With the students back in town for the semester, Marya Ryan re-contacted the Business in Environmental Responsibility (BER) volunteers she spoke with in the spring. The volunteers are helping with the glove recycling program. Over the summer, they identified contacts for nonparticipating departments with $2,000 or more in nitrile glove purchases for the first three quarters of fiscal year 2017-2018. Ryan emailed their contact person, Meghna Vijayan, and caught her up on events over the summer, such as the relocation of the trailer at PPSB and F&S's work with the Division of Research Safety. Ryan also asked whether they could help identify teaching coordinators in the teaching labs to assist with that work.

Hi Pete and Shawn--

Zero waste activities for the past week were

• Morgan White and I had a phone call with Monica Miller of the Division of Research Safety and Shantanu Pai. We are working with her to ensure that labs/facilities participating in the glove recycling program are employing best safety practices to prevent biohazards and dangerous chemicals from entering the recycling stream. I have emails out to participating labs to gather lab names, room numbers, and PI contact information so that we can start assessing any additional instructions, training, or other program components that will support safe practices.
• With the students back in town for the semester, I re-contacted the Business in Environmental Responsibility (BER) volunteers we spoke with in the spring. They are helping with the glove recycling program. They helped us over the summer by identifying contacts for nonparticipating departments with $2,000 or more in nitrile glove purchases for the first three quarters of fiscal year 2017-2018. I emailed their contact person, Meghna Vijayan, and caught her up on events over the summer, such as the relocation of the trailer at PPSB and our work with the Division of Research Safety. I asked whether they could help identify teaching coordinators in the teaching labs to assist with that work.
• Morgan agreed with Robert McKim's suggestion that the battery recycling proposal his committee formulated this spring and summer be adopted by the PWR SWATeam. The committee that drafted the proposal is one that he and several other interested faculty members formed (the Campus Committee on Recycling Batteries). He solicited input from me, Morgan, and Joy Scrogum. He will take it to the PWR SWATeam meeting on Sept. 10.

Best regards,
Marya Ryan

SmilePolitely picked it up. http://www.smilepolitely.com/splog/theres_a_new_website_for_campus_bicyclers/

1,075 Carbon Credits (CCs) were sold to BEF @ $6.25/CC.

This sale resulted in $6,718.75 being added to the Carbon Credit Sales Fund.

An email explaining the sale is attached below.

An email with transaction information is attached below.

Campus Landscape Architect Brent Lewis provided the attached planting plan and the following comments on the plan, for review by Chi Omega representatives.

1. We have many trees in this very small garden, who are all fighting for water and nutrient resources here.  We have lost a few trees already and the cherries that are left don’t look as good as we would like them.  Around each tree we will just install a mulched area.  This will serve to reduce some competition from the woodland plants and the trees.  You can really notice that now as we are late summer and the geraniums that should still be up have dried out and greatly dissipated.  Adding mulch will also give the sense of some order when a maintained edge is present in the beds.  However, this will be a good area to include some early spring ephemerals like Blue Bells or Spring Beauty as they will thrive when the moisture is there, but no longer compete when the trees are out-competing for water.
2. Currently there are no shrubs in this garden.  Adding them to the plan does a few things for us. For one, it adds some structure to the garden.  With them, we will have a mid-level plant that serves to punctuate some areas, and to form a backdrop to other areas.  They will also add some winter interest to this garden, which is currently missing.  Lastly, they assist in our effort to reduce the maintenance in the garden by taking up larger amounts of space, while simultaneously keeping the weeds at bay as they shade them out.
3. Another design element that is not obvious in the current design is a return to matched plantings at the sidewalk entries.  In the new plan I am putting matching plants on either side of each walk.  This leads the eye and the brain to connect one side of the garden to the next, thus rendering it as a more cohesive whole.  Regardless of the plant used, the average person understands this and will perceive this as an intentional garden, versus the state it is in now.  
4. Adding to the above, I am also using plants along the main east-west walk that most anyone will know.  Regardless of what is planted behind them, people will see plants that they have in their yard, and are accustomed to seeing.  They may not know Baptisia or Penstemon, but they know coneflowers and hostas, which they will see first and assist them in understanding this garden as a planted space and less of a question mark (when they can’t quickly tell what is supposed to be there).

Hi Pete and Shawn,

• Morgan finalized plans for a glove recycling meeting with the Division of Research Safety to discuss whether training may be needed to prevent gloves that have been in contact with harmful chemicals going into the recycling stream. Our instructions for participating labs note that gloves that such gloves cannot be recycled, but we want to discuss whether further instruction or training should take place. The call is scheduled for Sept. 4.
• I posted glove recycling statistics that Kimberly-Clark sent us in the spring and back-dated the entry accordingly (April 10, 2018).

Best regards,

Marya Ryan

Zero Waste Coordinator