, but that you're part of working group or working groups for a time, but then you need
- to step back a little bit, but you still want to stay involved in the commission. Um, so maybe you step
- back from the working group and then rejoin that when we're different. Well, I, I like having
- the flexibility. Yeah. Just knowing that, you know, there are seasons of life. And if that hasn't been
- a problem.
- Has it been a problem? One thing we do have an issue, we have had issues in the past where like one
- or two or three people are really involved and then one or two or three people aren't in any working
- groups at all. And so they come to a monthly meeting, but they're not really, they don't have a lot
- of context for any one thing in particular. So they aren't necessarily as engaged and the people who
- are engaged are like doing a lot of things and really trying to keep momentum. So I think we included it to,
- to sort of set the stage for new commissioners. If you're going to join, we would really like you to
- be in the working group. But I do think that to Shannon's point, it's like, there are going to be times
- when you're like, I can't, whether I'm in the working group or not, I'm not going to be attending things
- for a little while because I've got stuff going on. And that's so fine. I'd rather people be enthusiastic
- about the EC and take breaks where they need it than be forced and quit. So what do you think, Adam?
- I guess you could have some sort of like, you have to be in a working group for like,
- half of the year or something, the next number of months. But then at that point, it's like, we're kind
- of not about manning it. Like, what does it mean to be in the work group? Like a certain percentage
- of meetings? Yeah. It's kind of hard to. Yeah, I'm conflicted because if you, if you were to force somebody
- into a working group, they could still just attend none of those working group meetings. Exactly. Yeah.
- Oh, but there's a thing that says if you don't participate in working groups, you eventually are out
- of the working group. And there's something in there that's like a little bit more firm language. I
- think I'm okay.
- with it still technically not being required as long as it's made clear that it is expected. That's
- the way I read it. I don't remember reading it that. I do remember thinking that it was required. That's
- what it reads strong enough. The pressure is bottom. Did you say it says strongly encouraged? Yeah,
- strong but very strong. I don't remember how it's written. Yeah, I think we tried not to make it
- If you don't, you can't be part of our group kind of thing. But I do think it was, I mean, for the reasons
- I said, it's, it's very valuable having commissioners be involved in some working group of some sort.
- But, you know, if you're a really big water person and there's no one else who's into the water stuff,
- it may not make sense for us to have a working group. And that may be the thing that you're like, as
- soon as that comes up, I'm ready for it, but that's my thing. And that's what I really want to do. So.
- Okay, sounds like the important as is, were there any other changes or modifying the handbook that anybody
- feels strongly about? Okay, that's the only change. Harry, I want you to show proper. Okay, yeah, yeah,
- we can go ahead and vote on the changes to the bylaws. Second, nice.
- Oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to force you into making it. It was, it was my choice carrying those
- two. Sorry about that. No, no, no. Okay. Yes. Yes. Yes. The changes that we talked about with the quorum
- going to 50% plus one and not five minimums. Yes.
- I need brown. Very all right. Yes. Yes. Great. Thanks, all. Thanks for the discussion. Speaking
- of discussions, here we go into the old business, which is the working groups. Great. So the first one
- is water quality. Mitchell is not here today, but I attended the water quality working group with him
- last, sometime in the last few weeks.
- Don't want to blur, but we had a few folks from the Bloomington Utilities. Thank you. Oh, you were there
- as well. Oh, do you want to do the update on this one? No. Yeah, I took too many notes, but basically
- we had a couple of folks from the Utilities Department, Liz Carter and Evelyn Gordon, who chopped through
- some changes. Basically, there's a bunch of changes that are being made. So what I can say is that
- Some of them were just adjustments to some of the different administrative details. But in looking through
- this, it was things like they had regulations around like plastic erosion control being something that's
- not allowed. But because of the way a new laws come down, they can no longer say you can't do plastic
- erosion control because it's not in the codes. They basically put it in the
- Um, the plant apartments, musical code to say that you can't have that. So things like that was like
- just sort of. Hiding up some rules that were in place that had been formalized. Um, let's see, there
- is some different permits about, and you might know about this as well. Um, about water quality, if
- depending on the size of the development that you're working on. So.
- And if you want to elaborate on this, it's maybe more fitting for your... Yeah, I think it was also
- from 37, I think. I forget how it was codified. But basically, the permit name, I think, is CSGP. Infection
- and stormwater improvement, maybe. Something along those lines. So the state now does not allow
- municipalities to
- permit erosion controls for sites under an acre. And it's only the IDEM permit. And I think IDEM only
- regulates sites more than an acre. So I think that under an acre, you know, lot size is not being regulated
- for erosion control at this time. That's nice. Another thing, driveway culverts, didn't know this, but
- previously it was said that property owners had to maintain culverts that went under their driveway.
- and that, or that, that bridges, well, it, but it was not, oh, that's what it was. It was not officially
- in their, in whatever their, their code was. So they added that word. If you have something that's,
- that's the one under your driveway, you could be the one to handle it, that the city will install it,
- but that you have to manage it. So that's something that had been kind of happening, but they had to
- put it in officially. Let's see, there's,
- Their design manual went into effect. They've been doing some revisions to that. It goes with utility
- board, and they're updating things about green infrastructure and stuff like that. There's a lot of
- details about that, which I can send you if that's useful. And then they're also changing their street
- sweeping using Route Smart to improve street sweeping routes and frequency. They're looking at long-term frequency
- uh, decreasing, basically decreasing the overall volume. So instead of just like doing it whenever they
- can get a truck and go out there, um, trying to be a little bit more intentional about how much they're
- sweeping, when they're sweeping, and if doing it on a certain, uh, cadence reduces the overall collection
- over time. So it's like just less, um, uh, a little less work overall, but they're like monitoring it
- and measuring it in a way that they didn't before. So they can assess like what they need to be doing
- moving forward and with the room time.
- Um, let's see. And then, okay. And then there's some things that are not, there's a report that we received
- that is going through utilities board next. And then they're going to go through, I think now like a
- finalization process and then release it. So that would be something that will come out to the public
- at another time. And then we were talking about, there's that item grant, that 319 grant that has to do with,
- Uh, and now point source water pollution. And so we were talking about different ways that we might
- be able to do something with them. Maybe with them, maybe with the parks department, um, uh, in one
- of the waterways in Bloomington. It sounds like that the original idea was that it was for the Cascades
- era isn't like the proper watershed to actually be applicable. But we were talking about maybe trying
- to tie in that with a clear creek, which is where they've been doing a lot of sampling. Um, there's
- some different levels that they're being required to sort of, um,
- uh, remediate. And so trying to figure out if there's multiple ways of incorporating some clean-up or,
- um, educational materials or, um, monitoring or something like that that we can do that would be like
- through an IDEM funded grant. So talking through that a little bit, but trying to figure out where the
- EDC fits on that as far as like helping look into things. So it was very jam-packed. There were a lot
- of things that were very natured of interest. And, um, yeah, overall,
- They're really excited to continue conversations with us. Utilities is a really relevant department
- for us, so it's nice that we've got some folks who are excited to talk about what's happening in the
- waterways, what's happening with the bacterial levels and things like that, and what our role could
- be in either helping to communicate about that, engage people about that, or do any kind of supportive
- documentation. That's the water quality through the voice of the carrier who is not a water quality
- specialist.
- Right. ECPC is the next one. That was one of those meetings that had a whole bunch of folks at it. Is
- there anyone who wants to talk through that process? So, ECPC met twice. The first one was where we
- almost had our quorum issue and the third had to leave. We discussed the St. Remy wetland situation
- a little bit and also a future housing development
- Um, near the beeline where a bunch of tree removal is going to happen though. That one was in the early
- stages. We just touched on it. We had some, a staff member there as well. I can't remember who that
- was. We decided we had strong enough feelings about the St. Remy spillway project that we wanted to
- write some sort of letter. Um, and so we planned to meet again a week later.
- Uh, which ended up just being me and Mitchell. And we are bringing a letter to the commission today.
- It's next week. Uh, the packet, I think, was about the same when we actually got continued to November,
- because there's still some unresolved issues. Um, so. It's sort of remind us for those of us who haven't
- done these meetings. What is the sample?
- They have, um, where is it? I can share more now. Sure. It's on the southeastern part of town right
- on the county city line. Uh, they have a, a couple of, uh, cons within the HLA common area. Uh, and
- one of the cons has a spillway data, um, to the south of it.
- around the pond and there was a wetland delineation on the parcel. And the wetland delineation did not
- cover the entire parcel, but it showed significant wetlands, emergent wetlands within the construction
- area. So while the spillway is certainly failing, CB wants it repaired, the HOA wants it repaired. It's
- impacting a significant, I think it was impacting 0.7 acres amount of wetlands.
- Um, mostly because of the construction access road, um, that would be remain in perpetuity. So then
- the dam can, um, need maintenance periodically. And trees are being removed as well. Um, and then I
- think it's crossing a couple of streams, so right there in buffer areas are being impacted. Did that
- cover anything? Yeah, no, not much. Um, my issue with it being continued again, um, this is one of those
- things where,
- I wish there were some more flexibility within government because our recommendation was essentially
- to seek an alternate route that was shorter and less disruptive and would pretty much require them to
- ask a property owner if they were okay with an access road coming up along the edge of their property, which
- theoretically be asked of them anytime, because they could say yes, and then a new survey could start.
- They could say no, and we could be forced to go with what the original petitioner has put forward at
- whatever time this has continued to. So it's one of those things that is disappointing to me that would
- be pushed back for consideration another month, because whenever
- should they choose to heed our advice, it will require them to take more time. They will be frustrated.
- So I wish that it could be put in front of them now, even though the project is being continued, because
- then the question could be asked. So I did ask. I did ask the designers correctly. They said that the
- property in question, it was an empty lot that
- That was actually their preferred route. Negotiations failed. Okay. So that has been asked. And then
- as far as the other point about the entirety of the ponds, creating a wetland area, the west part of
- the pond, after we met, we looked at the plot again, and the west part of the pond is actually not within
- the HOA's control. It's like the northeast and south part of the pond, the backward sea.
- Um, so we are working with them on that to get that, uh, all of the needs met and some, uh, wetlands,
- um, messic plantings. Okay. Yeah. Is, so it sounds like part of the letter, like it's kind of already
- addressed that with the conversation. Is everybody just, I mean, I guess if they didn't have the meeting,
- did we submit this to their path here or can we rescind the initial letter? And you can certainly revise
- it or rescind it and revise it. I mean, the, uh,
- I submitted it to Eric formally, but since it was continued, I don't anticipate it'll be sent out unless,
- I'm not sure, I don't pay that close attention to the practice if something's continued and plans are
- submitted and it's listed as continued or not. So I think it can be resubmitted and modified if you
- guys would like.
- And Harry, do you want to lose space for your other comment about whether we wanted to vote on IDEP,
- like, whether it's like both? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Thank you for bringing that up. So the way that the ECPC
- worked this time was that they met and then put together a draft of what this letter would look like
- and then sent it to Rachel. And the question was, do we want the Environmental Commission to look at
- it as a group, read it as a group, say yes, they think it's OK, and vote on it letter by letter?
- Do we want to say, ECPC, thank you for doing this work. We trust that what you're saying is representative
- of the Environmental Commission. You may sign at the Environmental Commission. Or option C, ECPC discusses
- it. ECPC writes a letter. ECPC signs it as a subcommittee to the Environmental Commission. If people
- have thoughts on what's the difference between E and C? The Environmental Commission as a whole would
- be signing the letter versus if the subcommittee would be signing it.
- I'm trying to figure it out. I should note sometimes the board of zoning appeals and EC often meet up
- the same night, not this month, at least half of you meet up the same night. So sometimes to get a letter
- submitted and to meet the BZA requirements, there's not really time to have the EC have eyes on that
- letter prior to it being submitted. So I think I didn't very acknowledge that point, but I just wanted
- to make that super clear that sometimes that can be the difference.
- So one option is a good faith, like, yes, the EC will sign it, assuming that, you know, the ECPC has
- done its thorough divergence in writing something that is, you know, aligned with our goals and all
- of that, or just skip that and say ECPC sign, write what you want signed, what you want we support some
- committee doing what they think is best. I trust what the ECPC is like.
- I trust them, but at the same time, I think that it's just clearer if it's signed by the committee,
- by the ECPC instead of the EC, and then we don't have to worry about anyone coming back and saying,
- oh, you didn't run this by the whole EC. Technically, we didn't run it by the whole ECPC either, because
- we can't share things. Oh, we just had another meeting. That's a fair point.
- So either way, there is some trust involved, which, right, when a knee-jerk reacted was, oh, it should
- just be signed by the ECPC. That is the group that's accountable for it. And they're like, well, I pretty
- much wrote this. So that's one of those things where... I want to move there. Right. There's still trust
- involved either way. So I guess I'm
- I'm fairly comfortable with B or C. It's up to other people. A question for Rachel. From the city's
- perspective, does it look any different if it's signed by the whole EC, or politically, or the ECPC,
- or the author's name as a member of the ECPC? I don't. I can't speak for the Board of Zoning Appeals.
- My inclination is that they're going to see city-level environmental commission. Yeah.
- Okay. I did add the environmental commission logo. So there is that recognition for it. Now what do
- you think about it having the name of the author or authors in the letter and then environmental commission
- planning committee versus just the name of the committee as a whole? Because you're going for it. Right.
- Either way, I mean, it's, whether it's as the ACPC or as the environmental commission, there is still
- going to be a certain amount of press there. And we do, we do want them to see the words city of Bloomington
- environmental commission. So definitely couldn't really want names to come first. So we could also list
- the names. I mean, that feels a little, a little extensive, I guess, to like list names of the people
- on the committee, but.
- I guess just as, as for example, the author of this particular letter or the primary author knowing
- that like, I wasn't in on those meetings and gave there for the letter. You know, we were going to be
- doing some law potential. I mean, maybe not a lot, but like there's potential for it happening more.
- I was also, I think Mitchell and I were both also planning to try to attend this meeting as long as
- it didn't run at the exact same time as the BC meeting. So that would be another way for, if it doesn't
- conflict with the meeting for authors to
- be extra involved, but I don't have terribly strong feelings on the name part. Like I don't, it isn't,
- I want to see my name on it. It would be if you were David or someone was like, well, I didn't write
- that. I'd rather just see the names of the people who wrote it on there. So like I don't have strong
- feelings. Do you have any strong opinions? No.
- Okay, I think keeping it as it is then makes sense because it represents a specific part of the EC,
- but clearly it doesn't work administratively as well to have that whole EC exposed to the letter every
- time. I think that the ECPC is a fine route because then there's no question about, oh, did it go before
- the whole commission? Well, it went before whatever part of the ECPC attended.
- If we had a CPC quorum. Yeah. Well, and, and sometimes the EC itself doesn't have every single member.
- No, it's true. So yeah, that's giving some permission. And when it comes to the letter being rescinded
- or edited, um, my knee jerk reaction is I wouldn't change a thing. Yeah. I mean, I would want the plan
- commission to read.
- In its entirety, and then obviously the petitioner can say we tried that and the negotiation didn't
- work that way we still have our two cents in there and then our rationale. Yeah, I say that, not just
- because I spent a little chunk of time on that first paragraph, but but I mean I want them to.
- see what we're thinking basically to say we looked at that map and we said I understand that you've
- tried to be accommodating given what you have to do. Could you do this because it's so much less damaging
- and goes through fewer mature trees, crosses no tributaries, goes through less wetland, and if they
- say no we cannot then they are where they are. And I don't think the DBA is still in the full map. I
- don't see them seeing
- I don't think there's anything like there's an empty lot nearby. So I think that this at least poses
- the question for the dishwasher to answer at least. Yeah. It puts it on the record. And again,
- it gives a why. It's not just us being difficult. It's saying, man, I see a route that I know you have
- to go up a hill and over some private property, but it's so much less disturbance and zero wetland.
- So just way, way superior amount. But they would then address that.
- That would be that. So yeah, my initial reaction is I see no real reason to rescind or edit unless there's
- anything that anyone wants to edit or add. One more thing, I wasn't there, but I totally approved as
- a member of that planning committee, I totally approved it, and not having to write it.
- Yeah. And I think personally, I think that having this documentation out there somewhere, like, here's
- stuff that we're raising and whether or not they're like, we already had the conversation,
- it's not possible. The fact that this is on our radar, we're saying, here's what we're seeing, here's
- why it's important. If it doesn't work, it doesn't work, but that doesn't make it any less important
- or possible or whatever. So I like it with that thing. Any other thoughts on this piece of it before
- we move to the next working group? Good letter.
- I will email the ECPC formally to say that was good to me to know that, especially for my thought. Should
- have seen me trying to measure on the computer screen. Disappointing. Okay, well then we can go ahead
- and move to the light pollution subcommittee. Anything from you all? So, we're not mad. It's kind of
- not bad. We've been slacking a little bit, but I did reach out to planning
- about that question I had in the UDO, the response I got, they said that that pretty much only applies
- to like street lights on the right of way, public right of way, and that there are other bits in the
- UDO that apply to lights on private property that kind of supersede that line. So it sounds like my
- concern was
- unmarked. So no one can just put a spotlight. Yeah, so you cannot put a spotlight. I will say that there
- are enforcement cases for that. So it was out at like 6 a.m. when it started. So if you do have a complaint,
- maybe you're converted. I don't specifically. It was just. Yeah, that's crazy. Yeah. I can see the solution
- working here. Just one night to stay on your report.
- Yeah, that's about it for me. Nice. And I know that when David was here, he was mentioning the changes
- to the UDO. I think it's Eric that just kind of keeps our rolling list of anything we want considered,
- and then they kind of start to call that list a little bit to discuss what should be on there. So I
- know to everybody that as we're talking through things that are potential additions or edits to the
- UDO, it's not that we can send them through planning kind of anytime, and they'll just keep track of them.
- We usually do that at the end of the year, so that will be approaching. So if you get it to me, then
- it already won't be addressed until the end of the year. Yeah, that's good to know that they collect
- them, but they don't actually do anything with them until the end. So thanks. Great. OK, thanks for
- the updates. About a diversity working group, we're just going to organize. Who's going to say what?
- Shannon, do you mean Beth and Michelle?
- Well, so we haven't met as far as I know. But there's just one small bit of news, which it seems like
- the Bee City has officially made its way through the whole process. Because I don't know if you all
- have been getting them, but I've been getting notices saying we are now, we've paid our dues. We're
- now Bee City. So that's good. Yeah. I was going to say, I know that we had the resolution passed, but
- can we add to our social media now and then maybe
- like every three months for the next year, just like get a reminder of what this is and announce one
- of it, like just kind of like keep surfacing it while we figure out what we want to do about that status
- or anything like that. And I was talking to Tangible a week or two ago and we were talking about maybe
- doing something, I don't know, an op-ed or something to basically celebrate the fact that both IU and the city
- have now achieved obesity status. So I can follow up with him on that if you all would. Good idea. Would
- like me to. I don't know exactly. You two are going to kind of co-write it. But we could or we can do
- other things. Yeah. Okay. Before we get off with finite diversity, the bug fest. Did you guys return
- the outreach materials yet? No, I saw the tip. Okay.
- Okay, I just wanted to make sure that it was not lost while I was gone. Yes, and I still have them.
- Oh, because we were just talking about maybe going on some table. Yeah. I guess that is biodiversity.
- We used some of the outreach materials and that showed up to the opening of this exhibition. We got
- maybe five or six people to sign up for the habitat connectivity plan, just something. Handed out a
- few of those flyers. Yeah.
- And I forced it on some other people. I have my computer there. I was like, we'll fill it out.
- I love it. Um, so as, uh, as an addition to some of the, um, habitat connectivity stuff, one is that
- Saturday is the neighborhood association special at the market. So I'm going to go, actually, I think
- I'm gonna take some of those flyers with me and I hand them to them to also say,
- Let us know if you want us to come and talk to your neighborhood gathering. If there's a meeting that
- would be a good one, we can do it literally any time of year. It doesn't have to be this one. We might
- try to show up to that, too. Yeah. Same day as no kings. I know. Yeah, Saturday at the market. I mean,
- depending on the time of the month, I think it ends up being this. But anyway, so by checking in with
- as many of those groups as possible to say, hi, how can we
- Help make this possible in your share enthusiasm. Seriously, I think most neighborhood associations
- are interested in engaging. So that can be something that we continue a conversation about depending
- on how they respond. I wonder, would it make sense for us at some point to partner for biodiversity
- to partner with the.
- neighborhood, they have those grants for the development of like more. Oh yeah, like $500 neighborhood.
- Maybe. That's a great idea. Yeah, but I thought about putting in some, you know, like rain gardens or
- things like that for water collection and pollinating, sort of pollinator friendly fence. But it might
- be interesting if we were to partner with them to say,
- Create habitat and here's some way you can apply for some money to do that in the neighborhood. That's
- a really interesting idea. Yeah. Do you think that it would be, while we're here and able to talk about
- it openly, thinking about that. Okay. So, so does everybody have a passive familiarity with the hand
- grants that we're talking about? So yeah, basically it's like, it's not, it's not a ton of money, but
- it's enough that like, and, and,
- couple of blocks would be able to do something interesting. And yeah, I think a lot of times it is intended
- to be sort of neighborhood enriching things.
- Maybe I'm confused, but that's one more thing. Well, this is why I was thinking rain gardens, but. I
- think some people have done rain gardens. I think this is a modern one too. I thought you were talking
- about like the neighborhood. Neighborhood improvement. Yeah, that was what I thought you were referring
- to. Yeah, so this one, here's some language. No, wait, oh wait, this is, let's see. I've gotten it.
- Funding request. Oh, so this is funding request between one and $10,000. Neighborhoods must provide
- a minimum matching
- Neighbors Providing Matching, this is not the grant I was thinking of. That is the Neighborhood Improvement
- Grant. What I'm thinking of is something else. The stormwater one's kind of hard too. I mean, there's
- like a proposal and the more people you have on it, the better. Okay. You have certain priorities and
- they don't guarantee you'll get whatever the full amount of it costs or anything. There is a residential
- stormwater. Let me see if that's what you're talking about.
- I'm sorry, I don't remember. I was associated in a storm. That's what I was thinking about. Yeah, it's
- just that it's bundled under small and simple grants provided to five hundred dollars annually available
- through September. Why do you do that for community building that funding neighborhood newsletters,
- celebrations, training sessions or invasive species control?
- funding to remove plants, the place of native species, things like that. So it's 500 bucks for a neighborhood
- at one time a year. It sounds close, but is this the major thinking action? I think it's neighborhood
- improvement. Oh, I guess maybe not the one I want. Maybe it was a sustainable income. I don't need that one.
- Okay, I'm going to send Rachel kind of send this to you and send it to the here. There it is. I think
- that's it. Just email it to you. Yeah, the rain garden. Okay. Yeah, build community garden. Yeah, plan
- to pollinate our garden.
- Okay. Yeah. And that one doesn't have any of the matching stuff. Interesting. No, it's smaller, but
- there's only $10,000 total available. Oh, the budget itself. Okay. So the one I was looking at is $500.
- This one is up to $1,000. But I think that's a really, really cool idea. And I think that when you think
- about that, like, let's say you're talking to a neighborhood association,
- Do you think it is us saying if that's something you want to apply for, that would be basically supporting
- the habitat connectivity plan concept that we would something, something like have ideas for you or
- provide you, like what do you think our involvement would be in that? Then not like officially, but
- just now like as your brainstorming on this, somebody considered.
- I haven't, this was just a random comment. I hadn't thought of it. Yeah. I think so. We certainly could
- talk to them about it and the ideas, you know, you know, but. We couldn't encourage them to reference
- the habitat activity plan and the proposal. We're helping with this. I think we'd want to reach out
- to whoever.
- is like evaluating these grant proposals too and say, we'd like to, you know, this is very much in line
- with some of the things we're encouraging through our habitat connectivity plan. And basically,
- you know, we'd like to sort of partner with you to get news about this out there and also to help them
- if you can. Yeah, with the projects that emerge.
- I mean, I think, I think the idea is really, really good. I was trying to like, what does the logistics
- look like? But maybe step one, it's just connecting with hand and saying like, this totally applies
- to something that's really important to us. And it's baked into different parts of the city and the
- climate plan and things like that. Like there's a bunch of places this pops up. So how, is there something
- that we can do to either help? This one might be ESD, but it's probably some mistake. Oh, we have both.
- Oh, okay. Departments. Yeah, this is a sustainable neighborhood, yes or no?
- I mean, I think on the Habitat Connectivity Plan, we just keep encouraging people to make improvements
- on private property, but it's always worth referencing that grants exist, especially if you're going
- to do something in your community or across multiple yards or an HOA space or whatever it would be.
- We're still kind of pushing that every little action counts. So just reminding people that those grants
- exist is a good level of involvement.
- Well, great. One other note about the Habitat for Connectivity Plan was something that came up last
- week or last month, which is really interesting. I think Heidi brought that up actually, but it was
- about if there's any kind of communication we have with people after they add something to the Connectivity
- Plan. And we were talking a little bit about mailing lists and things like that, and then thinking that
- sounds like a logistical
- I don't even know what may be a possibility, but Labyrinth, if nothing else, when it comes to how would
- we communicate with people. I don't know, Rachel, if that's something that you can ask. Are there any
- other ways that if people say, yes, I would like to hear from you in the future, that we could say,
- great, here you go. It would be like a newsletter that you would send to people who signed up, then
- we would make the right. Can we do something like that?
- Probably. I am scared. I don't have the capacity right now to do stuff like that. I guess, like, selfishly,
- I would encourage to do the Facebook post and say, hey, you should follow our Facebook. We're making
- more comment or more group updates. I can certainly ask about the newsletter and see what that looks
- like. Is there any, do you know if there's any, like, city communications person that could do that?
- Yeah, there's, I don't know about having an EC-specific newsletter and has,
- a newsletter that Angela may be more unhappy to include items on. And then the city does have their
- outreach. That Angela's newsletter goes out. I want to say, I don't want to give a number. It goes out
- to at least a thousand people. So she is always more than willing to put stuff out first.
- At Bonfest, we had some nice brochures that had plant recommendations and deer resistant plants. On
- the city's, on the Habitat Connectivity Plan website, do we have links to information about native,
- suggested native plants? The brochures are in the
- page. They're just not on the connectivity plan, so you'd have to navigate a little. Okay. Yeah. I will
- note too, Fiona's been working on kind of a brain drain task and she's more creative outlet than the
- more technical stuff has been putting together kind of one pagers of the brochure information and just
- creating nothing new updated book. So I think she's planning on presenting that sometime in the spring.
- She doesn't have
- all of the information from the brochures. The example she gave was like, some of the native plants
- have heights, but not all of the native plants have heights across all the brochures. So that is being
- done as time. But I don't think there's a link on the habitat connectivity map itself suggesting native
- plants or linking to those brochures
- directly. I think that's something that can be added because I think there is like an information tab.
- There's that so on the EC's web page, there's like a sub page that is like it's labeled natural landscaping
- things actually labeled brochures on our homepage, but it but then it's like the list of like links
- to all the different brochures we have about de-resistant plants and native things and things like that
- like a natural
- landscaping everything. So we could link to this page. It just kind of floods you with choices. Yeah.
- You think that would work out if we put that on the map links? Well, so at the, at the, at Bugfest,
- when people were interested, they would go directly to the page. And so I do think it would be helpful
- for all on the landing page to have immediate links to
- plants, you know, suggested plants. So yeah, that would be if there's a link to that page that could
- be helpful. Do you think it sounds like it might be more helpful to have like the actual like link to
- this thing, like the pressure that we have? Yeah, on that or what's done are resources on that page.
- That's it. Okay. Yeah, so this is the resource of the different tab. Yeah. Yeah, so this is probably
- where the GIS team is going to want to host
- Yeah. Um, so I can definitely ask that if that's okay with the group. Just a tab that. Yeah. It says
- like native plant recommendations or resources. They're like, um, whatever, I love that page, but whatever
- this page is called with the resources. Oh, it's the, yeah, it's like natural landscaping. You know,
- maybe just natural landscaping resources or something. Yeah. They all phrasing like that.
- Yeah. Can we have that be like the third thing listed? I think right now it's like the PDF, math, and
- recorded GIS issue or whatever. Yeah, good mention. And I think this is stuff that we're like continuing
- to kind of figure out how to do it better now that we've got a map that we're really excited to engage
- with. It's like, what feels really intuitive? Where are people going when they won't?
- Any other thoughts on any of the biodiversity working group items? Any other thoughts on any of the
- biodiversity working group items? Any other thoughts on any of the biodiversity working group items?
- Any other thoughts on any of the biodiversity working group items? Any other thoughts on any of the
- biodiversity working group items?
- We don't have too few. We have enough deer. We have more than enough deer than I think we can get. Yeah.
- It would be amazing if we had like trackers on the deer, all the deer, and we could watch in live time.
- We could watch how they move around. I noticed some of them had it on their side.
- Oh my gosh. Adam, at one point we talked about you doing a presentation on sort of the invasive animals
- and their impact and all that for the EC. Is that something you're still doing? Yeah. In Bloomington,
- we think mainly about invasive animals, insects. And there are invasive animals that reduce biodiversity,
- including insects within animals.
- I give lectures on invasive species all the time. So you'd be happy to. Cool. I think last month we
- were talking about just sort of some timing for when we might do things. So it might be like early 2026.
- Sure. Okay. Cool. We can have an 11 of the wild. The what? The fall of the wild. Yeah. Oh, Anderson
- was telling me about the dolphins. It's a sort of anti...
- a lane manifesto instead of invasive animals. There's a call of the wild, it's about the guy that- It's
- not the call of the wild. Oh, that's a little species. Yeah, it's a critique of a whole set of species.
- It's interesting. All right. Well then, if folks have any other updates, we can keep moving on. Special
- projects, we were talking about putting together some items just to help with our tabling.
- um, using some of our budget for some things. Um, that was not been the time for me to work on that.
- And if you're interested in design things like designing what our little presentation thing would look
- like or designing what a new tablecloth could look like, feel free to join the special projects where
- we do things like that. Because right now it's going to say the city have a standard vendor and would
- it be very easy to just do a tablecloth? Yeah, it's really expensive. Weirdly, like an actual, like
- nicely made tablecloth is like interesting and
- Like 140 bucks. So yeah. So, so I think it's because of the way it's printed, like it's printed really
- nicely. So there's some sort of, some things that will require input from other people. It's not quite
- as easy and cheap as I would have hoped, but can I jump in real quick? So I think that you see budget
- was $1,300 for this year. I think that was requested for action too. And I think that 400 of that was
- used for the city. So we're down to 900. It will reset.
- in the new year, but you still have $900, obviously, with this year. Maybe I should just take it to
- the tablecloth. Go to the tablecloth. Okay. $140. That's like 10 years or something. That's true.
- It's true. Presumably it would. I'm not on special projects, but I'm in favor. Okay. Thanks, Matt. I
- appreciate the support. Okay, great. The last thing on the old business is the eco-heroes
- The human discussion, folks, we have had some really great themes over the years. I sent an email out
- that there was a huge silence too, so thank you. But I listed a ton of the different themes that we've
- done over the years, like about pollinators, about trees, about just the plant and biodiversity,
- all this. And so Adam and Matt and I have gone through some ideas separately and not together, but we're
- gonna bring our separate ideas here tonight to hear if people have thoughts
- Ideally, we would be able to lock in a theme. And then what we can do is start talking about like a
- tagline and talking about what kind of materials we want to share with educators or the community as
- they're putting together. But identifying a theme is going to be square one into putting all of these
- things in motion so it's not an insane rush come March. Right. The sooner we do that, the better. That
- way we can get it in front of educators and stuff before they've planned their whole spring. We don't
- want to fall behind like we did last time.
- And sometimes it feels like it's in your mind all the time. It's being feel that way no matter what.
- It's actually trying to get ahead of it. So do either of you, or anybody else, if you have ideas for
- themes that you'd like us to consider, feel free to say something. But Adam or Matt, do either of you
- have any themes that you'd like to kick off? I had two that I thought of. The first one was something
- around killing your lawn. It's a kind of, I don't know.
- Like getting rid of, you know, grass monoculture, maybe just letting it grow a little taller, placing
- them native plants and all the bits and bits that it has. And it's kind of like eye-catching, I think.
- And then I didn't have a nice tag like with this one, but something about like predators, just because
- that's another thing that people get excited about. You know, you've got like raptors and wolves and
- stuff, but it's also like,
- buzzes, most reptiles. Yeah. OK. All right, cool. That's all. OK, awesome. Awesome. I love it. Matt,
- do you have any questions? I'm just always, every year, a broken record. I'm focused on native plants
- and the ecosystem services they provide. So I was trying to figure out, I don't have a great working
- title, but it just sort of ties in with everything from the connectivity plans, MCIRs, calorie pair removal,
- to anything, but I just basically, um, few of the things I wrote down like native plants and Bloomington's
- wonderful wildlife or like native plants fueling Bloomington's wonderful wildlife or supporting, or,
- I don't know, just was kind of spitting out ideas, but my, it's like native plants are the, are the
- foundation, even if you're more excited about the, you know, Fauna that they support, but it leaves
- it very, very open to them.
- you know, painting a butterfly on a flower to a buffalo in a field or whatever, because it's all stems
- from the wildlife, but it's not a very focused idea at this point. Gotcha. Cool. I came with three ideas,
- some more, some less focused. The first one, I was trying to figure out what we could do about around light.
- I was thinking light, like the sun, the benefits of the sun, the gems of sun, whatever, solar energy
- and, or light pollution and what that looks like. So the eco heroes in our art contest specifically,
- so it's how people express through written art, art, 3D art, some sort of creation that they've made
- this theme. So I was thinking about light from a few different directions and maybe it's all, or maybe
- it's like, I don't know.
- Uh, my partner's currently dating children on a bird watching program. So birds came up and I was like,
- we've been on the birds before we've done different like types of wildlife, but I was like, people like
- birds birds. All right. And then we're going to say about the birds. I like it. I have all sorts of
- ideas too. Um, and then the last thing I had, because the, the, the idea came up last two years ago. Um,
- that the area that we're in has like a ton of karst and it has tons of like geos and so much limestone
- history. I was thinking like nature rocks as a thing and it being about like geology or something about,
- you know, the role that stone, that earth, that rocks play and Bloomington you found in the ecosystems
- too. Because it does. And so I'm like, well I'm done. Those are my three ideas. I think those are amazing.
- I think we should go with one of those.
- My first thought when you said it, though, it was like, it's the end of the world as we know it. No,
- no, no. Like, you know, the apocalyptic thinking. No, but it's not local though. Well, like what emerges
- from that? But then my second thought was not a real thought. My second thought was related to that.
- So when is Eco Heroes? When is that contest? It happens for Earth Day.
- And so we typically try to get materials out to teachers at the start of the year. Okay, April 18th
- is the roofay event. So by then it will have been submitted and we'll have picked winners and we'll
- have gathered prizes. What do you think of? Well, I don't know how appropriate this would be. I'm just
- wondering if I'd be worth doing a sort of tie-in with one of the sort of either native plants ideas
- or I'm doing this whole big project with a bunch of artists in the spring around the herbarium.
- Um, the sort of the, which is basically that native center basis, right? I sort of plant archives sort
- of why is it important to think about sort of catalogs or archives of, um, living species. But,
- but I, one day I was just thinking it'd be interesting to try to do some sort of time, but you should
- also, whatever we do, we should reach out to artists for climate or for climate awareness. Um,
- who would help us get the word out for this. But I think your ideas are good ideas. So I'll just sort
- of... Do other folks have ideas of themes that are general, like one word themes? Like I said, birds.
- Any theme or something specific that would be like, something to consider? Well, do you have a favorite
- native plant that you want to fish? I'm sorry, I do. No, I wouldn't. I mean, I wouldn't want to put
- the artist in that spot.
- Yeah, I would tell them that the free time they could do a big tree or they could do flowers and they
- could do whatever. What is my number? It's tree, seven. Seven. We are a tree city. That's true. Yeah,
- it's kind of tricky because you want it to be like somewhat focused. You don't want everyone to just
- be like doing the same thing. You release some latitude for expression. I like the accessibility of
- the birds.
- I mean, like so many people have gotten into birding over the last couple of years, but it's also like,
- I fear, and I know we're talking about kid's art, but even so, I fear it's going to be like creative,
- just literal art. Whereas when you focus on light, I actually think could get us some really interesting,
- or even karst, and that's sort of the karst topography. Because the karst has a lot to do with how we
- think about water and wastewater and all sorts of things like that in the area too.
- And so I think, I really, I find like that it's just a very evocative thing to work with. And the adult
- artists could certainly do a lot with that. Yeah. And I think that's part of it is like what appeals
- to children, what appeals to a classroom, what appeals to a high school, what appeals to a fiery, like
- there's like, there's so many different ways that we can go about this and kind of making sure it's
- like, is there a little pocket for people about walks of life to, you know,
- I think probably birds, but it's like the lowest common denominator here. It's a cheap shot. I know,
- I know. Birds are 30. What are you doing? John, go ahead. Well, there are lots of great ideas. Birds.
- I also like the native plants and so on. So what have we done in the past? Oh, would you like me to
- read you a magnet? Yes. Give you some time. Well, I just want to say the nature of rocks to tag along,
- I think, is very good.
- Trying to imagine people drawing rocks. Or they just draw nature, you know? They're like, well, I totally
- miss the geology. Or they'd make paper mache geos, and then they, you know, write what a geo is.
- Who knows? Kids are weird. But that's a routine. Muscles. Yeah. And those are rhinoids. They could be
- like sculptures. They could grow. Where do you all see the most participation with topics? What was it?
- with one of the most participation. Participation was always high until the pandemic. It's just been
- harder since, somewhat regardless of the, I'm thinking that us getting out ahead of a year might give
- us a better chance. We want people to be able to tie things into grade school lesson plans or, you know,
- more time for us to put up flyers if we choose to do that, more time to harass friends and family.
- Here's some things. Last year, it was bugs in bloom, how native insects are important to Bloomington.
- The year before, it was drops to drains, eco-heroes working with the city on stormwater streams. And
- we paired with the city a couple of presentations on that. And then a list of others are eco-heroes.
- How about the eye and environment? How do you nurture nature in your neighborhood? Mission, lower emissions.
- Embracing our aging planet. Let it grow. What trees give us. Fighting fragmentation. Not the question
- mark, I just ended on a question mark. Protecting our pollinator pals. Doing my share of cleaner air.
- Celebrating Earth's variety of life, biodiversity. And lakes, rivers, and streams, oh my. Those have
- been the things that I could talk to.
- So we don't really talk, there's a few things, like the native thing, we don't name natives in any of
- those. Birds, we don't name birds. We don't name rocks. We don't name sun or light or whatever it relates
- to. So I think, I mean, we don't name predators by name. Like there's a bunch of opportunities that
- keep flushing me off this list. I will say that I think some of the more broad things, I think the broader
- things were maybe in the beginning a little bit too.
- Um, like the very first one I think was the, how do I put that out of environment? And it's just like,
- I mean, you get any and truly anything, which is great, but it's also really hard to judge those and
- say like, and then it becomes how much time do I actually think you put into this or that sort of like,
- you kind of start to critique what the perceived effort was versus, you know, does it tie to the theme
- because it can be so many different ways to tie to the theme. What do you mean the theme?
- Do we need to decide today? I think a general direction will be helpful. And we can wait until the next
- meeting. The next meeting is going to be a wild one. So. Well, I want to point out that. Yeah,
- please do. Yeah. Talking about why you did it in the night time. I'm trying to get a diverse environment.
- What do I think about the night? You know what's happening at night? Oh, yeah.
- save the light, enjoy the dark, so what do you enjoy about it? And there's also nocturnal animals, there's
- like what happens to plants at night. Ooh, that's a really interesting one. Yeah, we'll get on with
- an American book about what happens at night, offensive stories, home keepers of the night, book of
- constellations and animals, owls. That's a great thing to put on, like if we were to do this at any point,
- like a teacher resource list of like the library has this book or like you could reference. So anytime
- you think of things like that, we can always put them with whatever our, um, ecovirus thing is going
- to be for sure. Okay. Yes. I really like that. Um, if we, uh, if we wanted to go back to like lawns
- and natives and stuff like that, we could do something not rewilding. Um, one of the things that I noticed
- in your list was,
- Um, a lot of them have this kind of sort of focus on action or sort of ethics. And the thing about birds
- is that it doesn't feel like, what do you think? But rewilding like, you know, sort of rewilding escapes
- Wilmington, whatever people would interpret that. And all sorts of different ways that you could think
- about laws, you could think about, um, native species.
- But I do like the night one better though. Yeah, again, I think it's more interesting. That's a really
- interesting observation. I wonder what the turnout looks like based on, is it an observation type words
- about birding or maybe the last one where it's more about the thing and teaching about the thing versus
- what is my engagement with it.
- That's really fascinating. I think it would suggest some sort of engagement. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, yeah,
- yeah. Like, let me consider nature at night or something, because I mean, avid bludgers, whether it's
- like, you know, the night flowering plants or whether it's moths or owls or raccoons or whatever.
- Interesting. Did you say record? Someone said record. What do people think about that? It is very wide open.
- Or maybe they have some flashlights and looking for frogs. And the light pollution thing can also come
- up with like dark sky, the value of dark sky. Yeah, okay. Okay. I mean, I think it sounded a bit fun.
- Yeah. The night scene sounds fun, but it is, you can take it in a number of directions even if we're going to
- Mostly get baths or something. I don't know. I don't know what we'd get. I don't know what we'd get.
- Yeah. But it goes in like so many directions. Right. I like that you, there's a lot of room to be creative
- with it or you can draw the stuff that's obvious. Is there any other theme that people would like to
- really consider? Cause I think I'm hearing a lot about the nighttime thing. Any other themes that people
- are like, it feels like we're onto something. I think a lot of the ideas are good that we could, we
- could revisit them for any
- additional, like, for your heroes. Seriously. We're talking about June for next year. But those are
- the piggy banks. If we're good, right. But those are the piggy bank for next year. Right. Just hold
- on to it for next time. Cool. But I like the late contender here. I think that seems like swimming for
- you. I love it. How do folks feel about some sort of, yeah, nature at night or something? Our nature
- at night or something. Let me see. Nature at night. Yeah. Okay.
- Either Bloomington's nature at night or our nature at night. Something that makes it still feel kind
- of local. Yeah. Something personal, yeah. Okay. Are folks okay with if we do that theme, the ninth theme?
- I think it should be fun. Well, great, Heidi. Great idea. That was great. And it kind of touches, it
- kind of includes all the different groups in the area that are put away. Yeah.
- Yeah. Okay. This is great. I'm a big fan. Thank you for suggesting it. Thank you. Um, Matt and Adam
- both for thinking through things and getting us going and for everybody for interviewing ideas. This
- was super cool. Um, oh, Rachel, we didn't hear from you. Night or you are you. Excellent.
- Before I move on from working here, is that everything about eco-care that you wanted to touch on? I
- believe so. And then we, maybe we can just set up a meeting sometime in the next couple of weeks and
- we'll. I wanted to get just a, I don't think I've ever gotten a formal confirmation of who is a part
- of each group. I know we're missing some people tonight, but who wants to be part of the eco-careless
- group? I don't know. I don't know.
- Um, yeah, it has to be less than easy. We can't have more than six. We can have everybody. We just can't
- all come together in a single meeting. So you can get us to be like, I would like to be on the part
- that. Designs a fire since then you all could come to the meeting. It's just, you have to send out the.
- So, yes, if you'd like, you're welcome to to be part of it. I don't understand. You raise your hand.
- You did not raise your hand on that.
- They did not rejoin in Heidi. I'm not sure. I can always put in any of them later. I'll pressure you
- next month. I'm not sure if I can put in any of them later. I'm not sure if I can put in any of them
- later. I'm not sure if I can put in any of them later. I'm not sure if I can put in any of them later.
- I'll pressure you next month. I'm not sure if I can put in any of them later. I'm not sure if I can
- put in any of them later. I'm not sure if I can put in any of them later. I'm not sure if I can put
- in any of them later. I'm not sure if I can put in any of them later. I'm not sure if I can put in any
- of them later. I'm not sure if I can put in any of them later. I'm not sure if I can put in any of them
- later. I'm not sure if I can put in any of them later. I'm not sure if
- So ECPC, I have Harry, Matt Pauly, Norm, Adam Martinez, Mitchell, and David. Is that everybody who wants
- to be part of ECPC. Okay. Special projects. Harry, Matt, Mitchell. Is that right? Water quality, please.
- Casey, Mitchell. So you don't want to get me in there. David, are you part of the water quality group?
- Okay. Then I have Casey and Mitchell. Yeah.
- I've been hanging out. And Heidi, would you like me to add on you for right now? Sure. Okay. That was
- with the e-mails about it. Why pollution? Add-on. Who is the second? Okay. Two thirds of it is add-on.
- It doesn't quite matter. You want to include it as well? Okay. Are you also ever to add-on though?
- Not on water. I didn't actually really sign up for special projects. I'm just, I don't know, something
- about being the vice chair, and I guess he wrote it down. Yeah, so you're the vice chair for so long.
- Yeah. And then by the first year, Carrie, Nanya, Matt, Adam, Jennifer, Shannon, and David. I'm officially
- on? I am on. OK. OK. OK. And I had all of the action work. Yeah. Does anybody have any other comments before?
- I saved my volume. Okay, thank you. Thank you for covering everybody. Yeah. Cool. Okay, well, is there
- anything else that people want to just say about Ecovirus? That was kind of the goal was to lock in
- just a general brand. I think it's really great that we essentially have a theme. Yay, thanks everybody
- for contributing and nice job. What a fun addition. Okay, so next on the list is the staff update, starring
- Rachel Dawson.
- The first thing I have is item public notices. Council Member Piedmont-Smith emailed, I think she emailed
- you and I, Carrie and I, about does the EC get public notices and meet you guys often in comments. So,
- I guess we are in central, it's a little weird. So these public notices,
- or a separate item. If it's sent to the office of the mayor, and it seems environmental, office of the
- mayor, secretary does send it to me. If it doesn't seem environmental, I usually don't get them. If
- it's sent to the council's office, I don't usually seem to get them. So kind of just practicing, I don't
- always get these public notices, but I wanted to bring this up.
- Mostly because Council Member Fugum said, I asked them if they'd be interested in this. Is this something
- you guys would be interested in seeing the packets? These public notices are about permits that are
- going on in the Williamson. I don't know anything about these profits. I would not be able to advocate
- for, again, to give more detail. The public notice is what it is. Since it's a public notice, it's also
- found on IDEM's website.
- So I just wanted to ask everyone what their thoughts are. If there's any strong feelings, and if you
- guys would write a comment. And just to clarify, these are going through IDEM. So they're not going
- through our county council. They're going through the state level, which is unworthy. Indiana Department
- of Environmental Management. Correct.
- And I think DNR and Department of Natural Resources, I'm assuming since they have a construction and
- floodway for men as well as stamp permits and probably some others, I think they probably have some
- sort of public notice. I do not receive those and recently has public notice. I also don't receive those.
- So I think you would only be looking at a very small fraction
- Uh, if, you know, they represent, you're saying we see these, you know, receiving a small fraction for
- me anyway. And one other thought is that the Minerva County. Formerly American environmental commission
- now the resiliency committee resiliency commission, um, they're the county level. So, because these
- like, like the central one, I'm pretty sure the top side of the city, uh, that's the one that Isabella
- center and that.
- is outside the city limits. So, technically, it's outside of like Boynton, you know, Maryland Commission.
- Theoretically, the county commission of this nature would be relevant to respond to that, I think,
- above us. So, I feel like that's where I think it's really useful for us to know. I think if these things
- impact the environment because they've been approved, that's something that eventually may trickle down
- in some way because of like a water issue or a soil issue or something. But figuring out do we want to
- find a way to be lifted on these permits as they're coming through would be useful. I do think the idea
- allows interested parties to sign up for a list. So if individuals are interested, we could also do
- that. Do you have any strong opinions on how the EC handles this? It seems on the outside of our jurisdiction
- that, I mean, what would we do?
- It will come in to issue a report, yeah, but to whom? Because it's not the city. And I should note too,
- like I brought up an example here. Some of them are quite detailed. Some of them are this. There's not
- a lot of information about it. I'm okay with not receiving them. You made it sound like they only very
- occasionally get to you. I get six a year if that.
- of those six, three of them are about the same project. And most of the time it's Catalan so far. Yeah,
- I just don't know what we would really do with the information. Kind of the same way we were talking
- with ECPC, if there's something that's like really big and obvious that we want to weigh in on, you
- were passing along. Sure, like if there's something, any factory or something. We could treat this similarly
- in the very rare occasion that it's something you think we'd like to know about.
- Sure. I mean, looking at the examples there, it's hard to know without like a historic list. I've been
- missing out. Yeah, it does feel like it's a lot of load processing on our side to figure out if it's
- even relevant. Are you okay with that, Larry? Thank you for asking. Okay.
- Okay. The second thing I have is scheduling December meeting. I have heard through the room in the middle
- that the last you have a schedule for might be any youth graduation or some college's graduation tonight.
- So I guess I think we wanted to check out who are we going to meet for December.
- The week after is the holiday. So a week directly before, none of the rooms are available. So we would
- have to put it pretty close to either the November game. I haven't touched early December for that Thursday
- night, or we could move into another day of the week. So we can't have it on the 18th, which is when
- I was- We could have it on the 18th. That's how it's currently scheduled.
- But is there an IU event, a large IU event that would be? I think Mitchell may have said something about
- it. I don't know if that's true. I haven't. I need to check the schedule. OK. Does it make it like one
- specific school or something like that? Should we see first if we would need quorum? I mean, we only
- have some of us here. Yeah, we have to make a quick Google search. It says winter commencement is the
- 19th. They don't choose the next day. Oh, yeah. OK.
- I don't plan on being affected by that. I anticipate that date working fine for me. You're going to
- be able to. Yeah. Cool. Same. So. Maintain some red tape. Yeah. Okay. So again, we're decided on the
- red tape? Yeah, yeah. And so that will be something that's going to follow up and to say, hey, if you
- are not going to be on the 18th, please, please, please let us know because, um,
- Although it was fun to cancel meetings at the last second. It's more fun to note in advance. Okay. And
- that is the staff update. Thank you for the update, Rachel. Okay, so we're running nicely close to the
- end of our meeting. So I'm going to go ahead and turn it over to the reports section and just know that
- we're, yeah, kind of we've got about 20 minutes to get through the last part of our agenda. So first
- we have Tree Commission or EREF or Friends of Lake Monroe. Dave, any updates? Well, September was
- one of those months when Monday comes before Thursday. And so I've already told you about the September
- meeting. October is one of those months when Thursday comes before Monday. In terms of there's a Thursday
- that comes up before Monday. And so the commission is meeting next week and so I can't tell you
- much done yet. So that's trade commission. Iraq met in October, October 6th, eighth, I mean. Let's see.
- There was something about vegetation management. Oh yeah.
- Griffey has dealt with vegetation management, their ecologic and KCI contracts. And they mentioned that
- some things also have been done in vegetation management in the switchyard in Griffey, in Crestmont,
- and in Lower Cascades.
- And then we've talked about urban forestry. Calorie fair is now under 1,000 in the county. 300 have
- been removed. And there's the 15-year plan to remove them is on track. Tree of Heaven is being removed.
- And there's no spotted lander plot here, although there is some in the state. Urban forestry planted
- 142 trees in the spring. There are 20 trees that are growing in around Kirkwood and the square, 1,215.
- 1,215 trees have been planted this year in the city, and there are 24,000 inventory trees in the city.
- Next, they talked about education. Nature days are in full swing when students are taken from classes
- to various places in the city. Leonard Springs and Griffith in particular
- In Bugfest this year, there were 1,400 participants, and they tagged six monarchs. Griffey Deer Management,
- November 14th and November 21st to 24th will be closed under the White Buffalo contract with the
- White Buffalo works with sending volunteers who come in to kill the excess deer in Berkeley. Next thing
- on the agenda was projects, building trades park,
- Phase one is complete. I didn't catch all the details about this. The ricky parking lot is to be paved
- with one rail to trail. This coming in at the Rogers Family Park on the power line trail.
- We'll go from Switchyard to the RCA. Wait, that's big news. So the Rails to Trails, what are they doing
- to that? The which? The Rails to Trails is coming in at Rogers Family Park. They're connecting the parking
- parks with a power line cut out. Oh, okay. That's great.
- Okay. Yeah, I guess I didn't get the details on that one. Okay, so that's Iraq. I don't think it's getting
- paved. I was not at the last meeting. But yeah, so I think that's project seven's done.
- connecting Switchyard Park to whatever the next park is. Yeah. Yeah. But then the Rodgers, we also chose
- the Rodgers family park. They're going to continue to, I don't know. That's interesting. But they're
- connecting the parks with the power line cut from Switchyard Park. I'm not sure what that is about.
- I could be wrong. Yeah, that's interesting. I don't know if that's true. There's not really a great
- way to get there on a bike right now.
- It gets to some like, uh, when you can, there's like a staircase that you have to go. Yeah. It's like,
- if you're on, um, with it more spike at that point, that is the go. Yeah. Okay. Okay. That's go for,
- and then you can go up from the old car park.
- Yeah, there's a whole trail system. Yeah, but they're connecting that to the rest of the trails. That's
- amazing. Yeah, because right now it's like you have to go through that neighborhood or the name of the
- neighborhood. Yeah, like the south of the park. Yeah. I must have misunderstood something. It happens.
- Yeah. No, I was looking and the power line trail is like on the city website and it lists a bunch of
- different things. So that might be helpful too.
- Yeah. Okay. Thank you for that update on ERAC. And then do you have a friends like mineral update if
- you want to share on that real quick? Just one thing there. Their science committee, which I go to to
- support the environmental commission, met last night. They're talking about going to some statewide
- meeting, the Indiana Clean Lakes volunteer group and getting involved with some lab
- there when they're discussing how to work with this Indiana Clean Lakes Volunteer with respect to Lakeland
- Moat. There's nothing now on microplastics in Lakeland Moat that anybody sports down the questions of
- whether they should do something. The science committee should work on volunteer
- programs, especially on how they use GIS for Lake Monroe and there's a program called StoryMap that
- they're thinking of making use of. And they might have a cruise on the lake to train volunteers
- that crews would have 10 to 30 people. They would go around to various places and even show them how
- long and they'd do different things. So that was the science committee last month. Gotcha. Thanks for
- sharing that comment about the, there's nothing about, there's no study on the microplastics in the
- lake thus far.
- I feel like that's a very topical conversation. I'm guessing a lot of people who would love to know
- what that state is. So I'll be eager to hear if they put this in place. Yeah, great. Okay, we have just
- a few minutes left for the BCOS update or MCIRs update or Clean Community Program. BCOS, I can be real
- quick. They approved the Sustainable Energy Utility Capstone Project as Alex presented to us. They also
- shouted out that it was their commission's 20th birthday.
- 20 years ago this month. And they approved a resolution, well, they advanced the resolution that they're
- going to officially vote on next meeting to add resilience to the name. Like, I'm not sure exactly where,
- like what the new acronym would be. I don't know if there's going to be an and, I don't know the order.
- They haven't finalized any of that. They have advanced that they're going to add resilience or to vote
- on whether they're adding resilience to the name.
- next month and it sounds like it has some support. So that's my big update. What's Alex's last name?
- York. J-O-R-C-K. Any update from MC Iris? I did not. It's in their meeting yesterday, but they received
- a note. So they
- are changing, they're reducing ways of using challenge for next year. They're focusing only on tree
- cutting, coloring, fair use, and bush honeysuckle. And instead of giving somebody a new tree or shrub
- when that was replaced, I think they're going to be giving the applicants $30 to get certificates instead
- to offer some flexibility. It looks like they talk about some weed wrangles. The native plant sale will
- be September 12th.
- And then the MCIR's annual meeting is this Friday, October 17th, Friday the 7th. Does somebody else?
- So if you're interested in going, I will make that information. Nice. Okay. Thank you. And then we program
- the update. Perfect. Great. So this is where we go around and say any announcements that we have, because
- we're short on time. I'd say if they're EC specific. One example is November 21st. It's a Friday.
- From five to 730, there's the open house at the Waldron for city boards and commissions. It's the city's
- chance to recognize and honor the fact that people are putting their time and energy into these things.
- There's snacks, there's a little talk. I can't remember if there's some sort of like artistic piece
- of it, but I think last year it was like, it's like a first Friday. Well, there was like a first Friday
- last time, but it's November 21. You're invited. People from the EC will be going. A couple times.
- It's not EC related, but I can be quick. Okay, so I have to do a couple of things. A couple
- of the exhibitions that are up that might be of interest to people in here. One is called Forest, and
- it's 90 years of the Hoosier National Forest, because there are all these different artists to sit the
- wall during up through the end of this month. Another is called No Missing Landscape. It's at the Process
- Gallery, and it's on ecological disturbance and destruction. But the main thing I wanted to announce
- is that Terry Thomas Williams is going, do you all know who Terry Thomas Williams is?
- You should know. She's one of the great modern nature conservation writers from Utah. But she's giving
- a big talk at the Busport Chumley November 6th, which is my Thursday evening. It's free but ticketed.
- And then the next day, she's having a conversation, also free but ticketed. But yeah, I can give you
- information if you want. But she's amazing. You should read her work and go and hear her speak. This
- needs to be information. I think I'll put it on the police book. Norm also had an update.
- He sent me North Brampton's inquiring about getting a place at both the March and April farmers markets
- to hand out the flyer about reducing lawn cutting routines, produce the production greenhouse gases.
- You've seen the draft of the flyer and maybe possible circulated the leaf to the residents with their
- water belts for the 26th of November. Thank you for sharing. All right, we can talk more about that
- as we keep moving through the season. Do we want to decide
- on an EC theme exactly, or are we comfortable knowing roughly what it's going to be? It's just because
- we aren't going to see each other again for a month. The Eco-Heroes? Or Eco-Heroes, sorry, yeah. Are
- people OK with the Eco-Heroes committee coming up with it, or would you, the group, like to decide?
- Like, maybe not the theme, but the whole thing? The whole thing. The whole thing. The whole thing. The
- whole thing. The whole thing. The whole thing. The whole thing. The whole thing. The whole thing. The
- whole thing. The whole thing. The whole thing.
- Okay, I'm going to send an email with the thoughts we made about potluck pigeon items and remember meeting
- as much of other things we can follow up on. But if that's all we've got, we have four and a half minutes
- just to be adjourned.