February

Backyard Chickens 101

Saturday February 23, 2013
1:00 pm – 3:00 pm
Interested in farm-fresh eggs sourced straight from your backyard? Hanover Farm‘s head farmer Brett Alcaro will walk you through all you need to know to start your own brood of backyard chickens.  Registration is required; $20 per person, $5 for children ages 8-12.

Wine and Dine Divine

Saturday, February 23rd
7:00 – 9:30pm
Get to know Friends of Karen and enjoy an event co-hosted by the creative, ConsciousWine. Tickets are just $75 — reserve now on our secure website as space is limited!

Making Your Home Energy Efficient

Sunday February 24th
Application Assistance: 3PM
Q&A with the Energy Coach and 3 local energy efficiency contractors: 4:00PM – 5:30PM
An informative seminar led by energy expert Norm Jen of EnergizeNY and local energy efficiency contractors: Michael DeCandia of EcoHome Construction, LLC, Mario Bruni of Bruni and Campisi, Larry Nissman of Phoenix Mechanical, who will help homeowners to understand how their homes leak energy, how they can fix them – and how to take advantage of state incentives to pay for it. Registration is required, RSVP with the Lewisboro Library by phone (914) 763-3857

Leon Levy Lecture

Sunday, February 24, 4 PM
Alex Shoumatoff, renowned author and historian, will present the history of the great estates of Northern Westchester, particularly South Salem, and how these estates influenced local conservation efforts.  Admission is free.

March

Food and Energy: discussion and potluck

Fri, March 01, 2013
6:30pm – 7:30pm
FOOD: On the food side: Meet your local producers, retailers, educators who are working to build a food infrastructure for us all. ENERGY:  A short panel presentation will share the opportunities for involvement in local Energy improvements (alternative and efficiency and infrastructure).  Registration is required and tickets cost $5 per person.

CT NOFA’s 31st Annual Winter Conference

Saturday, March 2
8:30 am to 5:00 pm
The 2013 Winter Conference brings into focus the challenges of adjusting to climate change for farmers, gardeners and consumers.  Join them to discuss the future of sustainable farming and celebrate local food.

Environmental Film Series: “Dear Governor Cuomo”

Friday, March 8th
7:00PM
The Lewisboro Library’s series of environmental-themed films with discussions continues. “Dear Governor Cuomo” documents the response to the news that Governor Andrew Cuomo might lift the four-year moratorium against hydraulic fracturing (fracking) in New York state. There is a suggested donation of $5 per person, to fund viewing license fees. Registration is required, RSVP the Lewisboro Library at 914-763-3857

Supplies will be gathered at Thornwood Self Storage, which is also accepting supplies to go to relief efforts. (M-F 9-6, S/S 10-5) Supplies will be delivered to locations designated by the Occupy Sandy and Rockaway Emergency efforts.

Please bring the following donations:

• First Aid supplies (new, sealed, labeled)
• Carbon monoxide detectors
• Blankets
• Flashlights, Candles
• Water
• Batteries
• Diapers and Wipes
• Work Gloves and Masks
• Rubber boots
• Shovels
• Cleaning supplies and bleach
• Trash bags and Quart and gallon Ziplock type bags
• Large clear plastic containers to put sorted supplies into
• Serving dishes and utensils
• Generators

NO FOOD or CLOTHING WILL BE ACCEPTED

If you would rather donate $ that will go to Rockaway Emergency Plan busses that are bringing volunteers out and back to do clean up work, please visit this site.

This effort is coordinated by Tara Santoro,  Heather Flournoy and Sandra Giordano-Lena. Each of these women realized they had an opportunity to combine the power of their workplace resources with their community resources to make a difference in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. All three love food and farming and are community builders. Tara works weekends with Gaia’s Breath Farm stands at Westchester farmer’s markets.

Her weekday job is at Thornwood Self Storage. Hearing about Sandy relief efforts she immediately saw a role that the self-storage place could play– a place to gather goods to be taken to Rockaway and other places hard hit.

Tara says “Just do something and do it now.”

Sandra can be found weekends at John Boy’s Farm stands, and manages the new winter market in Mt. Kisco. She realized that this was a perfect place to get people to donate items. During the week she works at Wittus Design in Pound Ridge, NY, a town that has had a higher percentage of residents without power for longer than any of the other northern Westchester towns. Sandra opened Wittus’ doors and fired up their super efficient woodfired stoves to the community for warmth.

Sandra says “I just want to help any way I can, and I hope you’ll help the effort be successful.”

Heather Flournoy can often be found at an area farmer’s market on a Saturday morning, gleefully shopping for local foods and chatting with friends about ideas for her community network, Katonah Green. During the week she works for Energize NY home energy efficiency program. (notice a them yet?). When she saw that both of her friends Tara and Sandra had posted ideas on Facebook about gathering goods to go for Sandy relief efforts, she decided to jump in and bring it all together. Her co-worker Elyssa Rothe had already been very involved in relief efforts and revealed how much citizen action was desperately needed in the Rockaways and how uncoordinated the Red Cross efforts seemed to be. Heather spoke with one of Energize’s home energy efficiency contractors  and mentioned the effort. Mike from Bright Home immediately offered up a truck and some guys to collect items and deliver them to the  Rockaways. This effort will continue until the areas hit by Sandy have been restored to the point of self-sufficiency.

 Heather says “We are all more powerful than we ever imagined when we join forces.”

In essence, just bring stuff out to the market closest to you this Saturday!

Questions? Call the team at 914-589-6615 or email heather@energizeny.org

Not everyone is so lucky. This year I live in an apartment in Katonah, upstairs, so I have less control than in a full house. BUT, my landlord had and I have done a lot of things to prepare, and I’d like to share, as well as suggest we use this forum to support each other.

If you are setup with sources for heat and water and power, and are willing to share that with Katonah Green readers, email me and I’ll share that info privately. If you are in need, email me at editor “@” katonahgreen.com (remove quotations) and I’ll try to find you a place to cook, charge up, get internet and maybe even get a shower. I don’t suggest posting it on the page as that will be public. If you are a member of the Katonah Green Meetup group then you already know a lot of the members and may wish to make your resources available to them. Head over here for that. My suggestion is that we have each other’s phone numbers as internet will likely get knocked out.

FOOD

Here are some food items I’ve prepared in case we have no refrigeration this week. (I do have a portable gas grill and a propane stove in the apartment so I can cook) All items available at Mrs. Green’s in Katonah and Mt. Kisco and at Nature’s Temptations in Ridgefield. By the way, they had fully stocked shelves Saturday evening and no panicking crowds and are open today.

No cook/no refrigeration Breakfast food: chia and hemp seeds with buckwheat groats. I add water and canned coconut milk to this and it expands and is ready to eat in 20 minutes. I add dried mulberries, brazil nuts, walnuts, pepitas, cinnamon, allspice and raw honey to flavor.

A few other food items to have on hand:

• Canned organic soups
• Unripe bananas and avocadoes (should be ripe by Tues/Wed when we start feeling the stress of the storm’s aftermath
• Apples, plums
• Farmer’s market eggs (they don’t need refrigeration. *note that store eggs do!)
• Canned wild-caught small tuna
• celery
• onions
• greens (will last a few days uncooked)
• potatoes
• sunflower seed and almond butters
• rice crackers
• mom’s homemade jam
• a bottle of Pacific Redwood organic, sulfite-free wine (available at Katonah Wine and Liquor)
• a couple of packs of aseptic organic lunch sized milks ( I don’t normally use these because of BPA contamination among other things)
• organic food bars, like Rise brand (the first organic one I’ve found with no cashews or peanuts or stuff like maltodextrin)

Don’t forget that even if we lost power tonight, the food in the fridge is edible tomorrow, and that the foods in the freezer will be edible the next day or even longer if your fridge is well insulated.

WATER

I saved jars and have filled them with filtered water. Tonight I will fill the tea kettle and two big pots with filtered water.

I just learned one thing that I didn’t realize: in Katonah, we won’t lose water pressure so toilets will flush and at a minimum we can have cold showers. But do consider having potable water prepared in case of water contamination.

POWER!

Plug in Inverters: Above is a photo of a great little inverter to have on hand this year: (similar inverters available from Radio Shack). I even ground coffee with mine last year.

Installed inverters: If you have a Prius, there are a number of options to use it as a backup generator.

If you don’t, here is what my landlord had installed in his non-hybrid car: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_st?keywords=2500+watt+inverter&qid=1351400703&rh=k%3A2500+watt+inverter%2Cn%3A172282&sort=reviewrank_authority

NOTE (from neighbor Michael): with inverters this big, they need to be installed properly, directly to the car charging system with heavy gauge cables. I had my mechanic do it, because I didn’t want to cut through the firewall myself. I also have a big cutoff switch so I can’t accidentally leave it on and drain my car battery. Last year we ran 2 sump pumps 2 refrigerators (10% duty cycle — not on all the time) 1 heating system.

Be safe, be prepared, check on your neighbors, get real about climate change! And even if this storm doesn’t knock out power etc, we’ll be better prepared for the next.

~Peace, Heather

"Sailboats on the Sound" photo by Jessica Brockington

Although it’s way too early to say for sure, and way too uncertain to be complacent, conditions on Long Island Sound seem to be improving.In the most highly stressed part of the Sound, between Queens, the Bronx, Westchester and Nassau Counties, concentrations of dissolved oxygen – a key indicator of habitat health – have been significantly better in two of the last three summers than the 20-year median, an improvement that’s probably attributable at least in part to upgrades at sewage treatment plants.

More locally, reduced levels of pathogens enabled Nassau County to reopen 2,500 acres of shellfish beds in Hempstead Harbor in 2011, for the first time in 40 years. Shellfishing is part of the Sound’s legacy, and safe, sustainable shellfishing should be part of its future.

Improvements like these and others are the work of dozens, if not scores, of committed people and institutions. Four of them were honored this month by the Clean Water/Jobs Coalition, which presented them with its annual Sound Guardian award.

The honorees were Commissioner Joseph Martens of the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and Commissioner Carter Strickland of the New York City Department of Environmental Protection, for a landmark agreement to use green infrastructure to keep polluted stormwater from reaching local waters.

U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand received the Sound Guardian award for her leadership in working to reauthorize the Long Island Sound Stewardship and Restoration Act in Washington D.C.

The final honoree was Skanska USA Civil Northeast, for its work building wastewater treatment plants that have led to significant improvements in the waters surrounding New York City.

The Clean Water/Jobs Coalition gives the Sound Guardian Awards to individuals and organizations who have made a difference in the protection, restoration and stewardship of the Sound. This year the Coalition gave the awards at a reception on April 19 at the Water Club in Manhattan.

The Coalition is a partnership of Audubon New York, the Construction Industry Council of Westchester & Hudson Valley, Inc., and the New York State Laborers. It was formed in 1991 to lobby and advocate for funding for public works projects that will help revive the Sound’s habitat, make the Sound safer for recreation and stimulate the local economy.

Although the towns in northern Westchester may seem far from Long Island Sound, large parts of Lewisboro, Pound Ridge, Bedford and North Castle are in the Sound’s watershed, and the Mianus, Mill, Byram and Silvermine rivers all flow through northern Westchester into the Sound.

from Top Left: Herondale Farm in Amenia, Energize NY home energy efficiency program, carpools, sustainability committee

Here are some high impact actions Northern Westchester residents can do to honor Earth Day and to reduce our communities carbon impacts!

ADOPT A NEW HABIT: take the train, find out your bus schedule, set up a carpool. Public transportation is not so easy in many of our towns, but with a little research you’ll find buses, trains and can set up carpools. Try these resources: Metropool (for commuters), 511 NY (for rideshares) and Avego (for rideshares)*. For public transportation: Bee-Line bus routes,  and the Ridgefield to Katonah HART shuttle and MetroNorth rail.

GET YOUR HOME ENERGIZED: Because most of our area is not heavy on industry, more than 50 percent of local emissions come from heating and cooling our homes. If one in three Northern Westchester homeowners pursue energy-saving upgrades we have the potential to save residents $52 million annually, and significantly reduce our carbon emissions. Together we can dramatically and quickly reduce our energy consumption. Most of our homes are wasting energy and money due to leaks, cracks and insufficient insulation. We encourage all of you to sign up with Energize New York right now to get a free assessment and guide you through the home improvement process. To sign up for this great program go to www.EnergizeNY.org or call the team in Mt. Kisco at (914) 244-7210. By the way, this program has my seal of approval.

JOIN YOUR TOWN’s Sustainability or Energy Advisory commmittee: Your contribution of time and thought can create real change. Since I joined the Lewisboro Sustainability Committee I not only get to learn how to make eco projects come to fruition, I get to work with great people, and have a sense of hope that we can do something about the dire environmental situation we are facing globally. Check your town’s government website to find out how to join. Here are a few links: Croton-on-Hudson, Lewisboro, Bedford, New Castle, Ossining, Somers.

SWITCH FROM FACTORY FARMED MEAT and eggs to local, organic, free-range and cage-free, and reduce the amount of meat you consume. Not only are feedlot raised beef cattle fed pesticide-laden feed and antibiotics which contribute to the proliferation of antibiotic-resistant diseases, the production of mass market beef relies heavily on fertilizers [which are in themselves a tremendous cause of climate change, air pollution, and water pollution] ,and are a huge contributor to the killing of life in downstream water bodies by stimulating the growth of algae. (See this photo and more info by J Henry Fair) Also, the fecal waste from factory farms is a tremendous toxic waste problem: one of the largest toxic spills in US history was the breaking of a hog waste lagoon during a Hurricane in NC which killed everything in the Neue River in 1995.  Much of the meat sold by the fast food chains is grown by ranchers in Brazil who are deforesting the Amazon to raise their cattle. [J Henry Fair, Industrial Scars]

By purchasing only locally raised (within 200 miles) you’ll reduce the impact from transporting the meats as well. When you switch over to local and grass-fed, you can get to know where your meat is coming from, how it is raised, what it is fed, and get an education on the food chain. You’ll be consuming meat that has a much lower carbon impact. Where to find? Try our local farmer’s markets, find local farms. Some resources: Slow Food Metro North, Katonah Green’s Green Guide, or go to Patch.com, navigate to your town, and search for local farmer’s markets.

Together we can make a difference!

* there is not yet an Avego community in our area, but we should use this tool and build one! Create a profile, download the app, and start posting where you are driving or if you need a ride. I’ll be participating over the coming month to get this rolling!

This week we had some great discussion around a video I posted from TEDTalks to my Facebook wall–Peter Diamandis’ Abundance is Our Future. I’m a fan of ‘abundance thinking‘  and of the potential of technology and the incredible possibilities of our combined efforts to solve a problem. In his presentation Diamondis says, “I’m not saying that we don’t have our share of problems – climate change, species extinction, resource shortage – but ultimately we have the ability to see problems way in advance and knock them down.”

My post spawned some insightful comments that I wanted to share from Tony Mannetta, a local foods activist. Tony is an agricultural consultant living in Dutchess County. He has been working to preserve farming in the New York region since 1980. He has served as Director of Greenmarket farmers market, local agriculture liaison for Baldor Foods and consultant to Pespsico’s Local Food Sustainability initiative.

In response to the “Abundance is Our Future” Tony commented:

“A Revival meeting for Tech Fix. I think he’s correct in some ways, but a few ideas very wrong. First off, he has the brain/danger concept wrong. We don’t handle long term crises well at all. Second, he, like many, simply dismisses human politics and change. Yeah, we got climate change to deal with, species extinction, but check out the Singularity! Finally, agriculture? Hello?! Guess our robot successors will figure all that out.”

For contrast I suggested he watch the countering climate change TED Talk from Paul Gilding called The Earth is Full.

“The world is full. It is full of us. It is full of our stuff, full of our waste, and full of our demands,” Gilding said. “We have created too much stuff. This is not a philosophical statement, this is just science. Our approach is simply unsustainable.”  Mr. Gilding is the former director of Greenpeace International. “Thanks to those pesky laws of physics, it will stop. The system will break.”

Tony commented: “Amen! The crux is to get people to see this as a crisis NOW without immobilization or dismissal. Fear can do both. He discusses this, and we all know the quite powerful forces that are at work to make sure people stay lulled until it’s too late. I am hopeful, but not convinced we’re going to make it through this bottleneck as a civilization (though I agree, it’s time we became civilized). As I always tell doomsayers, the future is not yet written, today is a day to act.”

Tony continues: “One story and I’m off:

In the early 1980s, I attended an annual dinner for NYC farmers markets. The audience was composed of local farmers and city officials, the dinner speaker a Chinese economist/agronomist. After regaling us with some pretty interesting stories of the failures of command agriculture and the rise of agricultural entrepreneurs (China wanted to create 10,000 farmers markets in five years), someone asked what we as Americans could do to help the Chinese in their mission to change their economy. I will never forget his response: “Change what you dream.” Puzzled faces across the room.

“We in China look to the American dream as the success story, everyone wants to have what you have. But there isn’t enough in the world to make that dream come true for China. So I ask you, I implore you: Change what you dream.”

Tony added some details about Chinese agriculture at the time stating that: “The command economy meant the government figured out how much consumers would demand, and farmers were charged with producing x amount of products for the region/nation, the only system more inefficient than an open market. He joked that over-production of Chinese cabbage would mean apartment building hallways would be lined with walls of cabbage at times. Obviously 30 years later, that story stuck with me.”

Thank you, Tony, for sharing your thoughts and insights and this great story.

~Heather

____________________

Tony can be reached at winesap@mindspring.com.