Members e-news

["Kathleen M. Brosemer" <kathie@cleannorth.org>]

Members e-news for February

Contents

1.  The great fabric and paint extravaganza - this weekend!
2.  Carpet days - please help
3.  Envirothon Feb 26

4.  Northwatch meeting
5.  April's events - rainbarrels, BOYD, Envirothon
6.  Newsletter call

7.  Transportation issues group
8.  Barricades party
9.  A&P tapes - deadline March 20

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1.  It's this weekend!  Feb 8th, from 10 am to 4 pm, the great Fabric,
Yarn, Notions, and paint sale, in the back room at the Clean North office,
which (not coincidentally) is the home of The Second Coat paint reuse
centre.  Bring your unwanted latex paint, and all those sewing and
knitting treasures you loved, bought, stashed, and never got around to. 
Drop offs accepted weekday afternoons.  Then come on Saturday to shop! 
Bargains galore, lots of really great stuff is here already.

Andrea and Steve could use a hand or two to help out, if you want to come
and be sociable on Saturday for an hour or two, call Andrea at 779-2015 or
Steve at 945-1573.

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2.  Carpet days are here again...

We have a big job ahead of us.  Moving all the stuff in the Clean North
office to one end of the room, tearing out carpet, laying down new stuff,
moving all the stuff back again, repeat as needed.  It's all happening the
weekend of Feb 22 & 23 (with some preparation in the weekday evenings
preceding that).  Can you help?  Debbie will be calling...

Please don't feel obligated if you have health issues that won't allow you
to do lifting/carrying.  But if you can help, we'll be setting up a
schedule for 3-hour shifts, and we'll need about five or six people per
shift, for the better part of two days.

We'll also need specialty help in three areas:

Carpet-laying skills
Furniture-moving skills
Food for volunteers

If you have any of these skills to offer, please mention it to Debbie when
she calls.  We'll be looking to distribute these skills evenly over all
shifts if we can.

We'll need a few volunteers to prepare some food for the carpet/moving
crews, too.  We can buy doughnuts, snacks, and pop, and set up for
coffee/tea, but many of us will be working more than one shift and
bringing food in will be more practical than going out/home to eat.  So
we'd like to plan for a hot dish or two for lunch and dinner on Saturday
and Sunday.  It needs to be tomato free.  Something like a chicken stew or
pea soup would be ideal.  We'll have electricity to plug in a crock pot or
other electrical device, so that's an option.  Can you help?  Please email
kathie@cleannorth.org if you can.  Thanks!

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3.  Envirothon

We're planning an activity for high school students, on the theme "Urban
Sprawl and Agricultural Land Preservation."  If you have ideas on this
and/or want to help put something together, email Peter at
petmcla@soonet.ca and he'll let you know when we're getting together.  It
will be soon - the Activity Day is Feb 26th.

*************************************

4.  Northwatch meeting

The Northwatch winter meeting will be in Sudbury on the weekend of
February 22/23.  Just thought you'd like to know.  It is, after all, one
of only a few very good reasons you don't have to help with the carpeting!
 Details, email northwatch@onlink.net.

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5.  April's events - rainbarrels, BOYD, Envirothon

Still working out details, but here's the plan so far:

April 25/26 (Fri/Sat) we do the Envirothon at Camp Wakonda
April 27th  is the day for the Rainbarrel party and barbecue at Peter's
house.
May 3 will be the next Bring Out Your Dead computer recycling event,
providing we can get our location, recycler, and transport all lined up.

Mark your calendars!

***********************************

6.  Newsletter call

The next paper newsletter has a deadline of March 1st.  This is your
formal request to participate!  Please send in an article - about your
environmental observations on your last holiday, something you've learned
recently about an environmental issue, your favourite chemical-free garden
tricks, anything!  It's your newsletter!  So far we have the book review
section, an article about car co-ops, and more bad limericks by yours
truly.  Surely you can add to this!  Email ed@cleannorth.org with your
promises, then your stuff.

**********************************

7.  Transportation issues e-group

We have a lot of transportation issues happening.

*  Car co-ops - Terry is really keen to find out if it would be feasible
here.
*  Engine idling - Marc wants us to launch a campaign to reduce this
phenomenon.
*  Bikes - Andre is trying very hard to keep the bike workshop open for
another season.
*  Vehicle Emissions - we'll be doing another summer voluntary clinic with
Environment Canada.  Jack is lead.
*  Bus - Peter is keen to work towards improving city transit service,
perhaps by rationalizing service with high school bus transport.

So there's much happening, and perhaps we could do some joint projects.  I
had an idea about a local-transportation documentary on Cable, for
example, and perhaps getting a small grant towards production costs.  It
could link these issues.  Then, too, there's that Envirothon theme of
Urban Sprawl.

How about we start a Transport email list, and if you're interested, go
sign yourself up for it.  I'll ask Dan to start it.

*************************************

8.  Barricades party

I'm not too sure about what's happening here, but here's what I do know:

Murray and the Tree Chipping committee have agreed that our owning a few
barricades of our own would help us in getting the site set up. They would
also be useful for other projects.

Murray has figured out how to build them.

Lyn Hollingsworth at Soo Mill has made us a nice gift certificate, for
enough wood to build maybe ten or twelve of them.

There's a vague plan for when the snow melts, to get a party together to
build and paint these barricades.  Someone (I can't remember who) is
getting a stencil made to paint our logo on them.

So, if you want to be on the barricade sawing-and-nailing-and-painting
list, email kathie@cleannorth.org and I'll make sure you don't miss out on
the fun!  We promise not to do this in black fly country!

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9.  A&P tapes - deadline March 20

Last but not least, I have the date until which we can collect tapes. 
Please drop yours off at the office whenever you can.  If the door is
locked, you can stuff them (in an envelope, eh?) through the mail slot
which is about shin-high (look down, look waaaaay down!).

************************************

Thanks so much for reading this far.  Stay warm!  And don't forget to
watch www.cleannorth.org for the latest e-news, alerts, and places you can
be a useful environmental citizen.

Kathie


--

I awake each morning torn between a desire to save the world, and a desire
to savour the world.  This makes it hard to plan my day.
                           -  E.B. White