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Come to the…

Neighborhood Solar Forum
for single family homes

sponsored by Sustainable Flatbush

July 16th @ 8pm
Ditmas Workspace
535 East 17th Street (corner of Ditmas)

http://www.ditmasworkspace.com/

Peter Landy will speak about his experience converting his house to solar power.

Chris Neidl of Solar One will speak about current legislation and initiatives to make residential solar power affordable.

RSVP requested (but not required) to anne@sustainableflatbush.org
Special Thanks to Liena Zagare and Ditmas Workspace

*Spread the word to friends and neighbors!

**The next Solar Forum will focus on multi-family apartment buildings, including co-ops.

Flier design by Keka

Here’s the concept:

Block Party NYC is a new program by the New York City Streets Renaissance which is helping neighborhoods around NYC come together and enjoy their street for a day, free from the usual hazards and distractions of automobiles. This summer alone, we’re providing mini-grants to over 30 block parties throughout the 5 boroughs. Each of these parties also gets the services of a professional urban planner for a day, who will help find community solutions to community problems like traffic, speeding, and noise and air pollution. They will also talk to residents about what they like and dislike about their street, what they want to preserve, and what needs to change.

Yes, we will discuss all of these serious issues with our neighbors, but we will also hang out and have a great time! Here are all the details:

Newkirk Avenue Block Party, a Livable Streets celebration co-sponsored by Flatbush Development Corporation, New York City Streets Renaissance, and Make Music New York, with participation of Solar One, Brooklyn Compost Project, Council on the Environment of NYC, Transportation Alternatives, Alive Structures, Midwood Martial Arts, and Newkirk Area merchants. Join us for:

Live Music and DJ’s all day!
Traditional NYC Street Games:
Handball, Skully, Hopscotch, Double Dutch, Jacks, and more!
Food Vendors!
Environmental Info and Activities:
Solar Power, Composting, Green Roof/Garden Design, Cell Phone Recycling, etc.,
plus Recycling Games and Art Projects just for kids!

WHEN: Saturday, June 21st, 11am – 6pm, Rain or Shine!
WHERE: Newkirk Avenue between East 16th and East 17th Streets

See you there!

The NYC Recycling Action Committee, formed by two NYC teachers, aims to help get recycling programs in every public and private NYC school.

We’re making progress toward that goal, but we need your help. Please do your part by signing this petition.

Calling All NYC School Recycling Supporters!

A Joint Committee hearing with the Dept. of Sanitation and the Dept. of Education on SCHOOL RECYCLING is set for TUESDAY, JUNE 3, 1 PM. at City Hall.

Councilmember Bill De Blasio will be holding a pre-hearing press conference on the steps of CITY HALL at 12:15 PM. He’ll announce a bill calling for school recycling programs in all NYC schools. Plus, he’ll introduce legislation to bring back dumpster recycling collection (exactly what we’ve been asking for)!

Join us in showing the NYC Council how much we care!

Bring your teachers, students, parents and signs! Yes, it’s a school day, but a wonderful opportunity to learn about our City’s decision-making process. Councilmembers McMahon, Jackson & others, NRDC, the Custodian and Cleaner’s Unions will be there too!

We’ll have “Be cool. Recycle at school!” t-shirts if you want to order some—they’re only $5!

After the rally, the hearing takes place from 1-4 PM. The public is invited to attend.

This is a critical moment: be there! And forward this far and wide!

Be cool,

Micki Josi and Coquille Houshour
NYC School Recycling Action Committee
info@educatingtomorrow.org
www.educatingtomorrow.org

Here are the details, courtesy of the Green Drinks website:

Join us for BKLYN Green Drinks @ The (Brooklyn) Center for the Urban Environment located on 7th Street between 2nd and 3rd Avenue. Celebrate their exciting and innovative new headquarters as they become LEED-Certified Gold for Commercial Interiors by the US Green Building Council, the first of its kind in Brooklyn!

Founded in 1978, Brooklyn Center for the Urban Environment is dedicated to educating individuals about the built and natural environments of New York City. Creators of the Green Brooklyn conference and the Sustainable Business Network, the Center is a local leader in the field whose commitment to strengthening public education and developing more sustainable communities is rooted in the belief that creating a healthy and livable environment requires instilling an appreciation for and an understanding of the built and natural environments. Their wide range of programs address the needs of the city’s underserved communities with a diverse menu of hands-on educational offerings that develop an understanding of the interdependency of urban life with the local ecosystem, improving academic performance and instruction, and fostering environmental stewardship.

The folks at BCUE want to announce that they are also accepting
recycling on the premises that night:

• Alkaline batteries
• Inkjet/laser cartridges
• Compact Florescent Lightbulbs (CFLs)
• Technotrash, meaning: All forms of electronic media and their cases: diskettes, zip disks, CDs, CD-Rs, CD-RWs, DVDs et al, video
tape (i.e. VHS), audio tape, game cartridges, DAT, DLT, Beta or Digibeta, and virtually all other type of computer tapes.
• Hard drives, Zip and Jazz drives, jump drives, etc.
• All forms of printer cartridges including both inkjet and toner.
• All types of pagers, PDAs and their chargers, cables, and headset accessories
• All types of rechargeable batteries and their chargers
• All of the cords, cables, boards, chips, etc. attached to or removed from a computer.

WHERE:
Center for the Urban Environment, 168 7th Street, Brooklyn, NY 11215 (btw 2nd and 3rd Aves)
F train to 4th Ave or R train to 9th Street. Walk over 2 blocks north to 7th Street and 1 avenue west to 3rd Avenue

WHEN:
Wed 5/21, 7 pm – 9 pm

Cash bar (proceeds to benefit CUE)

Still thirsty? Bar Tano located at 457 3rd Ave and 9th Street will be open until 12 am.

(… Now, if we could only find a permanent place to recycle our CFLs…)

For two weeks in May, delegates from across the world will be visiting NYC as part of the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development. This is the first year of a two-year cycle in which the United Nations sets its policies on sustainable development. Agriculture is one of the major themes before the Commission.

New York City is a model for innovative urban food systems and agriculture projects, and the City Farms Tour will highlight several sites in Brooklyn, including sites in [Bed-Stuy]. We invite you to come out and be part of this exciting moment, when community-based food projects in your district are receiving international attention.

Hattie Carthan Community Garden (photo from BedStuy Blog)

The Tour will be held on May 10th (tomorrow!) and is open to the public. The announcement above is from the folks at Hattie Carthan Community Garden, which is part of the Magnolia Tree Earth Center, a cultural and environmental institution founded in 1972 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Other gardens featured on the tour are the Hollenback Community Garden in Clinton Hill, Bed-Stuy Farm/Brooklyn Rescue Mission, and East New York Farms. Cooking, vermicomposting, and urban beekeeping workshops will be held along with tours of the sites.

Rebecca’s container gardening demonstration

Last Sunday’s event, “Greening Flatbush: Garden Where You Are” was a huge success! The Sustainable Flatbush Gardening Committee assembled a stellar program of speakers and demonstrations on topics including Container Gardening, Urban Composting, Street Trees, Permaculture and more.

Mela and Sandra talk trees

Karla advocates for worm composting

We can’t wait for spring to get our hands dirty and start planting up the neighborhood!

Government sustainability initiatives may have greater success when framed as responses to energy volatility than to climate change. In the short term, expanding capacity margins through energy conservation will make the City more resilient to volatility, while expediting PlaNYC initiatives. In the long term, we need to push discussion far past PlaNYC’s current goals, and start building a post-petroleum economy now.

The good news is that a national project to make clean energy cheap can restore domestic manufacturing, create millions of jobs that can’t be outsourced, and stimulate the economy, while improving our quality of life and mitigating climate change. New York City’s leadership can help make such policy actions a reality, while ensuring a better future for our citizens. What’s the next step for New York City?

Here’s a link to the summary version (the whole report is 50 pages long!).

On Sunday, February 24, residents and other members of the greater Flatbush community can learn what they can do to beautify and improve the environment of their neighborhood.

“Greening Flatbush: Garden Where You Are” is an afternoon of short lectures, demonstrations, and workshops on topics ranging from planting and caring for street trees to composting with worms in your kitchen.

“Garden is a verb,” says Chris Kreussling, co-chair of the Gardening Committee of Sustainable Flatbush, which is sponsoring the event. “It’s not just a place you visit. It’s something you do.”

“Hearing about what others are already doing can inspire people to work with their neighbors to takeaction,” says Kreussling, who also authors a local gardening blog, Flatbush Gardener. “We want to build community through gardening.”

Greening Flatbush is Sunday, February 24, from 1:30 to 4:30pm at the Flatbush Branch of the Brooklyn Public Library at 22 Linden Boulevard.

The event is free, but space is limited. To register, or if you have questions about this event, please email greeningflatbush[at]gmail.com.

For directions, see the Flatbush branch web page on the Brooklyn Public Library Web site.

Have I mentioned that our Gardening Committee is amazing? Check out their mission statement:

We envision a clean, green, and beautiful cityscape for and by the inhabitants of Flatbush.
Our purpose is to empower our community through shared gardening and pro-environment projects.
To achieve this, we will:

• Educate our community to create green, life-promoting spaces indoors and outdoors;
• Support other groups and individuals in their environmentally sound gardening projects;
• Inspire and challenge all members of our community to sustain and respect public gardening and environmental initiatives;
• Green and beautify our neighborhood one flower, one plant, one tree at a time.

Anyone interested in becoming an active member of this committee can request to join their listserv here. Go Gardeners!!