Minutes of 29March2009 meeting

Present: Anna (facilitator), Jeff, Charlotte, Brandy, Shelby, Julene, Emily, Elaine (minutes-taker), Dorothy

Next meeting: April 5, facilitator is Elaine, minutes-taker is Dorothy

............April meetings: 5th and 19th
............May meetings: 3rd and 17th
Summer meeting schedule will be decided later this spring.

Minutes from previous meeting were read.

FOLLOW-UP ITEM: SEEES letterhead. Anna will contact Alicia to get the final version of letterhead. Anna will draft a letter thanking APT for their LED streetlight initiative.

FOLLOW-UP ITEM: SEEES logo. Charlotte created a digital image of the logo during the meeting using her cell phone. The logo will be put on the new SEEES facebook group, and added to the blog and web site.

FOLLOW-UP ITEM: SEEES projects list. The listing of projects or "to do" items was passed around, and it can be found in the SEEES binder in the library. Everyone is encouraged to look it over, and fill in wherever they think appropriate. Further discussion was postponed until a later meeting.

AGENDA ITEM: Skagway Recycling Forum. Was scheduled for the Friday before the Buckwheat, but was canceled due to too many conflicts among the people volunteering for the race. It will be rescheduled for late April or early May.

AGENDA ITEM: visit from Haines sustainability coordinator, Stephanie. Charlotte has been trying to connect with Stephanie. When she is able to make contact, she'll see if Stephanie and the Haines City Manager would like to come to a SEEES meeting in April or May. She'll also see if they might be interested in participating in a community forum sometime in the fall.

AGENDA ITEM: SEEES in Facebook. Charlotte is going to create a Facebook group for SEEES and put information on our meetings, links to the blog and web site, etc. to encourage more people to get involved with SEEES.

AGENDA ITEM: gmail for SEEES. Shelby will start using the gmail to network among SEEES members by forwarding messages to the whole group whenever she is asked or thinks it is appropriate. She'll be adding the people on the SEEES email list to her forwarding list. If you want in or out, contact Shelby.

AGENDA ITEM: SEEES donations box. Anna and Dorothy will make a donation jar/box that Julene will make available at You Say Tomato. Also, we started collecting donations during the SEEES meetings. Trish at SDC has agreed to take our donations and deposit them in one of their accounts so we can write checks off of that account when needed.

AGENDA ITEM: info on Skagway's new CSA. Emily and Charlotte clarified how their new CSA would work. It will be a true CSA, distributing organic produce grown here, not shipping in produce from outside. The CSA members will share the risk and benefits of farming, such as some crop failures, or perhaps some extra crop bounty. Also, the CSA members are buying a whole season, produce will not be sold weekly.

SPECIAL NOTE: Dorothy recommended the Cranberry Festival Cookbook, which has many good recipes from CSAs.

AGENDA ITEM: using the SEEES blog to reward sustainable businesses. Anna suggested starting a "sustainable business" recognition or award on our blog. Anybody can submit a business for recognition at any meeting by describing what they are doing to be more sustainable. Anna also suggested that we could come up with a list of criteria for getting a higher level of recognition, perhaps an annual award.

AGENDA ITEM: progress report on SEEES brochure. Julene has drafted an excellent brochure giving information on how/where to recycle in Skagway. Right now, Grant at Public Works is reviewing it. When it is final, we want to print and distribute it to the community. Dorothy is going to check into what it would take to make it an insert in the newspaper. Another possibility is including flyers with the Borough's quarterly billings.

TENTATIVE AGENDA for 5 April 2009 meeting posted on blog.