September Waste Prevention Action Team Updates

[John Deuel]

Hello Waste Preventers! 

Our Waste Prevention Action Team (WPAT) met last Wednesday. Here is the link to all the notes from that meeting, including previous meetings. Here are the takeaways: 

• Dawn Marie Gaid will be stepping down from the Co-Team Leader role, but staying with the WPAT and supporting the effort. 
• John Deuel will be joining Jeanette Hardison as Co-Team Leader. John, Jeanette, and Dawn Marie will be meeting to facilitate the transition. 
• WPAT has $800 in Coalition set-aside funds left for this calendar year. There is funding left for restricted use on the ReUse Directory, Block Captain, Benton To Go, and No Food Left Behind projects. 
• John Deuel proposed a review of the Team's goals and projects in light of recent significant policies and trends happening, such as Oregon's Recycling Modernization Act. John is forming a small subcommittee to develop recommendations for the Team. 
• Recycling Block Captain Program: Kaylee Smith and Andrea Heidenger have been contacting Block Captains to assess participation in the program's future and are planning an important meeting in late October for all interested parties. 
• Preventing Food Waste: Tabling has continued at local Farm Markets. More funding has been raised to support this program. Youth outreach in schools will begin soon. 

To all those interested in Waste Prevention, please let me know if you are interested in getting involved more. We will regularly list specific volunteer opportunities. Change is happening in the ways we think, use and recycle/dispose of things. The paradigm is shifting toward thinking "upstream" for prevention. Please help make this shift accelerate!

John Deuel

757-284-7041

Steering Committee, Treasurer, Waste Prevention Action Team Co-Leader, Corvallis Sustainability Coalition

Board Member, Corvallis Environmental Center

Member, Regional Sustainable Materials Management Plan (SMMP) Task Force

Our home in Philomath, Oregon is located within the traditional homelands of the Mary's River or Ampinefu Band of Kalapuya.  Following the Willamette Valley Treaty of 1855 (Kalapuya etc. Treaty), Kalapuya people were forcibly removed to reservations in Western Oregon. Today, living descendants of these people are a part of the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde Community of Oregon and the Confederated Tribes of the Siletz Indians.