Sustainability at Lake Superior College

Retreat Minutes 4/23/10

Faculty/Staff Members present:  Megan Bugge, Kevin Futhey, Mat Gilderman, Wade Gordon, Dick Haney, Kristi Heintz, Theresa Hornstein, Carol Johnson, Cliff Koski, Glenn Merrick, Deanne Roquet, Jeri Schwerin, Julius Salinas

Student Members Present: Tom Deschenes

Announcements

-Deanne showed the beginning stage of LSC’s Sustainability webpage http://www.lsc.edu/sustainability/ initiated by IE.  The Council agreed it needed to be better distinguished from LSC’s main hompage by adding a “banner” related to sustainability.  The Council also agreed it would be nice to have a link to this page from somewhere on the LSC homepage, as of now there is no link to it. Steve is willing to make changes. Deanne will bring our comments to IE at next week’s meeting.

-Mark Winson joined us to discuss our FY10 and FY11 budget.  For FY11, the Environmental Council will have $5000 to work with.  In the future, Mark suggested we develop our own budget plan in January and submit it to Wade.  From now on, only Kristi will originate POs and Wade will authorize them.  Kristi will also give a monthly budget report.  Kristi and Mark will meet next week to discuss the remainder of the FY10 budget.

-The Council also discussed with Mark the responsibility of the council in paying for items or projects we initiate or suggest.  Mark suggested we establish our role as a “Recommending Council” and make recommendations to defer the cost to the responsible cost center.  These recommendations will be evaluated by Mark and that cost center.

-A suggestion was also made to approach President-Elect Johns to set up regular meetings with him in order to keep him posted on work we are doing.

-Mark requested our help in completing the Annual MNSCU Sustainability Report.  The “Annual Report” workgroup will work on this during their session and Kristi will pass it on to Mark next week.

-Mark will attend the Annual MS4 Annual Stormwater Public meeting on Wednesday.

-Mark also discussed the Parking Task Force’s intentions for LSC’s Campus Access Plan.  He also mentioned they are looking at ways to subsidize the mounting cost of student bus ridership.

Sub-Committee (Today’s Work Group) Reports

Annual Report-Deanne, Theresa, Jeri, Dick, Mat, Carol, Megan, Cliff, and Glenn spent much of the time working on the MNSCU Sustainability Report where a lot of great ideas for the future were generated, and a list was compiled and added to the EC Share Point.  Everyone is encouraged to add to that list.  We will work on this at the next meeting.

Vending Misers-Kevin, Tom, Megan, and Kristi wrote a story, but we’d like to gather more data showing energy savings to put with the story.  Cliff and his work study will put the meters on a machine without a miser and a machine with a miser and we’ll collect the data after 1 week of use.  The workgroup also thought of ways to explain the purpose of the misers, and a sign will be created in a couple of the high traffic areas.  Megan will contact Creation Station to help with the “artwork”.

Worms-The worm building work group (Theresa, Tom, Mat, Julius, Carol, Kevin, Kristi) talked with Gary Adams about the timeline for the demise of the worm building and materials that can be salvaged.  Chris Ringsrud is already beginning to remove solar/wind equipment.  The doors and some other equipment inside may be the only parts salvageable.  Theresa owns the shelving inside and will donate it and scrap wood to the art department.  Anyone who is able is encouraged to help move the worms to their new home in the Atrium, May 7^th at noon.  Gary will pick up the new stock tanks that will go under the stairs in the Atrium for the worms.  The work group decided it would be a great idea to create an educational sign to be mounted on the stairway above the bins, Gary agreed.  The group agreed it would be nice to reclaim some wood from the existing worm building to frame the signs.  Mat, Kristi and Theresa will work on signage.

Sustainable Curriculum-Deanne, Jeri, Dick, Carol, Cliff, and Glenn utilized STARS to work on defining sustainability in curriculum and addressed the three levels which instructors could report they are incorporating sustainability into their curriculum.  Instructors will be surveyed to find out who is doing this on our campus and at what level.  Cliff and Deanne will report back to IE with this information. Deanne also posted a document from today’s work on the EC SharePoint for anyone to add/edit.

Old Business

Earth Day– the Council agreed that Earth Day was a great success.  The PCC banner was signed by many students, Wade was the marker master, and the banner is now hung on the science catwalk and looks fantastic.  Mat posted pictures on LSC’s Facebook page and Kristi posted some photos on the EC blog.  The commuting survey was done at the EC table, was emailed to everyone, is still running and will run until next Thursday.  Kristi will get the results from Peter.  Thank you to everyone that volunteered at our table and the entire event!

Some items that will need attention and better organization next year are Johns Recycling (he chose to collect in the lower lot and wasn’t visible), Goodwill (came early and left early), and compostable cups (ended up in the trash).

New Business 

Motions

No motions were made at this meeting

Next meeting

Next meeting we will wrap up some items from this meeting: STARS and defining work groups, one year and long-term goals of the EC, FY10 and FY11 budgets, and the EC annual report.  The next meeting will be next Friday, time TBD.

Submitted by Kristi Heintz