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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes - MGG - 09-09-2010ORIGINAL Milton _—_—� MILTON GROWS GREEN COMMITTEE SEPTEMBER 9, 2010 MINUTES [APPROVED] Z=30>Date: September 9, 2010, 6:00 pm - 7:50 pm Place: Fire Station #43, 750 Hickory Flat Road, Milton, GA 30004 Attendees: Amy Peters, Gordon Hunter, Jon McPhail, Jack Lindon, Francia Lindon, Kathy Johnson and Bruce Langston. Agenda: The Agenda was distributed and was posted on the City's web site prior to the meeting. I. Approval of Minutes: No minutes were approved. II. Updates and Announcements: Rivers Alive - Francia got in touch with Wilson Borden. He doesn't have enough time to act as coordinator for this event. She had also made plans to get together with Carter Lucas to identify appropriate streams and has asked that his crew keep a lookout for problem pollution or litter next to waterways. Adopt A Stream (AAS) - Francia and Jack attended the training session given by the City of Alpharetta August 27 h. The principal instructor was Sharon Smith, Environ. Ed. Coordinator, Fulton County Dept. of Public Works. Other participants were Lauren Ackin (Roswell), Terry Porter (Alpharetta) and Mike Hall whose lab does the analysis of water samples. The class covered very basic water chemistry addressing water quality issues, bacterial and chemical content. Bacterial monitoring is the most recent addition. Non -point source pollution is the most pervasive and most difficult to identify. Most of this contamination comes from storm water runoff. The AAS's goal is to test the same stream in the same place each month to build up a statistical profile of its health. There is an on-line database the findings are submitted to. Kits for monitoring can be borrowed from Fulton City or purchased (cost-$200). Reagents are replaced for free by the state. The training session then moved to a near -by stream as a practical hands-on laboratory. There are 70,000 miles of waterways in GA so AAS is viewed as a prime beneficial example of a government/ citizen partnership. III. On -Going Business: Milton Roundup - Amy volunteered to man the MGG booth for that day. Jon will collect booth materials and help her. Jack will provide a list of the materials he has from past MGG booths/events. We will need to submit an application as a vendor so we need to pay attention to the approaching deadline. (Must remember to bring chairs.) MGG Foundation - Forming a 501(c)(3) nonprofit was discussed. Jon explained his ideas for its structure and the research he'd done looking at IRS publications and requirements, what we would need to do legally to make it happen. We would have to form a corporation meeting certain IRS guidelines for charitable organizations. Meeting these guidelines is necessary for GA to give any corporation tax-exempt status. Jon gave us a list of the publications to review. He also repeated the need to develop MGG by-laws. Hazardous Waste - Jack was going to try to set up a meeting with Vic Knight of Waste Management to discuss what is involved in setting up a collection. He was hoping that the Haz Milton Grows Green Committee Meeting Minutes, September 9, 2010 [APPROVED] ALL MILTON GROWS GREEN DOCUMENTS ARE PRINTED ON RECYCLED PAPER WITH AT LEAST 35% POST - CONSUMER CONTENT. Mat expert WM uses would also attend. From all initial research, it is expensive but there might be ways of mitigating the costs. He will submit a budget proposal to the City to sponsor an event. Jon asked to be notified of the WM meeting time and place so he can attend. Bring One for the Chipper - Marc Arrington wants to set up a second collection site at King's Ridge Christian School. Milton H.S. is the first. He has had preliminary discussions with the KRCS principal. He made a small budget request to cover things like revising road signs, hot drinks for volunteers and producing PR materials such as flyers and hangtags for trees at the point of sales. Scottsdale Farms has also expressed an interest in being one of the drop-off sites. Keep America Beautiful/Keep Milton Beautiful - Jon got back a reply from Lynn Cobb, Dept. of Community Affairs and our approach, MGG being the designated KAB representative with a City staff person handling any funding issues, was acceptable. Schools Environmental Education - Kathy discussed having a class about the BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill. She was hoping someone from one of the schools' PTAs would volunteer to help with the environmental education program next year. There was some discussion about setting up outdoor classrooms but there wasn't enough funding. Green Communities Initiative - Michele is moving forward on this. She briefed City Council on the ARC program. Joe Langoria was the only councilperson to ask any questions. He was concerned about any related unintended costs to the City. The procurement guide, for example, could list environmental preferences as long as they are written with a "fudge factor" that allowed the lowest bidder to meet the requirements. MGG Web Pages - Jon and Francia got together and developed an organizational chart for the flow of MGG web pages on the City's web site. They met with Jason August 19t' and gave him this along with a number of content and art files for posting. The initial material developed included an MGG landing page, volunteer opportunities list and Adopt -A -Road information and forms. There still are many holes in content. Communications - There was a brief discussion on the desire to develop and distribute a newsletter. Also discussed was the serious need to set up a functioning database of volunteers and people interested in what MGG is doing. There was some discussion of available software designed for this application, the related costs, who would buy/own the software and who would have access to the database. Despite repeated tries we were unable to get any of the work that was done on the database from the volunteer who had previously worked on it. The meeting adjourned at 7:50 pm. 4 / 0 Jon B. McPhail, Co -Chair ATTEST: Francia Lindon, Secretary Milton Grows Green Committee Meeting Minutes, September 9, 2010 [APPROVED]