9/30/04

Great first meeting, Greenfire!

In this introductory meeting, beyond our respective names, school years, and favourite colours (mine is blue), we also talked about the major initiatives of Greenfire in the past and for this year.

Please read this list of initiatives and think what you might want to work on, and of astronomically more importance, what ISN’T HERE THAT NEEDS TO BE HERE.  You all make this happen! Greenfire is simply the convenient way to organize manpower and resources.

We are responsible for the alternative gift market (an environmentally responsible way to give around the holiday season), as well as campus wide, state wide, and indeed national issues.  Many times your voice can be directly addressed through letter writing campaigns, which will be organized shortly.

Current and ongoing campaigns…

Little Something Green (LSG): This is the fundamental way that Greenfire can disseminate environmental messages to the campus on a daily basis.  The members of Greenfire come up with original ideas for basic messages to be posted all around campus in the form of small, laminated, semi-permanent, green signs.  A few of my faves are “Dry your hands on your pants,” “three friendly ways to conserve water…,” and “use rechargeable batteries.”  I’ll send out the whole list next meeting or so, at which point I’ll be talking more about this program, and reigniting it in this new academic year.  LSG is an ongoing campaign, and you all should mail me directly for ideas and when you want to volunteer (linealm@lawrence.edu).  [Continuing campaign]

Composting:  Downer commons currently wastes about 350 pounds of food a day.  This number has decreased due to action on the part of Greenfire, but ideally it should be 0 through reducing, reusing, or recycling, and this is the whole idea of composting.  We plan to have huge bins, either outside of the Greenfire house (which would be most convenient location-wise) or outside of the Co-op (which already has a composting permit).  There are internship opportunities for ENST majors in the form of maintaining the composting system.  Otherwise, to make this work we need some sort of work rotation system based on you, the potential volunteers and interns.  Email Suzanne (a member of Greenfire house) with any ideas, questions, concerns, or simply with your active and unrelenting support (ozments@lawrence.edu).  [Continuing campaign]

Environmental Management System (EMS):  This is a highly anticipated and planned campus-wide system to save our earth in economically beneficial and environmental ways.  One example is new boilers in the buildings that will pay themselves off within about 2 years, and generate a net savings of $60,000 a year from then on.  That’s a stack o’ cash!  [Continuing campaign]

Harvest Dinner: This one time event is an organic dinner at Downer where all-organic, locally-produced foods are served.  We attain speakers to talk about a range of issues of concern to organic foods.  We also have information at each table about the environmental impact of eating organic.  Last year the speakers were an organic farmer, and another speaker from a pro-organic foods organization.  [One-time event - to go down some time before the end of October]

Progressive Summit: This one time meeting of the minds of all the progressive groups on campus comes in the form of a weekend at Bjorklunden.  Lawrence has a residence in Bjorklunden in Door County, and everyone, whether first year or fourth, should take this chance to get out to this beautiful country.  The general idea is that all the progressive organizations should be working more closely together on specific issues (e.g. the upcoming election), and we are going to coordinate a collective goal and superstructure for ourselves.  Also, we gonna rock out hardcore.  [One-time retreat]

All Campus Environment (ACE) Day:  This is a day in which we all get together and actually get out and get our hands dirty doing environmental work.  Last year we cleaned up our ever-so-dirty Fox river (which, like our kitchen floor, absolutely refuses to get clean), also, groups went out to Bubolz, Highcliffe, and other parks in the area to do plantings or whatever other projects.  Additionally, we passed out environmental information around downtown Appleton.  This is a really fun way to save the earth, and work with environmentally-minded people outdoors.  Email Brian, this event’s organizer, at (hilgemab@lawrence.edu) if you want to suggest an activity or even to volunteer your interest ahead of time.  This day should be staged pretty soon (next 2-3 weeks, probably on a Saturday or Sunday) before the weather reverts to evil.  [One-time event]

One Minute Left (OML):  Everyone, from the Thoreau’s among us, to even the foreign exchange student who knows absolutely no English, should write articles, or send in artwork, poetry, or anything literary to the One Minute Left.  OML is a leftist publication on campus focusing on a range of political, social, environment, etc. issues.  Articles don’t need to be long at all; even a few hundred words may suffice.  They don’t even need to be liberal-minded, write to OML with your conservative views (so we can tell you why you’re wrong).  Last year an entire section was devoted to the College Republicans for their articles.  Also, the paper would like editors, copy-writers, computer software people, and so on, so please volunteer your skills.  With minimal work (maybe a few hours every couple weeks), this paper could easily sweep the world of campus publications.  If there is enough interest, there is the distinct possibility of this becoming a paper with paid positions!  Stax o’ dollas!  Email articles to (oneminuteleft@hotmail.com).  If you have questions email Ben at (paulib@lawrence.edu).

Downer food sucks.  Instead of this gold-star, tattooed number, concentration camp style system that they have going on for vegans (you have to sign up ahead of time to receive a specially prepared (and, most likely, spit upon) plate of vegan greens), everyone should be able to enjoy healthy, natural foods on a meal-by-meal basis.  For about 8 dollars a meal, they could be doing a lot better, and you all should show your disgust of Downer by joining up with Suzanne (ozments@lawrence.edu) and Liz (henrye@lawrence.edu) in their campaign to work with Downer to overcome the obstacles to having solid vegan options (all the time, to all the campus), and not just to the gold-star wearing masses.  Please email either Suzanne or Liz to tell them at least that you are interested in getting vegan food back in Downer lines, even if you don’t want to commit to anything right now.  [The beginnings of a campaign; look for progress on this!]

To end this expatiating and super-informative email, a few last orders of business…

Greenfire took a vote on whether to be partisan or non-partisan, and we decided to be non-partisan.  It makes us less exclusionary by nature, and it avoids officially pigeon-holing our organization as a rag-tag band of Kerry- (or Nader-) (or Bush-) endorsing hippies.

The Greenfire house is open and inherently seeks trouble, so come make some over at our house.  You can break stuff, swear, smoke, spit on the floor, or, you know, whatever; the back door is usually propped open a bit.  If you can’t get in and you really want in, just start yelling like a bastard.  You’ll get your way.

That’s all I got, and if you actually read this whole ridiculous email,
then you are, indeed, the greatest hero of them all,

Love,
Matt Lineal