SJVGreens Minutes
Minutes of St. Joe Valley Greens
January 12, 2004, Kathleen Kaiser, recorder
Call to Order: Tom Brown called the meeting to order at 7:10 PM. Vicki Webb was out of town. The meeting was held at the St. Joseph Valley Public Library, Main Branch.
Members Present: Tom Brown, Jeff Sutter, Dave Vollrath, Lance Howard, Kathleen Kaiser.
Guests Present: Karren Cooper and Jim Coplen from the NW Indiana Greens and Richard Eberly, guest speaker.
Guest Speaker: Richard Eberly, science educator at New Buffalo High School.
Richard gave a very interesting presentation on sustainable forestry including a discussion about the differences between traditional forestry and sustainable forestry, the latter of which he and his family practice on a tract of woodland owned by his family.
We were pleased to hear how much less damage, waste and collateral damage to remaining trees occurs when sustainable forestry practices are utilized rather than traditional forestry. Richard noted that sustainable forestry is a little more labor intensive as monitoring and managing the woods occurs year-round. But sustainable forestry typically enhances biodiversity, uses smaller equipment, disturbs the forest floor less, dramatically reduces the need for logging roads, and eliminates much of the waste of tree crowns often left on forest floors by traditional commercial forestry practices. Drying tree increase the risk of fire. Sustainable forestry removes and uses the crowns which, in turn, reduces the risk of fires.
The Eberly wood farm uses a solar kiln to season the wood Richard harvests from their woods as well as from trees acquired from neighbors and acquaintances. Richard related fascinating anecdotes about rare and valuable wood from trees he'd rescued from firewood or rot and many of the objects of beauty made from wood from his solar kiln. Richard maintains a close relationship with a Japanese wood broker who supplies wood to Japan's national living treasures. The broker is himself a national living treasure.
Richard also shared excellent information on mushrooms and their culture (even offering his "recipe" for planting morels.) If you want to ask Richard any question about sustainable forestry, including his "secret" for growing morels, contact him by email at richeberly@comcast.net.
Treasurer Report
Lance Howard will issue the Treasurer's report by email to the active members.
IGP Delegate Report
Dave Vollrath gave the delegate report.
Green Candidates for Congress - Clark Field and Jeff Melton are seeking the 7th and 11th congressional seats and are running on a green platform. The two candidates have asked the Indiana Green Party (IGP) to endorse them. The IGP coordinating committee (IGPCC) asked the candidates to fill out a questionnaire regarding their campaigns and positions. Vicki will be sending the candidates' responses to our members, and members are asked to vote on whether or not we will endorse these candidates. Please email your vote to Dave Vollrath by January 19th.
Read the candidates' responses to the IGPCC questionnaire:
Ballot Access Reform - The IGPCC requests that all Greens contact their state representatives and ask them to support ballot access liberalization. Previous attempts to liberalize ballot access in Indiana by separate bills have been killed in committee. Tom Kromkowski-D South Bend is an opponent of ballot access reform and also serves on the House Elections Committee which oversees election law in Indiana. The ICFEL strategy is to attach an ammendment to an appropriate bill so that the ballot access reform issue has a better chance of getting to the floor of the General Assembly for a vote.
Green Presidential Candidate Visit - David Cobb, one of the candidates seeking the Green Party nomination for President, will be in Indiana on Friday, February 20th, primarily to encourage Green members to press for improved ballot access in Indiana. He will stop in Lafayette, South Bend and possibly Goshen. The NWI Greens will join the SJVGreens for the South Bend meeting.
IGP Video Conference - Tom requests that anyone with a 500+ Megahertz Windows laptop with 128+ megabytes of RAM and a USB port, please contact him. He needs a portable Windows computer to test a broadband Internet connection. The goal is to improve the quality of IGP video conferences.
National Convention - The Green Party of the United States (GPUS) Presidential nominating convention will be held in Milwaukee, WI, from June 24th through the 28th. Indiana needs to send 10 delegates. Please consider nominating yourself or accepting a nomination to serve as a delegate to the convention.
GreenTV
David Kaiser booked the next taping at Comcast on January 25th, with Joe Carbone of Jobs with Justice.
Tom Brown and David Vollrath will tape interviews at the Martin Luther King Jr. Day event, Jan. 19, in South Bend. The St. Joe Valley Project/Jobs for Justice are announcing the opening of the Workers' Rights Center.
March for Women's Lives
Kathleen Kaiser noted that she hopes to participate in the March for Women's Lives (formerly "March for Choice") to be held in Washington, D.C. on April 25th. Planned Parenthood of NW Indiana and the local chapter of the National Organization for Women will be chartering a bus for the event. Anyone wishing to sponsor a marcher, join the march or contribute towards the bus expenses can contact Bridget Hardy at bridgetmhardy@hotmail.com.
GreenTV plans on taping interviews with people as they are leaving for the march.
Adournment: The meeting adjourned at 9:00 p.m. The next meeting is Monday, February 9, 2004, at the St. Joseph County Public Library main branch in downtown South Bend.
St. Joe Valley Greens, South Bend, IN