CUFSP Meeting Recap 4.24.08

CUFSP Meeting Update 4.24.08

Club Officers
Based on responses to Liz, club officers for next year are as follow:
Food Purchasing Coordinator—Liz
Garden Coordinator—Becky
Outreach Coordinator—Open
Treasurer—Andrew
Publicity Coordinator—Channa
This means Liz and I will act as co-presidents for club governance purposes.

CSA
Specifics will be established in a meeting this Friday between Megan, Becky, Paula Lukats of Just Food, and Pam Koch of Teacher’s College Nutrition Dept. Let Megan McNally know if you are potentially interested in receiving a share: Megan.mcnally@gmail.com

Food Purchasing
- Local brunch at John Jay May 5th, local foods purchased through Sysco
- Liz is arranging to meet with Margaret Hoffman of the Greenmarket and Dining Services to discuss future local foods purchasing. Particular concerns are quantity and insurance.
- Liz is meeting with Ina Tsagarakis, Dining Services nutritionist, about food labeling and posting nutrition facts online.
- Plastic bags: If we write a resolution and collect as many endorsements as possible before the end of the year we can submit it to Joe Heavey and have plastic bags for take-out containers removed from John Jay! Channa is talking to a CCSC rep about the procedure for submitting a resolution and asking for CCSC’s endorsement. Other endorsements to ask for:
§ Ted/Rachel—SEEJ
§ Becky—CoreFoods, Green Umbrella, Barnard/CU EcoReps
§ Maddie—EarthCo
- Reusable containers for John Jay takeout: Liz will research this project this summer. This year, we need someone to create an online student survey to find out more about students’ use of take-out containers. VOLUNTEERS???
- Other notes:
o There will be a video displayed soon in John Jay showing how Dining Services works with City Harvest to distribute extra food produced by John Jay.
o Trayless Thursdays will be piloted in John Jay next year, to discourage people from taking too much food (then tossing it).
o Liz learned that currently our beef and chicken comes from Tyson and pork from Hatfield. For a good 6-minute primer on factory farm (i.e. Tyson) chicken, check out this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2t-XYgGXNtM. You can also read more about Tyson here: http://www.coopamerica.org/programs/rs/profile.cfm?id=301

Garden
- Because we haven’t finished planting and haven’t set up irrigation, watering the plants consists of filling up a container with water from the Pupin bathroom and making a few trips back and forth to the garden site. I’ve been watering the herbs thus far—can someone volunteer to check the plants Friday and water them if necessary? It’s fun!
- This SATURDAY at 2pm we will be finishing the trellises, cleaning the compost bins, and doing a little weeding/garden maintenance. Come to Pupin Plaza to help out!
- Duties:
o Procure vegetable starts—Becky
o Seeds—Sarah
o Garden signs—Sarah
o Finances—Andrew
o Summer organizing—Kari
§ Summer plant monitor—Sarah
§ Summer garden point person—possibly Becky, but please let me know if you are interested in this position!
- Best of all—our final planting date will be May 10th at 3pm!
o Advertising—Channa and Brenden, will work with CoreFoods on fundraising/tabling on May 7th

Only a few more weeks to go! For those who can’t make it Saturday, we will meet again this Sunday at 8pm in Math 520.

Why Bother with Urban Gardening?

Yet another quality article from Michael Pollan, addressing not just food issues (though he gives gardens particular notice!) but environmental action of all sorts. His driving point, which dovetails perfectly with FSP's garden aims, is that people need to stop relying on policymakers and scientists to find a catchall solution to our environmental woes. Rather, we need to physically change how we live. Read the full piece, part of the NY Times Magazine's "Green Issue," here.

My favorite snippet:
"But the act I want to talk about is growing some — even just a little — of your own food. Rip out your lawn, if you have one, and if you don’t — if you live in a high-rise, or have a yard shrouded in shade — look into getting a plot in a community garden. Measured against the Problem We Face, planting a garden sounds pretty benign, I know, but in fact it’s one of the most powerful things an individual can do — to reduce your carbon footprint, sure, but more important, to reduce your sense of dependence and dividedness: to change the cheap-energy mind."

REMINDER: The next FSP meeting will be 8pm this WEDNESDAY in the Piano Lounge, then it will be back to our regular date/time. Garden update soon to come.