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 Over 300 gathered at Skiddy Park to attend the “Trick or Trees: time-to-plant festival,” the largest ever volunteer based tree planting and tree giveaway in the City of Syracuse with a festival highlighting aspects of sustainable communities.
Youth from the Onondaga Earth Corps and adult volunteers in the CommuniTree Steward program lead over 150 volunteers from Syracuse Housing Authority (SHA), b.i.k.e. Syracuse, SUNY-ESF, SUNY Morrisville, 40 Below, West Genesee High School, Home Headquarters, and GreeningUSA in planting 176 trees at the SHA James-Geddes Complex and on Shonnard, Seymour and Gifford Streets -- all within the Clinton sewershed, an area targeted by Onondaga County to reduce stormwater runoff and combined sewer overflow.
 Tree planting was followed by GreeningUSA’s second Sustainability Academy festival of the year. Festival goers learned about energy efficiency, green schools, green jobs, planet friendly eating habits, soil health, neighborhood engagement, rain barrels, rain gardens, green roofs, bike repairs and of course about the benefits of trees. Neighborhood youth developed a benefits-of-trees activity and a green infrastructure tour of the rain garden, rain barrels and green roof at 515 Tully St for the festival, and were responsible for giving away 130 trees to local residents and volunteers. People visited a series of stations with a festival passport and were rewarded with prizes such as compact fluorescent light bulbs, energy saving gadgets, cookbooks, gift certificates to local stores and trees.
Highlights of activities from each station included:
Trees!
The Onondaga Earth Corps featured its new Benefits of Trees game at the festival. Participants were blindfolded, spun around and then attempted to pin a velcro ball on a felt image of a neighborhood. Wherever the ball stuck, participants tried to think of one benefit associated with where the ball stuck. For example, if a ball was stuck on the blue sky, a benefit from trees might be oxygen or air filtration; if a ball was suck on the tree itself, a benefit might be habitat for wildlife or wood for building.
Facilitated by the Onondaga Earth Corps
Home Heat Home
The Home Heat Home station included interactive demonstrations and energy efficiency information. Demonstrations consisted of two models – the Energy Meter and Insul-Learner. The “Energy Meter” compares the difference in electric power consumption of an incandescent bulb vs. a CFL bulb (of the same brightness) as measured by a typical house electric meter. Visitors can turn the bulbs on and off and observe the speed of the meter to judge which bulb is more energy efficient. The “Insul-Learner” is a square wooden box with a light bulb in the middle and surrounded on three sides by three types of wall insulation. The fourth side is empty. There are clear plastic viewing ports at the top of each side wall so visitors can see the insulation and empty space. Thermometers located on each of the four sides indicate how much heat (generated by the light bulb) gets through each side. The empty side is significantly hotter than the three insulated sides, graphically illustrating the concept of heat loss, wasted energy, and the importance and value of home insulation.
Numerous how-to handouts about how home-owners and apartment dwellers can prepare for winter and save electrical and heat energy while reducing their carbon footprint and greenhouse gas emissions were also available. Information on private and public home energy improvement and weatherization financing programs were also available. These included low-income grant, loan, and special payment programs supported by National Grid, HEAP, NYSERDA and EnergyStar, and Peace Inc.
Facilitated by Ken Bobis of OCC
Green Jobs
The Green Jobs station included Brainstorming Green Business ideas and business names and the “Guess that Green Job” game in which participants had to guess what job related to “mystery” items on the table. Items included cellulose insulation for Weatherization/Building Analyst, purple-topped Turnip for Gardener/Famer), Third-Hand Tool for Bicycle Mechanic, and Vegetable Scraps for Composting/Fertilizer Production. The green business idea activity produced many innovative ideas from participants including ideas for paperless schools - supplying computers to schools and eliminating paper, Southside Green - recycle/reuse fabrics & textiles, Northside Green - native plant restoration and several others.
The station also included information about business advising services that the Small Business Development Center offers to entrepreneurs and existing small business, and some descriptive materials about Green Business Aware, a local/regional Green Business Standards Certification project that includes the Syracuse Chamber of Commerce, the Northside Collabroatory, SUNY-Oswego, SUNY-ESF, and Syracuse First.
Facilitated by: Frank Raymond Cetera, Green Business Advisor, Danielle Sheppard of Green Train and the Northside Collaboratory
Food: green and on the cheap
This station highlighted an educational game which made the connection between food choices and protecting the environment and tips about how to purchase affordable and healthful foods that have minimal impact on the planet. Initial questions such as, “What do greenhouse gases do?” and “What are some results of global warming?” established important background information. People were then asked to take colorful representations of food and divide them into two baskets: one basket for food which can be produced locally and the other for food which must be brought in from a distance. They were also asked to take other representations of food and divide them between those which are derived from plants and those which are derived from animals.
Participants also met “Walt the Worm.” Children colored and painted worm coloring sheets, and both children and adults could observe worms as they were turning food scraps into soil in a demonstration worm compost (vermicompost) bin. Participants learned that worms help create the healthy soils that produce healthy foods and many went home with instructions on how to build their own worm bin.
Facilitated by: Debbie Walter of the Sierra Club, Robin Neal CNY Foodbank
Recycling and Waste Reduction
The table for Recycling and Waste Reduction was hosted by the Onondaga County Resource Recovery Agency. To receive a check on their passport, attendants had to decide which bin “waste” items went in: the trash or a blue bin. 3-5 items were selected for each person and attendants chose whether the items should go in the trash bin or the blue bin. Once finished, any mistakes were corrected and participants were awarded with an OCRRA sticker. Also on the table were OCRRA newsletters, recycling instruction magnets, and Spanish instructions.
Many people were interested in recycling and were eager to play the game. A few kids came back again and again just to play the game and OCRRA made some great connections with people at various community centers.
Facilitated by Sarah Stewart from OCRRA
Green Schools
The Green Schools Station contained a display with photos illustrating green schools strategies. Instead of lecturing those who stopped by, they were invited to play the “Body Parts Game”. This activity involved matching the photo illustrating a green schools strategy with a “game piece” containing clip art body parts, and sticking the body part affected by the green schools strategy to the photo. For example, the photo with the caption “clean indoor air” (containing a girl with an inhaler) would get a clip art set of lungs stuck to it.
Participants seemed to enjoy the puzzle and, because they had to read the photo caption and understand what part of their body is affected,
they may have learned something. There were 8 photos, so participants were able to complete the activity fairly quickly. I also had hand-outs
for the adults on “92 Low-cost and No-cost Strategies to Green Your School.”
Facilitated by Diane Brandli, GreeningUSA, US Green Building Council Green School Advocate
Dream Neighborhood
Participants gave video responses to questions such as, “If you could improve one thing in your neighborhood, what would it be?”, “How would you like to change your neighborhood?”, or “What kind of neighborhood do you want to live in?” Many participants hoped for increased safety and more opportunities for young people. All responses will be edited and used as an introduction to the 11/19 Dream Neighborhood Session.
Facilitated by Martin Jacob, SU Director of the Near West Side Initiative
Bicycle Repairs
The Peace Council’s Bikes 4 Peace crew was also on site helping folks repair old bicycles and in some cases repair bicycles to take home for free.
Facilitated by Ursula Rosum, Bikes 4 Peace
Sustainability Quiz
To wrap up the festival experience, festival attendees participated in a sustainability quiz. People chose questions at random from a large quiz board. Each question reviewed concepts learned from the different festival stations. Fair-goers were awarded with a ticket for a prize. This station was well received; many kids came back to answer more questions. A question that most kids knew was naming the three Rs: reduce, reuse, recycle. Most kids also knew ways to save energy in their home such as by taking a shorter shower, turning off lights, and be conscious to turn off the faucet while you brush your teeth. A tougher question was “What do cows and cars have in common?” along with naming the three pillars of a sustainable community. Volunteers enjoyed teaching the children some facts about what they can do to protect their environment as well as hearing their ideas to improve their neighborhood.
Facilitate by Laura Notarangelo, VISTA Volunteer
Funding for the Sustainability Academy festival was provided by the NYS Pollution Prevention Institute through a grant from the NYS Department of Environmental Conversation and through the Gifford Foundation. Funding for the Tree Giveaway was provided by the CNY Community Foundation. Tree Planting was coordinated by Cornell Cooperative Extension and the City of Syracuse Parks and Recreation Department. Trees for planting were provided by Onondaga County Department of Water Environment Protection through a grant from the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation. |
